Hagar, Sammy & the Waboritas-Cabo Wabo Birthday Bash Tour (2001)

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General		Extras
Category	Music	Main Menu Introduction Main Menu Audio & Animation Interviews-Cast-Over an hour with the thoughts of Chairman Sammy Featurette-Scenes From the Cabo and the Wabo cantina
Rating
Year Of Production	2001
Running Time	131:35
RSDL / Flipper	RSDL (66:55) Dual Disc Set	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	2,4	Directed By	Jeb Brien
Studio Distributor	Warner Vision	Starring	Sammy Hagar Mona Jesse Harms Vic Johnson David Lauser
Case	Brackley-Trans-Lipped-Dual
RPI	$39.95	Music	Sammy Hagar Eddie Van Halen

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	Full Frame	English Dolby Digital 5.1 (448Kb/s) English Dolby Digital 2.0 (224Kb/s) English dts 5.1 (1536Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	None
16x9 Enhancement	No
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	1.33:1	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	French German Italian Spanish	Smoking	Yes
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	Yes

    OK,  load up the ute with your best mates, pack off the ball and chain to an all-weekend lingerie party, and head off down to the beach-house with plenty of tequila and a copy of Sammy "The Red Rocker" live. Oh yeah and don't forget to pick up a few scantily clad, busty babes on the way, who don't mind plying you with margaritas while you party. If this is your idea of a great time (I wouldn't know - I've never been allowed to try it!) then this is the DVD for you. Long-time lead vocalist, axeman and songster with Van Halen, Sammy Hagar transfers his annual birthday bash from the Cabo Wabo cantina to The Chicago Theatre, Illinois for a 2 hour party with his band the Waboritas. I guess you could call this a laid-back, good-time rock show; as Sammy says "I don't want to get drunk after the show, I want to get drunk during the show!" 

    The set features over two hours of good-time rock 'n roll in the tradition of Van Halen and Guns 'n Roses. The twenty-two (!) tracks presented are a veritable encyclopaedia of rock music (is that oxymoronic enough for 'ya?). They range from the Van Halen classics (which Sammy co-penned with Eddie van Halen) Top of The World and Why Can't This Be Love to the tender ballad Eagles Fly/Lay Your Hand on Me. The pounding bass of Mas Tequila features well-recognised riffs from Gary Glitter's Rock 'n Roll (Part 1) whilst Let Sally Drive features the screaming, tonsil-scorching vocals more characteristic of Grunts 'n Poses. Finish What You Started is given a funky, irresistible, acoustic make-over with a cool guitar break from guitarist Vic Johnson.

    Over two hours in duration, the show features much of Sammy's banter and general stuffing around with the audience - if you're consuming margaritas at the rate knocked back during the show, you'll probably find this entertaining, if not you'd probably be better off skipping alternate tracks! Certainly the show was well received and Sammy's popularity could be judged by the rapidly increasing assortment of underwear finding its way from the audience (mostly female!) to bedeck the drum kit, assorted mike stands and of course the "Red Rocker" himself!

Video

    The initial impression given is that this is a very good video transfer and if it weren't for a few MPEG artefacts this would right up there with the better live music DVD transfers. Intermittent severe compression artefacts and lack of subtitling suggests, not surprisingly, that with a 133 minute video and three soundtracks, disc space was getting short. Given that there was a second disk included, it might have been better to format the package as a dual sided single disk set with a Dolby Digital soundtrack on one side and the DTS version on the other leaving more room for what could have been a first rate video transfer.

    Filmed in video, the transfer is presented in a full-frame aspect ratio of 1.33:1 and is not 16x9 enhanced.

    A smooth clean transfer, the video lacks some sharpness and shadow detail but has little low level noise.

    The colours were limited by the stage lighting and consequently the red-blue bi-coloration of an unimaginative light show. However, the colours were clean with no bleeding nor chroma noise of consequence

    Lack of sharpness in the transfer did mean that there was almost no discernible aliasing in the transfer. The main shortcoming of the video was in marked macro-blocking in some of the rapid action sequences, such as at 30:21, 30:40 and 66:10. This was usually associated with major loss of resolution and consequent graininess, such as at 29:57. There was also poor foreground detail in some of the crowd shots (e.g. 31:16).

    The subtitles were largely a waste of space with very little of the lyrics translated. Most of the effort in subtitling is reserved for Sammy's between-song banter.

    The RSDL layer change occurs at 66:55 between Tracks 11 and 12 and is not disruptive.

Video Ratings Summary

Sharpness
Shadow Detail
Colour
Grain/Pixelization
Film-To-Video Artefacts
Film Artefacts
Overall

Audio

    There was no skimping on the audio tracks with this DVD. The listener is presented with Dolby Digital 5.1, DTS 5.1 and surround-encoded Dolby Digital 2.0 soundtracks. Each of these tracks is selectable on-the-fly from your player's remote without recourse to the menu. This makes for interesting assessment of the DD vs DTS quality. All three tracks were of good quality. Track 14, Finish What You Started offers a superb opportunity to put your sound system on trial as it offers a mix of acoustic, vocal and isolated instrumental sections each having a different emphasis in each compression modality. All three tracks were listened to. The two 5.1 tracks were very, very similar but if anything I'd give the Dolby Digital track the edge on DTS for clarity and atmosphere. Once again I was impressed with the 2.0 track: its clarity, resolution and depth, although lacking some of the surround ambience and subwoofer support of the two 5.1 tracks, made it my preferred listening choice.

    The lyrics and between-track banter was clearly audible and there were no problems with audio sync.

    The surround channels were well-utilised with crowd noise and reverberation from the back of the auditorium achieving a realistic concert hall ambience. They were also specifically employed in Serious Juju to convey a mystical, embracing guitar surround effect and in Finish What Ya Started to position the listener, drummer-like, surrounded by kit.

    The subwoofer was tastefully employed to convey the punch of the bass drum from on-stage to the listener's midriff.

Audio Ratings Summary

Dialogue
Audio Sync
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts
Surround Channel Use
Subwoofer
Overall

Menu

Sammy Hagar Interview

    65 minutes of post-show interview with Sammy, in pensive mood, covering the Red Rocker's philosophy of life as a rock star, the rebirth from Van Halen and a variety of topics ranging from Napster to tequila:

1. The Rebirth
2. The Coolest Guy in Class
3. Paradise
4. Critique
5. Van Hagar
6. Cabo Wobble
7. Waitress!
8. Humbled
9. Redheads
10. The Kids
11. Humbled
12. Lasting
13. Locks of Love
14. In the Ring

Scenes from the Cabo Wabo

    Home video style footage of the Cabo, the Wabo cantina and pre-show party (spot John Entwistle!). It runs for 11 minutes and is presented in non 16x9 enhanced 1:33:1 and recorded in Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo. Makes some sense of the Cabo Wabo philosophy to those of us who don't know where Cabo is or what a Wabo does!

    The video falls short of reference quality for a live concert due to MPEG artefacts.

    The audio tracks are excellent and offer comparable Dolby Digital and DTS 5.1 surround sound or a sonically superior 2 channel track.

    A must-buy for rock fans or those who just want to party with Sammy.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall