Oasis-Familiar to Millions (2000) |
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General | Extras | ||
Category | Music |
Main Menu Introduction Menu Animation & Audio Active Subtitle Track-Blue Tambourine Multiple Angles-Cigarettes And Alcohol Featurette-Go Let It Out Featurette-Supersonic Featurette-Rock 'n' Roll Star Featurette-Live Forever Featurette-The Soundcheck Featurette-The Show Featurette-They Think It's All Over... Featurette-The Chat Discography DVD-ROM Extras-Songplayer-Live Forever |
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Rating | |||
Year Of Production | 2000 | ||
Running Time | 94:52 | ||
RSDL / Flipper | RSDL (56:47) | Cast & Crew | |
Start Up | Menu | ||
Region Coding | 2,3,4,5,6 | Directed By | Dick Carruthers |
Studio
Distributor |
Sony Music |
Starring |
Liam Gallagher Noel Gallagher Gem Archer Andy Bell Alan White Zeb Jameson |
Case | Soft Brackley-Transp | ||
RPI | $29.95 | Music | Oasis |
Video | Audio | ||
Pan & Scan/Full Frame | None |
Audio Linear PCM 48/16 2.0 (1536Kb/s) Audio Dolby Digital 5.0 (448Kb/s) |
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Widescreen Aspect Ratio | 1.78:1 | ||
16x9 Enhancement |
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Video Format | 576i (PAL) | ||
Original Aspect Ratio | 1.78:1 | Miscellaneous | |
Jacket Pictures | No | ||
Subtitles | None | Smoking | No |
Annoying Product Placement | No | ||
Action In or After Credits | Yes, end titles over pans across audience and stage |
Following on the heels of the Beatles and Rolling Stones, Oasis is a British rock band featuring a few young men (including brothers Noel and Liam Gallagher) with funny accents, catchy songs, and an appeal that extends beyond their country of origin. Their first album Definitely Maybe was released in 1994 and sold over 4 million copies in the UK but success across the Atlantic puddle had to wait until the second album (What's The Story) Morning Glory? which peaked at #4 on the Billboard charts and had two #1 singles. The band also had at least 15 minutes of fame through the off-stage antics of the brothers, which involved sibling rivalry, feuds with other bands and drug use. The band then went a bit quiet and there were rumours of a break-up, but they resurfaced in 1997 with a third album Be Here Now. The boys then calmed down a bit, got married and started families and got off the drugs and alcohol. Oasis is still around today (albeit with some changes in the band line-up), a few years and a few albums later - the latest being Standing On The Shoulder (sic) of Giants. Oasis has obviously retained a core group of loyal fans - as evidenced not only from their fairly comprehensive official web site but from fan sites as well.
I reviewed this disc straight after Oasis ... There and Then (NTSC), and it's interesting to compare between the two discs, not only in terms of the band's performance and transfer quality, but also in terms of the sophistication of the DVD production.
Oasis ... There and Then was an early DVD disc with just one title - DVD5, NTSC full-frame formatting, laserdisc quality video with analogue video artefacts, a remixed surround audio track, static menus and no extras whatsoever. This disc, on the other hand, features an RSDL disc crammed with extras, PAL 1.78:1 with 16x9 enhancement, a true-blue Dolby Digital 5.1 audio track, and animated menus.
The extras are also very sophisticated for a music DVD and makes use of active subtitles (a la "Follow the White Rabbit" in The Matrix), multiple viewing angles and DVD-ROM content. I must say I'm impressed - this is the most feature-packed music DVD I've yet seen.
However, despite the 16x9 enhancement, 5.1 audio and innovative extras, I ended up preferring the band's performance on the earlier DVD rather than in this concert. Despite all its faults, the music on the earlier DVD sounded more exciting and alive - five years later Oasis seems to have lost some of the exuberance and sheer energy of their heyday. As an example, I compared Acquiesce and Champagne Supernova (two of my favourite Oasis songs) on both discs - in each instance the version on the earlier disc seems more alive and kicking compared to the more pedestrian interpretation on this disc.
For once, this music DVD fully deserves its M rating - the Gallagher brothers seem to be inordinately fond of issuing four letter expletives in between songs. For those of you dying to know where the infamous scene is featuring an enthusiastic female fan baring her bosom to the band (as well as to the rest of the audience via the big screen) - it occurs at 46:07-46:13 (although there is a much earlier glimpse - but only if you have sharp eyes - at 30:40).
1. F***in' In The Bushes 2. Go Let It Out 3. Who Feels Love? 4. Supersonic 5. Shakermaker 6. Acquiesce 7. Step Out 8. Gas Panic! 9. Roll With It | 10. Stand By Me 11. Wonderwall 12. Cigarettes & Alcohol 13. Don't Look Back In Anger 14. Live Forever 15. Hey Hey, My My 16. Champagne Supernova 17. Rock 'n' Roll Star |
The transfer is rather problematic as it is riddled with MPEG artefacts including rather pronounced instances of Gibb effects, pixelization and occasional posterization. I suspect that it suffers from over-compression due to the DVD authors trying to fit both a Linear PCM track and a full 5.1 Dolby Digital track onto a 95-minute title together with a whole bunch of extras.
The transfer is also below reference quality in terms of sharpness and detail.
Colour saturation seems okay, but somehow I was dissatisfied with the colour reproduction - maybe it's because of a combination of various artefacts including slight colour bleeding and posterization.
This is a single sided dual layered (RSDL) disc. The layer change occurs at 56:47 and is about average in terms of disruption - it is definitely noticeable but at least occurs in a reasonably quiet part of the concert in between songs.
Sharpness | |
Shadow Detail | |
Colour | |
Grain/Pixelization | |
Film-To-Video Artefacts | |
Film Artefacts | |
Overall |
The Dolby Digital track is mastered at a relatively high level and features rather aggressive use of all five speakers (with audience noises in particular split across the rear surrounds), but does not contain an LFE (subwoofer) channel. Despite that, however, the music features plenty of bass directed at all speakers.
The best way of describing the overall sound of the Dolby Digital track is thus: Do you own or have you ever owned an AV amplifier/receiver that features a fake surround mode called "Stadium" or "Super Stadium"? Have you ever engaged that effect either intentionally as an experiment or by accident? And did you turn if off pretty soon afterwards because the end result is so over-the-top? Well, that's exactly how this audio track sounds...except you can't turn it off.
The Linear PCM audio track is mastered at a much lower level and sounds pretty underwhelming compared to the Dolby Digital 5.1 track. It is definitely below CD quality - more like FM radio I would say. Unfortunately, it is also the default audio track. Honestly, if this is the best they can do I'd rather they skip this format and use the valuable bandwidth for a DTS track or for improving the quality of the video transfer instead.
Although I can't detect any audio synchronization issues, the Gallagher brother's accent is pretty much indecipherable by me so I have no idea what they are singing about nor am I able to appreciate most of the stage banter (apart from the four letter words which came through loud and clear thank you very much).
Dialogue | |
Audio Sync | |
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts | |
Surround Channel Use | |
Subwoofer | |
Overall |
This feature has two audio tracks (Linear PCM and Dolby Digital 2.0) but the Dolby Digital 2.0 track is silent.
NOTE: To view non-R4 releases, your equipment needs to be multi-zone compatible and usually also NTSC compatible.
Video | |
Audio | |
Extras | |
Plot | |
Overall |
Review Equipment | |
DVD | Pioneer DV-626D, using Component output |
Display | Sony VPL-VW10HT LCD Projector, ScreenTechnics 16x9 matte white screen (203cm). Calibrated with Video Essentials. This display device is 16x9 capable. |
Audio Decoder | Built in to amplifier/receiver. Calibrated with Video Essentials. |
Amplification | Denon AVR-3300 |
Speakers | Front left/right: B&W DM603; centre: B&W CC6S2, rear left/right: B&W DM601 |