Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)To respond to the previous viewer, it isn't a coincidence that the band released a show from summer rather than 11/22, or any other date on the fall tour. Summer shows at outdoor amphitheaters usually involve extra video production to feed to those large screens usually beside the stage. You don't get that at Phish's indoor shows.
I won't attempt a song-by-song review since that's so, so subjective. Everyone has not only their favorite songs, but often their favorite arrangements of songs, or their favorite jam elements. Suffice to say that this is easily, very easily, the best performance so far that Phish has released in its entirety - the IT DVD is more of a retrospective than a live show, in my opinion. No disrespect to the folks that enjoy Brooklyn, Vegas, or Woodbury (google it if it's not ringing any bells), but this, at last, is something that captures the band on their game.
And capture the band it does. Because the video is taken from those projection screens, it features many, many close shots. That's the point of those screens - to bring the band members closer. You don't watch a video screen to see the stage show when you've got the actual stage in front of you :) Which is a roundabout way of saying that Kuroda fans may be disappointed. You can sort of get a sense for what was going on . . . but not really. You don't get any lightning shots, and you don't get those fantastic, sweeping crowd shots like those on the IT DVDs.
There's no mistaking the fact that this is a bare bones release. Right down to the bare-bones price. For what you'll pay for this, and what you'll get, it seems ridiculous to complain. And I'm not complaining. This is a 100% must-have release. Just don't expect it to be some grand production. It's a chance to view some very well-preserved stage presentation video, which is a treat in itself, but it obviously wasn't filmed with the intention of releasing it commercially.
My take? Just be glad they did.
Click Here to see more reviews about: Walnut Creek (2008)
Item Name: Walnut Creek; Studio:JEMP RECORDS
