Prince is a rather eclectic artist. He's changed his names more times than 'J.Lo' and 'Puffy' combined. He had the audacity to become a new ASCII character (!). True to form he is still known by that symbol. Well I'm not going to call him 'symbol boy' - it's still Prince to me. Look at the cover photo - it defies logical description.
Thru all the eccentricities there's something that have never left him - his talent and his belief in himself. Like a number of artists, he has rebelled against the RIAA studio system. He joins illustrious company like George Michael, Courtney Love and other artists who have embraced rather than demonised the mp3 format.
This 'Rave Un2 the Year 2000' concert is a natural for Prince. His trademark song '1999' would have him perform at Paisley Park Studios in hometown Minneapolis on December 31st, 1999. It would symbolise a change in philosophy and like many artists, it would mark the last time he would perform certain songs in his repertoire in a live medium.
Performing with him are a roll call of those afflicted with the 'funk' - Lenny Kravitz, George Clinton, Larry Graham, Maceo Parker, Rosie Gaines, Morris Day and of course, the New Power Generation. I expected a standard live revue of his past hits - this isn't like that sonny; it's more like Prince gets funky and freeform with his pals. The lack of his past hits like 'Little Red Corvette' and 'When Doves Cry' may grate against fans who expect a revival but reliving the past on the eve of the millenium is not what he wanted to do. In hindsight it looks like he's enjoying himself more doing this loose and freeflowing material.
Prince is known for his iron grip on his material, his art - and in this case it pays dividends. This is a tightly choreographed, beautifully produced and edited concert. It is also expertly shot with innovative use of shutter speed and panning. The dazzling stage design and huge variety of performers and performance styles means that the 132 minutes seems to fly by.
Prince has his own label, Paisley Park, which was produced in conjunction with Warner Brothers. I had expected a barebones Warnervision disc but I was quite surprised with just what sort of disk this is. In a word it is funkdelicious.
Prince has dissociated with Warners on rather acrimonious terms and joined up with newcomer Eagle Rock Entertainment UK to produce a truly stunning disc.
The menus are reminiscent of the Austin Powers series, all swirly lettering and psychedelic and labels that barely make sense (ie. 'Main Dish', 'Choice Joint' - that's main menu and chapter stops to you).
The video is a UK native PAL 4:3 with a high bitrate. It is of very high quality, good black levels, excellent nay superb colour/contrast levels. It is an exceptionally colourful production and you can see rich colours in the costumes and the wild array of instruments. Movement is very fluid and the use of strobe lighting poses no threat to the skilled compressionist here. There's no issue with PAL 4% speedup because the tempo of all the numbers have changed from what you have on CD. It is an all region disc.
The interviews section is framed 1.85:1 non-anamorphic and reminiscent of a TV special with dull colours and a palette that switches from scene to scene. Audio is acceptable Dolby Stereo. It seems to focus on various artists that share Prince's revolutionary anti-studio thinking.
There are three audio tracks - a Dolby 2.0 which is nothing special at 192k/s. You've heard this all before perhaps even in mp3 format. I did not stay long with this track and there's no reason to unless you like compressed music. There is also a Dolby 5.1 track at 448k/s which is of quite acceptable quality.
There is a dts 5.1 track at 768k/s which would be the choice for most people.
Strangely this disc lets your 'Audio' button work hence allowing you to do instantaneous Dolby vs dts testing. It is quite clear even in limited testing, that dts brings a more 'live' feeling than the Dolby 448k/s track. The space between your five speakers are more readily filled and instruments have more 'life' especially the brass sections. I also felt that the Dolby track tended to 'paint' the music with rather broad strokes; coarse and full of brashness if you will. The dts track shows much more delicacy and fine music detail which is evident whenever the music becomes more complex (ie. more background singers, more instruments). Rears are limited mostly to audience participation and make themselves known mostly in the pans. Bass is limited in the LFE channel. The live instruments do not express much bass.
There are four bonus tracks by his fellow artists presented in Dolby 2.0 but they seem to be rehearsal excerpts. There are 23 tracks in the main concert of which only a handful are his classics that he's probably sick of performing. I really wish there were more...
- Let's Go Crazy
- She's Always in my Hair
- U Got the Look
- Kiss
- Jungle Love (Morris Day & The Time)
- The Bird (Morris Day & The Time)
- American Woman (Lenny Kravitz)
- Fly Away (Lenny Kravitz)
- Get Off
- Medley (Rosie Gaines, Mike Scott, Maceo Parker)
- It's Alright
- Everyday People (Cynthia Robinson & Gerry Martini)
- Higher
- Purple Rain
- The Christ
- Blues Medley (Maceo Parker & Johnny Blackshire)
- Nothing Compares 2 U
- Take Me With U / Raspberry Beret
- Greatest Romance
- Baby Knows
- 1999 Intro
- Baby I'm A Star
- 1999
- End Credits
Prince feels strong about his anti-studio stance and you'll find production notes that telegraph his exact thoughts on the matter. Pity he writes like a h@X0r.
I have seen a number of music DVD's and this is one of the best of the lot, technically and artistically. If you're a fan you'll need this one. Badly. That's it.
