Blu-ray Movie Reviews

If you want the heaviest artillery, try Nine Inch Nails Live: Beside You in Time (Interscope), based on the 2006 tour’s appearances in Oklahoma City and El Paso. Trent Reznor is a master performer, acting out states of emotional desperation with his own combination of raw immediacy and confessional intimacy. He and other band members are often seen in half-lit silhouette, which tends to limit resolution. Projection graphics are used in only two tracks. Surround mixer Elliot Scheiner uses the soundfield simply but effectively, with drums centered in the front but resonating in all channels, the lead guitarist suspended between front right and surround right, and keyboard parts occasionally prominent in the rear. The overall volume is on the high side—at the reference level, this disc would be deafening. It takes only partial advantage of the band’s deluxe dynamic contrasts, and that’s a common affliction in hard rock, whether in high-rez surround or on stereo CD.

DTS-HD Quietly Makes Its Debut
To my surprise, three of the discs on my to-do list had DTS-HD Master Audio soundtracks. The best-case scenario for production values and technology is Pat Metheny: The Way Up (Eagle Vision), a live recording of a long conceptual piece of music taped in Seoul in 2005. Here’s an excellent chance to hear pristine source material with a well-deployed surround mix in a lossless format—it sparkles. Visuals are in tight focus, the lighting is excellent, and the camera moves with the ever-shifting perspective of the music, giving due attention to the intense concentration of each band member. Metheny fans will be rewarded by intense closeups on his hands coupled with a limpid Gibson hollow-body guitar sound. In some shots, you can clearly see the shadow of the strings on the guitar body.

Queen’s Rock Montreal & Live Aid (Eagle Vision) combines the 1984 feature film We Will Rock You, shot on 35mm in 1981, with the band’s memorable 20-minute appearance at the 1985 Live Aid concert. The mix is pure quad—once in a while a guitar lick or vocal finds its way to the rear for just a second—and the visuals are largely stagebound. But any stage with Freddie Mercury on it is riveting. Live, these guys were a monster, thanks also to Brian May’s deluxe, ultra-phat guitar sound. It’s indispensable for fans and anyone into classic rock.

Chronos (R&B Films) is one of those time-lapse art films whizzing through works of nature and man. The synthesized soundtrack isn’t the best demo material for lossless surround—but the Blu-ray images of these 45 minutes of IMAX loveliness don’t disappoint.

DTS-HD Master Audio is also featured in Hairspray, the movie musical based on the original John Waters film, and Nature’s Journey, a blend of nature footage, animation, and music by Michael Stearns.

PCM: An Interim Solution
Blu-ray’s less-than-cutting-edge use of its bigger bit bucket has led to a lot of releases in high-rez PCM, both movie and non.

John Legend: Live at the House of Blues (Columbia Music Video) is visually one of the strongest items reviewed here. From the beads of sweat on the R&B crooner’s forehead, as he sheds his jacket and tenaciously works the adoring audience, you can really see the benefits of a high-def shoot. An aggressive use of the moving camera maintains visual interest but can be queasy-making. Special appearances by Kanye West and Snoop Dogg enliven an already smokin’ show.

Bruce Springsteen with the Sessions Band: Live in Dublin (Columbia Music Video) captures a 17-piece band on a crowded stage in an explosion of joy. It’s the final working-out of Springsteen’s energetic CD tribute to Pete Seeger, We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions. Photographed in stage lighting that is both low and sepia-tinted, the resulting image has rich golden color saturation but not much definition. Even so, the surround mix is superb, combining the well-controlled lucidity of a studio recording with the energy of a live set.

Elton 60: Live at Madison Square Garden (Mercury/Rocket) has got it all: familiar tunes, sharp picture, good sound (for this venue), and designer eyewear. Sir Elton John has lost his falsetto even as he’s gained his knighthood. With his voice lower, he has to phrase the old songs differently, but the audience is in his corner and singing along. The surround mix follows the now-common strategy of letting just a little of the lead vocal into the center but more at the sides.

With all that empty space in the regulation Blu-ray box, why not throw in a CD? That’s what Alive at Red Rocks (Epic) does, so you can rip three studio tracks and two live ones for your portable player. The music is fascinating, thanks to irregular meters, swooping melodic leaps, the substitution of a turntablist for the usual keyboards, and at one point, a three-way percussion interlude. Red Rocks is an amphitheater, so in lieu of a concert hall’s reflective bounce, the mixer has to make do with the slight delay between directly miked and FOH sound. Again, the dynamics could be wider and the picture sharper, but these guys play a compelling show.

AC/DC: Live in Donington (Columbia Music Video) dates from 1991. Shot on 35mm film with 26 cameras, it’s visually dominated by lead singer Brian Johnson—Bon Scott having been deceased 11 years by this time—and of course the antics of Angus Young. He treats us to a striptease, from school uniform down to Union Jack underwear, and, um, beyond. Other visual effects range from the obvious (a stage-width female inflatable doll) to the subtle (the sun slowly going down on the outdoor venue). The guitars of the Young brothers are suspended on either side between front and rear channels, and the guitar sound is pretty sweet, like a good studio recording. They offer joint commentary on the alternate track in their colorful Aussie accents. David Mallet directed—he also did the more recent Gilmour and Elton titles.

Chris Botti: Live with Orchestra & Special Guests (Columbia Music Video) casts the pop trumpeter’s instrument in a straightforward quad mix with heavy reverb. Have you invested in a good center speaker? So sorry. The same treatment is given guest vocalists Sting, Jill Scott, Paula Cole, Burt Bacharach, Renee Olstead, and Gladys Knight. Color is intensely saturated, and if your display has good black level, you’re going to love the dramatic Technicolor-noir look of this production.

Tony Bennett: An American Classic (Columbia Music Video) is something special—a series of imaginatively staged production numbers with all-star guests, including Barbra Streisand, John Legend, k.d. lang, Diana Krall, Elton John, Stevie Wonder, Christina Aguilera, and others. The man can still sing, those geysers of PCM bits do wonders for the orchestra, and even non-fans might be seduced by this one.

Old-School Dolby and DTS
On some Blu-ray releases, high-rez surround is conspicuous in its absence. One of many possible examples is Club Date: Live in Memphis (Eagle Vision) with Elvis Costello and the Imposters—basically EC and the Attractions with a different bass player, the old one having written a tell-all book. What a shame this title hasn’t been released in high-rez audio. The DTS 5.1 soundtrack does well with the lead vocal, strongly anchoring it in the center channel—just as it should be. But the mix loses some of the character of the frequently swapped guitars. They all sound too hot and grainy. Good clubby bass sound, however. The stage lighting has Elvis intensely lit for the video shoot, so he’s in tight focus, but the other band members are lit only for the stage, and resolution drops off when the camera cuts to them. Emmylou Harris provides guest vocals.

Let’s assume that the selection of Blu-ray music videos will only improve over time. Will that make a difference for either high-rez music in general or Blu-ray in particular? History tells us that wars between some formats, or the natural aging of all formats, sooner or later relegate them to the past. But history also tells us that high-rez—or for people of a certain age, high-fidelity—audio has supported more than the musical golden age. Let’s hope that Blu-ray will be the last, and best, of the 5-inch optical discs, that it brings music lovers endless delight, and that the drowning man can finally lean back with a sigh, enjoy his cocktail, and tell everyone the water’s fine.