Tools:
Recommend review to a friend »
Last September, Sting busied himself with preparing for an intimate concert in the backyard of his palatial home in Tuscany, Italy for about a hundred or so of his friends. The concert was to be a platform for his new live-performance CD entitled "...All This Time". The general idea for this concert was to re-work songs from his solo career as well as from his days as the frontman of The Police in a live concert setting. He gathered various musicians from around the world and placed them in a pressure-cooker situation of having only 2 weeks to rehearse and to refresh all the planned songs. (By refresh, I mean deconstructing and then reconstructing the songs in a manner that would give them an updated arrangement and sound.)
It was Sting´s idea to limit the rehearsal time in order to harness the creative juices that he hoped would flow freely in such a situation. Everything proceeded as planned. The songs were coming together, and rehearsals were going well, too. While all this was happening, workers were constructing the concert stage and finalizing lighting and sound set-ups. Even the dress rehearsal the night before the scheduled concert went without a hitch. The concert was planned as a joyous occasion, celebrating the music of one of pop´s greatest icons in front of friends, family, and fans. However, all the hard work put into the concert almost came to nothing when the day of the concert arrived. On that day the entire world came to a standstill. It was September 11th, 2001.
Most DVDs are structured in a way that they present a main feature that is followed by supporting extras such as a making-of featurette or interviews. Things are different with this DVD, where a behind-the-scenes documentary meshes seamlessly with the main concert event, offering viewers a continuous experience from start to finish and preserving the 2-week timeline that would certainly be remembered by everyone involved with the project. The documentary gives an insightful look into how the concert came together, and then the DVD takes you right into the actual concert. With this being the case, I will not treat the documentary as bonus material but as an integral part of the DVD experience. Viewers are given the option of watching both the documentary and the concert in one sitting, or they can opt to watch them separately. If you have the time to spare, I would recommend watching them both at once. The 70-minute documentary is divided into a generous 22 chapters, all accessible from a "Chapters List". You can also access each song performed during the concert individually from a "Set List" menu.
The documentary starts off with the arrival and introduction of the musicians. Viewers are then brought through the process of how the songs are rearranged and rehearsed. The documentary not only manages to capture the camaraderie between members of the band and their creative moments but also the poignant journey that they all undertook throughout the two weeks that they were in Italy. You can feel the mood of everyone involved changing as they go through emotional highs and lows. In between the scenes are one-on-one interviews with Sting as he explains his thoughts about the songs, the band, and various aspects of the concert.
Towards the end of the documentary, the first inklings of a catastrophe finally appear. Watching the DVD, you will come to realize how the events of September 11th affected everyone, even those that are halfway around the world from where it happened. As if to highlight the traumatic realization of those events, the documentary dramatically ends with a fade to black image of Sting´s teary-eyed face contemplating the fate of a concert for which everyone had worked so hard. Of course, we all know by now that the concert eventually did take place, but that last moment of the documentary effectively captured the image of a man torn by his emotions, searching for the right response in the face of such tragedy.
The concert itself started off with an emotional rendition of "Fragile", highly appropriate, given the circumstances. After getting through that first song, things started to settle down and the musicians quickly got into their groove and the rest of the set was performed at the highest quality. Sting´s distinctive voice and vocal style garnered most of the attention onstage, but at the same time, he also lets the spotlight shine on various members of the band throughout the concert. The new arrangements of familiar hit songs are beautifully performed, injecting new life into them. The set list features a wide range of song styles, showcasing Sting´s extraordinary songwriting talent. Of note are the songs taken from The Police, featuring inspired new melodies and arrangements, extending their shelf life well beyond another decade. From the delicate, slowed-down version of "Don´t Stand So Close To Me" to the excellent new rendition of "Roxanne", every morsel of sweet melody emanating from the speakers never fail to give me goose bumps whenever I watch it. I have never been more moved by some of the performances I have seen on this DVD. Appropriately, the concert ends with quite possibly Sting´s biggest hit song, the Grammy-winning Police tune, "Every Breath You Take".
Of note is the fact that Sting did a highly commendable thing by not disclosing the fact about the unfortunate timing of the concert in the liner notes or even the back cover of the DVD. There is not a single mention of 9/11 until you actually watch the documentary. Even then, it was only during the last 7 minutes or so of the documentary that the events unfolded. Publicity is a two-edged sword, and fortunately, Sting chose to let the quality of the music speak for itself rather than take advantage of the situation and market the DVD in a way that might be deemed insensitive to some. After watching the tragedy on TV that fateful morning, Sting gathered all the members of the band and discussed whether they wanted to continue with the concert. All of them wanted to perform, but only if changes were made to the Set List. A few songs that were deemed inappropriate were pulled from the original roster of songs in order to honor the victims of the tragedy. Of great interest was the omission of "Desert Rose", which featured the famous Algerian singer Cheb Mami. Whether it was taken out due to the Arab-influenced sound of the song or due to the "raunch" factor (the performance was to feature a belly dancer) was never discussed or explored. Some things are appropriately better left unsaid. The energetic performance of "Desert Rose" can still be seen in the documentary since it was rehearsed the night before the concert.
Average user rating (1-5):
Not yet rated.
Not yet rated.
[release]10651[/release]