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Tracks Space Race Back From the Edge Tattooed Millionaire Inertia Faith Meltdown I Will Not Accept the Truth Laughing in the Hiding Bush Tears of the Dragon God's Not Coming Back Dreamstate The Prisoner |
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Recording info Recorded in Pamplona and Gerona, Spain on May 30th and 31st 1996 Produced by ? |
Lineup Bruce Dickinson - Vocals Alex Dickson - Guitars Chris Dale - Bass Alessandro Elena - Drums
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Filmed early in the summer of 1996, this video features the live performance from the same shows as the Skunkworks Live EP. The tape runs for about 50 minutes, and it captures most of Skunkworks' headlining set...but the songs that were dropped ("Strange Death in Paradise", "Headswitch", "Innerspace", and the second encore of Tom Jones' "Delilah" and Deep Purple's "Black Night") were ones that I would've especially liked to hear. At least "Innerspace" is available on the Skunkworks Live EP, and "Black Night" was already on Dive! Dive! Live!...
As expected (after hearing the Skunkworks Live EP), the sound quality of this recording is quite good, and most of the songs transfer quite well to a one-guitar live format. Bruce sounds fantastic through most of the concert (though he transposes lyrics here and there, and he sounds a bit odd on "Meltdown" and "I Will Not Accept the Truth"), and the two songs from Balls to Picasso sound great...much better than on Alive in Studio A, in my opinion. And "Inertia" sounds noticeably better than the studio version. There are even a few moments of tasteful improvisation before "Meltdown", "Tears of the Dragon", and "Dreamstate".
The visual presentation is a bit too "hip" for my liking...the picture is partially letterboxed, and everything has a blurry, low-framerate look to it, coupled with disorienting camera work reminiscent of "NYPD Blue". The video is still entirely watchable, but I prefer the low-key visual approach employed on Dive! Dive! Live! to this one.
So, the big question: is it worth $70? Well, that depends. First of all, the three songs from this video that appeared on the Skunkworks Live EP are the exact same versions...and the performance is already less than an hour long. The video also fails to deliver a number of my favorite songs from Skunkworks, like "Solar Confinement", "Inside the Machine", and "Strange Death in Paradise". On the other hand, the packaging is quite good: the video comes in a hard plastic case with cover art similar to the Live EP, and it includes a sheet with complete lyrics in English and Japanese, as well as further information in Japanese. And the performance is great overall (especially the band's rip-roaring version of "The Prisoner"!)...and it's the only non-bootleg Skunkworks video that's currently available.
All things considered, I feel good about my purchase. I wasn't able to catch Skunkworks during their abortive U.S. tour, and this video was the only way I was able to see them perform. And given the minimal sales of Skunkworks in the United States, I had no reason to believe that this video would ever be released domestically. So in the end, $70 doesn't seem that bad...I just wouldn't want to make a habit of paying that much for a video.
Reviewed by Jeremy Haines