Live In Geneva

[DazedOblivion]

The Live in Geneva DVD is getting some advertising from a radio station (99.9 KEZ) in Phoenix, Arizona. ;D Scott, are you responsible for this?!

www.kez999.com/cc-common/inconcert/thecorrs/

HERE you can sample some of the videos for the Live in Geneva DVD.

[DazedOblivion]

At one time there were SIX videos from LIG that one could watch at the link above - and now there is only ONE left: "Breathless."

[The One & Only Official *MIP*]

Awww... it's okay, you should already have the DVD & so be playing it all over & over... teehee...

[cynthia]

Yeah the dvd is really cool I liked it, but thanks to certain board members, they got me hooked to it...... Thx girls & guy *wink*

[Sabine]

Hihihi, me too, hihihi!!!

[cynthia]

Hahaha, Live in Geneva must be some sort of Drug, once you are hooked, there is no way off No quitting over-night

Thx for playing it over and over Sabine

[cw]

OK, maybe I'm just getting cranky or contrary in my old age but I have REALLY mixed views on Geneva .... and, as a concert I rate it a distant 4th out of four out of the concert DVD. Whilst one can have legit issues with the production of the film, my issues are with the show itself.

Don't get me wrong, there are some real plus points:

- the feel-good factor of Cazz's return
- Sharon's capacity as an entertainer highlighted
- the usual quota of comedy (intended or otherwise)

Some numbers DID come off. The drum duel on TFF; the trad numbers; the staging of Goodbye; a probable definitive concert arrangement of Radio .... and withut a doubt THE definitive concert version of WCID (take a bow, Anto).

My negatives are only two, but they are major ones.

The Corrs were ever so fortunate in having John Hughes as a manager and his instincts were so often right ones. Sadly, I feel he made a mistake with the BH tour ..... specifically with the so-called "enhanced sound". I'm not talking about the Jason Duffy replacing Cazz; they needed a replacement drummer and he gelled pretty well.

Rather the extra musician. I have nothing personal against Kieren Kiely, he is obviously a talented musician but I don't think the addition of the extra keyboards/squeezebox was a positive addition to the sound. Even just going on the evidence of the previous concert DVD's (and Unplugged), one would have to acknowledge that the sibs and the 2 amigos formed one extraordinarily tight musical ensemble. With the best will in the world, I could NOT describe the outfit in Geneva in that way.

On a couple of numbers, it DID click together and it rocked. I WILL acknowledge that their sound WAS enhanced and an extra layer added; HOWEVER that enhancement was essentially an additional layer of mud !!

The other issue was Andy. Don't get me wrong, she was very charming and immensely entertaining .... and on those scores, her's was a great performance. Sadly; I remain underwhelmed by her vocals in Geneva. Maybe I am being unduly harsh ... people DO have "off" ones .... and maybe I 'm judging against some great performances from her past but at least one of my negatives has remained "in play" since.

Firstly, I found her to be singing far more in her higher register where she has less vocal strength. This I saw followed through in Ten Feet High where she was singing quite a deal in that "little girl" voice .... which came to grate on me.

Second was her oversinging where she was often "forcing" it rather than generally singing "easier". This also came across in numbers where some have spoken of her dramatics/emotion. She has always had that and it's a plus but had she ever resorted to shrieking/shouting. Some may indeed class this as emotional eloquence however, I thought that on numbers like Goodbye and even Runaway ...she overcooked it.

I DO understand that my views may not be in accordance with the majority here .... I certainly don't lay claim to definitive wisdom but Geneva just didn't quite come off for me. Yes, there are some moments of magic; yes, there are some laughs but to my mind there were not those major pluses that went with the previous shows.

At RAH, their inexperience was obvious but there was an accompanying charm ... and the talent and passion was oh so evident. LR was just the concert that every band dreams of having .... but so few ever get to experience. LIL lacked perhaps the passion/atmosphere (maybe 1-2 off numbers) but by and large a slick polished show from when they were on the top of their game.

In Geneva, I'm not saying they "dialed one in" but it was one where either Andrea nor the outfit in general were on their top game.

[DazedOblivion]

CW, I think you have some valid criticism regarding Live in Geneva. Musically, it was a good performance, I thought, though having the extended band had its plusses and minuses. "Radio" sounded great with the new additional band members. And I agree that "What Can I Do" with Anto's fantastic guitar solo is their best version yet, though I do like the MTV Unplugged version with the orchestra as well. Maybe I don't find quite so much fault in the musical performances, but I grant you that, after the 2001-2004 break, Andrea's range had lessened somewhat.

My biggest criticism of Live in Geneva pertains more to the lighting, filming, camera and editing work. I believe that Stylorouge attempted to create a "grittier" handheld film camera effect, but I didn't like the result. The editing is too fast-paced, changing camera angles every fraction of a second, never letting us rest our eyes on any one image long enough. I assume that someone who buys a live concert video as opposed to a "videos collection" would like it to be as if they were at the concert, only with better seats than everyone else. To edit the performance in such a way as to make it seem like a music video defeats that purpose.

Speaking in terms of colour, there is a homogenous dark blue and black colour to the concert which contrasts notably with my favourite DVD, Lansdowne Road, which seemed so much more vibrant, partly owing to outfits the girls wore but partly the outdoor late summer afterglow.

Those who planned the stage lighting may be the most to blame for the failure to capture good quality images. When one cannot see Andrea's eyes but only her eye-socket shadows instead, something is wrong. However, I do like the moving shots taken from what appears to have been a steady-cam attached to cable.

Some of us were discussing this quite a long while ago in late 2006. My friend D.L. seemed to express it well:

The producers at Stylorouge seemed to have forgotten the Corrs' biggest asset re: video- their photogenic attributes. Andrea especially benefits from longer, lingering shots. And the lighting in that theater didn't help matters any. With the frenetic editing and grainy, hi-contrast photography, the Corrs could've been an ersatz tribute band and some people might've been fooled.

I do wish Rhino had a better product for which to stick their necks out. They took a risk to bring Live in Geneva to the American market, and though the performance was very good, it wasn't captured as well as it could have been.