Customer Reviews

Roxette: Ballad & Pop Hits

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

The aforementioned Really Roxette sychronication problem aside, this is an enjoyable and informative DVD with some interesting behind-the-scenes looks at a contemporary, intelligent rock group. You might call it the polar opposite of "This Is Spinal Tap."

I personally liked the point of commentary in one documentary describing Roxette as a "young-people band" (for fans age 13 - 19 or so). I didn't discover Roxette until I was 45, and I was immediately captivated by their great tunes and magnificent lyrics (Per Gessle's superb song-writing, coupled with a dynamite female vocalist who can really belt 'em out!).

If you're a Roxette fan, you need to own this DVD. It's worth it, even with the minor, easy-to-ignore flaws.

DVD means quality: mindblowing picture and sound quality based on digital technology. This release has nerve cringing manufacturing errors instead:

VIDEOS:
-BAD sound quality. It goes from loud to soft to loud again - even in the same song.

-It seems the DVD was made out from an old and worn out VHS tape. You can actually see those "tape artifacts" in most of the videos. For example Fingertips (0.53"), Spending My Time (0.19") and Joyride. They should have used the "The Videos" LASERDISC as the source for the older clips, not a VHS tape.

-The Look, Listen to Your Heart, Dressed for Success, Dangerous: The worst grainyness and blurring ever seen in a DVD. Even my old VHS tapes from 1988 look clearer than this DVD.

-Serious distortion and random red/black frames in most of the videos (eg. Fireworks: screen blinks at 1.34" and Fading Like a Flower: screen blinks at 2.04")

-In Crash!Boom!Bang! the screen freezes (2.45")

EXTRAS:
-Making of Joyride: BAD video quality... sometimes you cant see who-is-who and you can actually see "blocks" (digital artifacts), like you were watching a bad VCD.

-Really Roxette: Serious sync problem. The sound is off by a few seconds, then the lips move, then the sound comes. It happens the whole documentary. It's really annoying.

MY ADVICE:
Don't buy it. If you have your old VHS tapes (Look Sharp Live! and The Videos) keep them, because they look clearer than this DVD.

This is not a small town band signed to a small independent record label. It's Roxette and it's EMI. That's what makes this faulty release unacceptable.

Wow! What a great DVD. I was a bit skeptical at first about buying this when reading other peoples reviews. But I did not find any errors, no deleyad sync, or any probelms with the viedo quality. They must have corrected that error.

what amazes me is how well this package has been put together. Instead of ripping you off with 12 or so clips, this one contains 35 video clips, + 5 rareities including 2 early video clips, 2 TV performances, tho there not live, and one rare clip. And then a 50 minute documentry called "the making of joyride" and another one that goes for 60 minutes called "really roxette"

It is great to see a compant finally put a DVD together worth buying. Every video clip seems to be here. Including rareties and documentries, but what has amazed me the most is it is all on one disc!

Even tho I wasnt to crash hot on the type of techno direction towards the 2001 era, the songs where great, I only had the album "dont bore us, get to the chorus" and all but one song from that greatest hits is on here, and I liked alot of the ones I was watching for the first time too. Its a must have for the Roxette fan.

This long-awaited DVD (NTSC) suffers from serious problems like audio-synch and low-quality videos.
The videos from 1996-2003 looks very nice and clear. But a lot of videos before this time looks grainy or got "tape-lines" (like on VHS old tapes...)
But, by far, the biggest problem is the audio-synch on the whole "Really Roxette" documentary (it`s 2-3 seconds late)...

For sure, EMI released this on a rush, what is a pity

Roxette is one of the most influential duos on the face of this planet, this DVD covers every single hit they made, plus newest videos and some of their spanish language videos, as far as quality of the DVD : newer videos have great sound and picture, older songs sound so so, but it's not that bad really, the main thing is, now you can hold in your arms the proof of Roxette's strong existence in the world of music,

As other reviews have mentioned, the quality of the older Roxette videos (The Look, Listen to Your Heart) suggests that they were taken right off of the 1989 VHS tape (rather than from a digitally remastered copy). That being said, as a long-time fan of the group I was mesmerized by the more recent ballad videos. They look and sound excellent (Marie Fredrickson is as beautiful as ever, which may be one reason I loved the group as a teenager); also interesting to see the evolution of Marie Fredrickson's hair from the mid-80s to the present day. It is too bad that Roxette's music isn't sold or played in the USA much anymore. Largely because of that fact, as a US fan of the group I consider this DVD a must buy.

While it may be true about the audio synch on the documentary "Really Roxette" and that the video and sound quality on some videos could have been better they still look and sound ok. This item is a great buy. This DVD contains every single music video Roxette have ever done. Also the 'extras' section contains some very early Roxette videos which I found very interesting. They had that great chemistry right from the very beginning. Per Gessle is a songwriting genius which would never have been realized without Marie's vocals. There were so many videos that being an american fan I have not been able to see which makes this DVD collection awesome and that's basically why it gets 4 stars. True, it could have been better and if anyone in America has a PAL supported DVD player I would recommend getting the DVD "All videos ever made & more" which is probably better made but not released in the United States. You could find it on E-bay.

The "Roxette: Ballad & Pop Hits" dvd suffers from what I suppose is poor manufacturing. The volume increases and decreases in level at random times and the sound for the documentary "Really Roxette" is badly out of synch.
If you really have to have the videos in NTSC format, you should buy this, but be prepared for some disappointment.

All the videos hits are here - one can fully appreciate the superb technique of their production and the amazing talents of this group.

Start playing this disc and the years slip away, this was a great group and their hits stand the test of time.

A great collection guaranteeing many future hours of enjoyment and well worth every penny.

This collection is great All videos in one DVD, good section of the Making joyride, the bonus videos Fabulosos , this collection is import for the Roxette's FANS in the World I have missing 3 videos in spanich? but this DVD is the Great come back for this Sweeden Pop-Rock duet!
(C)2004 PolarWorks Collection FAN CLUB