Customer Reviews

Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble - Live at Montreux 1982 & 1985

5 star:		(56)
4 star:		(9)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

After reading for years about Stevie Ray's rejection in 1982 at the hands of the Montreux audience, I was both excited and a bit apprehensive upon the release of this DVD, knowing it would afford me the opportunity to experience the realism of the event. I've forced myself to believe that the booing was directed more at what the crowd perceived as a pretentiousness on the part of SRV, with the cowboy hat, boots, chest tattoo, and the fact that Stevie was certainly not a conventional or mainstream blues performer. Being a relatively young, not yet 28 year old white man probably didn't help either.

But as I watch the 1982 show, I am absolutely dumbstruck by the crowd's reaction. Yes, there are obviously some players in the crowd who recognize the mastery of Stevie's technique, and they initially cheer rather boisterously and with great approval. The cheering only seemed to anger the "purists" who booed all the more loudly and who seemed to have made the final word by the conclusion of SRV's set.

If you can place yourself in the moment, the final shot of Stevie walking off backstage is heartbreaking, showing bewilderment, discouragement, anger - I can't imagine what was going through his mind - he had just played his heart out!

Most of us know the rest of the story and Stevie's incredible success at bringing his music to a mass audience. What '82 Montreux perhaps shows best is how difficult it can be for anyone to present a unique and original approach to a traditional musical idiom like the Blues.

I initially intended to write a scathing indictment of the Montreux crowd. I'll just leave it at this - Frank Zappa once said that most people wouldn't recognize good music if it bit them in the ass. This Montreux crowd wouldn't have recognized musical virtuosity if it slapped them in the face.

Like most people who are into Blues, I couldn't wait to see this set when it was released. It contained two SRV sets at a very reasonable price and a short documentary as well as 5.1 DTS sound. Well it is great! Like my all time favourite, Albert King (see my reviews), material available on SRV (for all his impact in the 1980s) is rather scarce. I even saw him in Australia and he was so loud you really couldn't appreciate it, he needed smaller venues! This was a great chance to see him perform.I think the overall production of this set is excellent, as it usually is at Montreux. Great sound and camera work.

Well as a Blues enthusiast of 40 years. I think the first disc is far better than the second (but I love Reese Wynans keyboards). All the hipe about him being booed to me is overplayed. As a guitarist he was better when he was hungry, than after he became famous (do you know of a bluesman, not rock, that actually produced better material after they got famous?)(Listen to Buddy Guy, Albert King, Little Walter, Junior Wells, etc etc even Johnny Winter, the original SRV). So this is great and I agree the El Mocambo set is great, but I rate the first disc as his best work.

Top selection to me on Disc one is how he modernized Freddie King's Hideaway and combined it with Rude Mood (Urban/Country Blues). Just great. And the final tune is a great Albert Collins salute without copying Collins difficult style-you still recognise it (like in some of Duke Robillard's work). Fantastic! The old standbys- Texas Flood and Pride and Joy are great of course and his great slow blues Dirty Pool has that great unexpected chordal solo- an ode to Otis Rush's "Double Trouble" without, again, copying him completely (except the intro).

The booing didin't bother me. It's not as bad as the publicity made out. Most people are dancing and clapping and getting into it. If all booed maybe Stevie should have worried, but that wasn't likely. European audiences are strange as the Doors said in 1968, "they didn't clap or anything, they just stared". You know anything new from outside always has had trouble with Europeans, they are more traditional than we colonists. That's why in the 1960s the Folk Blues festival was so popular, they had Howlin Wolf and Muddy,(they were stuck in the 1950s) but never Paul Butterfield or Steve Miller.

Well this DVD is a landmark. Advice: If you can get this in PAL: the sound and picture quality is better. I am in Bahrain travelling and just bought another copy in PAL to supplement my NTSC one. Great!!!

The second disc has some replication of course. The addition to the band of Reese Wynans was a great move. Made them a Booker T & the MGs's with rock guitar and singing. All tracks are great, but the Slow Blues Tin Pan Alley with the late Johnny Copeland (who won a Grammy with Robert Cray and Albert Collins for the "Showdown" LP) is my personal favourite. Intense and honest the way the Blues should be!!! Actually the whole Copeland sub-set is my favourite part of the disc along with, again the opening instrumental of Scuttle-Buttin and Say What!

Every Blues fan should own this historic DVD. Note, some useless information: SRV was the age Jimi Hendrix died when he played on Disc 1. He was also born the year the Stratocaster was first released by Fender.

Also: To comment on a previous review. It seems that in "Ain't Gone 'N' Give Up On Love" Stevie switches guitars- from Old Number One Strat. Well it looks to me like he probably broke one of his heavy gauge strings on the first solo, changed guitars, and played on. The Swiss film crew just edited it, cleverly.

Finally the legend of those shows comes to us in high quality, beautifully done packaging, and artful handling of all the material is extremely well done. This is an absolute must own DVD and anyone who knows anything about Stevie will want this in their collection. Considering when these shows were originally video taped and recorded, the restored audio mixing and the brightened video color correction and editing are top notch. You can see the care and quality Epic and Legacy put into restoring and releasing these two concerts. The documentary feature that's added as a bonus element rounds out the content by letting the viewer hear about those days straight from those that were there and witnessed it. There are wonderful stories and reflections from Tommy and Chris, and Jackson Browne adds his reflections. Adding John Mayer to the show was also a nice touch, and he speaks so well and the sound quotes that director Michael B. Borofsky uses really tells the story of a how SRV's influence and impact to this day remains remarkable. The stills that are used in the documentary make you think that someone new that history was being made on those nights, and director and editor used them brilliantly. The only bad part cant be blamed on Epic or Borofsky, but apparently when the original show in 1985 was videotaped, the cameramen went off duty or something and only one camera captures the performance of the encore and even that camera inexplicably turned off for a couple minutes during Couldn't Stand the Weather. But the audio recording captured it all. Luckily for us, Borofsky and John Jackson who co-produced the DVD had the sense not to cut the audio out when the video goes to black, and allows us through a created montage of images, to continue to hear the music as it was originally performed on that historic day. What a great DVD to own, I highly recommend it. I got it last Wednesday, and have watched it at least three times already.

The first disk of this two disk set features a great early performance by SRV, unfortunately punctuated by boos from an unappreciative, and uniformed, audience. The extra feature merely echoes what the booklet explains in great detail, but it's nice to see some familiar faces talking about the event.

The 2nd CD, supposedly SRV's triumphant return to Montreux, is in my opinion a bit of a disappointment. To me it looks like Stevie Ray was in the full throes of his alcholism and drug abuse. He literally didn't look well, although that scraggly beard didn't help his appearance much. His speech sounded slurred, and his playing was not up to par. His performance on the "Live at the El Mocambo" video far outshines Disc 2. It was nice to see him playing with Johnny Copeland (even though Johnny forgot the words to Tin Pan Alley and played his guitar instead!), but overall I felt a little underwhelmed.

The final insult comes during the last encore on Disk 2. Presumably all but one of the cameras was turned off before the band came back on stage and the encore is one long, static shot from the balcony. Clips from his music videos are thrown in over the end of the last song to break up the monotony, but even those are repeated at least twice to fill in the gap!

If you've never seen an SRV concert then you should be pleased overall with this DVD. If you're a diehard SRV fan, you won't be able to resist getting more material from him. If you're not a big fan and are looking to "dabble" into SRV, get the "El Mocambo" release.

If you are a SRV fan, you must get this DVD. The picture and sound is quite good considering the technology back then except for the last 3 songs which are part of the encore of the '85 show, the band is only shown from a far camera.
Anyway, if you have'nt heard SRV & DT was actually booed the first time they played Montreux Jazz festival and when I heard this I thought 'why??' well it had to do with the audience not expecting a loud blues band from Texas - whatever...

To go back in time and watch these legendary concerts to me
was a real treat - I got it a week ago and I'm still watching it.
On first DVD, Stevie has that big big sound and there're nice close ups of his magic fingers doin' thier thing....

I love this DVD....

I watched an edited down 1.5 hour preview of this DVD on Music Choice over the weekend and all I can say is WOW! I had the audio of these shows on bootleg for years and quickly snatched up the official release CDs when they came out a couple years ago. However, I never had any idea that these were also professionally video recorded as well. Needless to say I will be buying this DVD when it is released on Tuesday.

These are two excellent concerts of Stevie in his prime (was he ever not really in his prime.) The first concert is from 1982 before they ever had a record deal. In what has to be one of the best examples of bad judgement ever, someone booked the band to play the show on an acoustically themed night at the Montreaux Jazz Festival. The narrow-minded audience didn't care for the look of this hot-shot blues-rock guitarist from Texas from the moment he stepped on stage and booed the band mercilessly throughout the show. In spite of this, they gave an electrifying performance and even won a Grammy for the version of Larry Davis' "Texas Flood" they played that night, when it was released on a compilation album later that year.

David Bowie caught their show that night and was most impressed. Jackson Browne then saw them play off stage at a musicians only party and offered them time in his private studio. Stevie played and Bowie's "Let's Dance" album, the band cut it's first album in Browne's studio and the rest, as they say, is history.

Needlessly to say, when the band returned to Montreaux in the follow up concert offered on this DVD from 1985, there was no booing. In fact, the band was the headliner for the now added "Blues Night" at the Montreaux Jazz Festival. In addition, Stevie asked lesser known blues legend Johnny Copeland to sit in with the band and receive some well-deserved recognition - just an example of the kind of guy Stevie was.

So, in summation, you get two defining moment concerts from Stevie's career. The 1982 show which at first appeared to be the worst moment in his career but ultimately became a turning point for the band and the 1985 show featuring his triumphant return. The quality and clarity of the footage is simply amazing and stunning.

Buy this DVD! You will not be disappointed.

Stevie Ray, you are greatly missed.

I preordered this DVD on Amazon as soon as I read that it was going to be released. I was familiar with all the good that came out of the 1982 appearance (hooking up with David Bowie and Jackson Browne) but, true to the primitive beast in all of us, I wanted to see firsthand how he responded to the boos. It was painful to watch but reinforced the many reasons I love Stevie Ray Vaughan--he just kept giving the audience his best--blistering, intense, heart-felt Texas blues. (By the way, standing really close to the tv screen and yelling obscenities at the jeering crowd didn't manage to shut them the hell up, but it sure made me feel better.)

The interview was fun. I love when Tommy Shannon and Chris Layton reminisce about Stevie Ray. John Mayer?--okay, I didn't quite get the connection, but he redeemed himself by being exceedingly quotable.

The 1985 footage was great, especially when Johnny Copeland came out to play with the band--the smile on Stevie's face was priceless. Repeated flashes of still pictures towards the end of the concert were a little tedious, but that's a minor quibble. It seems like the on-stage video cameramen had departed and the producers of the DVD wanted to give us something other than static shots of the band onstage. Note to producers--any shots of the band playing together are good enough for most fans.

I would highly recommend this DVD to blues fans in general, Stevie Ray fans in particular and even to non-fans who love those feel-good movies where the hero triumphs over the evil naysayers because of talent bordering on geius, personal vision and purity of heart.

Stevie Ray Vaughan was a six-string force of nature with his Fender Stratocaster. He was playing small clubs in Texas with drummer Chris Layton and bassist Tommy Shannon in 1982 when someone with connections heard them and declared "you need to play Montreux". Sooo... without a record, a recording contract or any name recognition outside of the handful of people who had heard them playing in Texas, they headed over to Europe where they were booked at the famous Montreux Jazz festival on the same day as several acoustic stars. Stevie and Double Trouble hit the stage with their electrified cyclone and played to a rousing chorus of boos. Stevie, talented as he was, dressed like a cross between a Texas Gunslinger and a New Orleans Pimp, and the crowd reaction ranged between indifference and total hostility. Were they good? Take a listen... the accompanying and extremely informative documentary features interviews with Slater and Layton, along with Jackson Browne, John Mayer, and a few others who knew what happened that day. SRV and DT burned that stage to the ground. They had honed their 3-piece Texas Blues to a fine edge and they unleashed their power on that crowd. The "music fans", too stupid to notice the genius in front of their very eyes, hadn't yet been told by radio disc jockeys who they should like.... so they didn't like SRV - yet. Of course there were musicians there too, though, and the word spread like wildfire through Jackson Browne's band.... and David Bowie.... and soon all the Montreux musicians were down in the musician's lounge listening to the kind of band that makes musicians tell other musicians "come here.... you've just GOT to hear THIS!" (I had the same experience the first time my brother played their first recording - which was made as a result of this very concert.) David Bowie had to figure out a way to get this guitar genius on his CD and in his band. (Listen to Stevie's wailing guitar on "Let's Dance".) Jackson Browne offered the contractless trio the opportunity to record in his studio. They made their way out to California and basically just recorded their live set in the studio. THAT recording became "Texas Flood" and all of a sudden SRV was not an unknown...

Two albums and a keyboardist later, Stevie returned to Montreux in 1985 as a "conquering hero" of sorts and although I would hesitate to say that they sounded better in the '85 concert, it is certainly gratifying to see them received with open-armed enthusiasm. In the '82 concert they only played about 52 minutes. In '85 they turn it on for a hot hour and a half.

Both of those concerts are more than worth a listen - and this fantastic double-disc set includes both concerts, plus the documentary. This is 5-star all the way.

When the audio cd's were released a few years ago there was a brief article in a guitar mag that suggested that a DVD of the performances was to follow shortly. I decided to wait in the hopes that the DVD would be available in the next couple of months. Well, several years later we finally all get to watch and hear something magnificent and historical.
Everyone who bought the audio cd's is familiar with hearing the boos from fans who were obviously ignorant of SRV's in your face, loud blues. We can now see for ourselves that despite the majority of ignorant fans ( in 1982 )there certainly were a number of fans that knew that they were seeing something to behold. True to their craft, SRV and DT played as if they were in front of a home town crowd. A testament to their love of performing to exhaustion. Seeing SRV play slide on "Give Me Back My Wig", is worth the price.
Bearded, full of confidence, lots of jewellry, big white hat with a fluffy white fox tail, shiney, glittery shirt, Stevie plays a no holds barred show in 1985. Anyone who booed in '82 surely held their heads low and bowed to SRV and DT. Johny Copeland plays and sweats buckets as he and Stevie tear up the stage for 3 songs. A great DVD for all SRV fans as well as hopefully new ones once you see both of these shows. MAN COULD HE PLAY THAT GUITAR.
I have one issue, during "Ain't Gon' Give Up On Love", in 1985, there seems to be some sort of edit glitch as Stevie somehow changes from number One guitar to a white "Charley" I believe. If you watch closely and in slow mo you can notice some wierd edit or something. If they played only one show, how did they do this?

Don't get me wrong, I love this DVD, and I am a huge Stevie fan, but I've heard him play much, much better than that. Despite the tough crowd, they did play pretty dang good. However, the sound quality on the first performance kinda sucked. And on the second performance, on the last few songs, the camera work went way down hill, only one camera was working and it was way far away from the band. Overall, this DVD is pretty good, but there are some pretty noticeable flaws in it.