I went to the sole big screen session in Sydney last night (there is only one screening in each location all over the world) of this new concert flim from the Fort Worth show on the 1978 US tour. The DVD/BluRay is being released later this month.
The film and audio quality were first rate - lots of camera angles, well edited. George might be able to chime in on this technical aspect - for an old film there were no spots, blemishes or artifacts to be seen at all - presumably this is thanks to the digitising process?
Fans of the Stones will enjoy this movie, and casual fans or people wanting to relive the 70s should like it as well. As a historical snapshot of the Rolling Stones at a period in time it is very revealing.
Jagger is clearly coked to his eyeballs - actually his eyeballs are what gives it away .... that, and his very obvious 90 minute erection. Despite the coke, he is in fine form vocally throughout the concert, with some fantastic adlib vocal tweaks, and he sways between being menacing and playful. At times you get the impression that in the absence of a woman on stage he's very close to wanting to rape Ronnie Wood. Mick plays guitar on a lot of songs, not that he's doing much or you can hear what he's playing (probably a good thing) - he tends to wear the guitar like a prop most of the time, Elvis style.
Ronnie behaves like he smoked two ounces of weed before the show, and is super mellow, but towards the end of the concert you can see him starting to get annoyed at the attention he is getting from Mick. Ronnie plays some excellent slide this night.
Keef is wired on an indeterminable substance and covers a lot of acreage on stage (as does Ronnie at times), and seems to be having a lot of fun. You can hear his harmonies really well, which I like - his voice always blends so well with Jagger's.
Charlie and Bill are their usual selves, holding it all together in their wonderfully understated manner while the other three head off in different directions. Bill is playing the custom Travis Bean and treads his usual well worn straight line path back and forth between his rig and the front of the stage - although you never see him actually move, which makes me think that roadies lift him up and move him to a different part of the stage whenever the camera is not on him. Of special interest is the fact that Bill is playing with the middle and ring fingers of his left hand taped together, having broken a knuckle a week beforehand when he was leaving the stage, stepped through a curtain and fell 9 feet to the ground, knocking himself unconscious. Watching and listening to Bill's playing at this concert you would not know that he is playing with two fingers strapped together - amazing.
There are no horns (other than Mick's), and no backup singers. Ian Stewart and Ian McLagan are both playing keyboards at the side of the stage. There are more Ampeg SVT's than you can poke a stick at, plus a couple of Mesa Boogie combos (maybe for Mick's Strat).
Some great audience closeups too. Overall a very enjoyable and interesting concert movie.
