FOOTAGE

CAMEL has released a lot of live-DVD's but never footage with complete recordings from the Seventies. So I was delighted with this DVD, containing material from '73 (1 songs in Guilford Civic Hall, unfortunately the sound is a studio overdub), '75 (BBC Old Grey Whistle Test with 3 songs), '77 (BBS Sight And Sound with 5 songs), '81 (Shepperton Studio for Old Grey Whistle Test with 1 song), '84 (Hammersmith Odeon with 1 song), '92 (Town And Country London Amateur Video with 1 song), '97 (Billboard Live with 2 songs) and a Bonus tilted "Left Luggage" (Little Barn Studios).

CAMEL is not a very exciting live band, a bit too static, but their melodic and harmonic sound is a 'warm bath' with Andy Latimer his expressive 'plastic face' during his moving guitar soli and Peter Bardens delivering great sounds and soli from his vintage keyboards (Moog, Fender Rhodes, string-Ensemble, Hammond). Enjoy a beautiful travel through time with songs like "Never Let Go", pieces from "The Snow Goose" album, "Uneven Song", "Lunar Sea", "Captured" and the previously unreleased "Preparation" and "Dunkirk".

Finally a remarkable footage with fine recordings from an immortal band like Camel, whose grandeur is witnessed by a few BBC sessions (three songs)- a bit uneven- and a recent live song performed at Hammersmith Odeon (dated 1984), which is better for me, even though it has been already witnessed within their famous live work entitled "Pressure Points"... the present DVD, combined with the best stuff from "Coming of Age" (inside the "Harbour of Tears" tour) are the best sample of their live approach!! I hope to see another "video testament" like this one,talking about their tour (dated 1991) performing the work "Dust of Dreams" , but at the moment the present new DVD represents their music career in a special way and it's enough for me;moreover some of the famous tracks within the double live album "A live Record" are represented here...long live Camel!!

Very nice footage!!

There may be people who you know but whose prog rock tastes were unknown to you, it happened to me, i have a friend who likes alternative or indie scene, but suddenly he told me that he listened to some prog, so i of course smiled and said to him, why haven't you told me before?. The fact is that this guy lend me some Camel DVD's, this one i am reviewing and a couple more, fantastic thing.

I actually had never watched a Camel DVD, so i was really pleased. This video was released in 2004 and it is not actually a concert, as the name suggests, is a footage so here we can see some performances from different shows and different Camel eras, of course different line-ups.

The video opens with Aristillus as intro, and then it runs in a chronological order, first with "Never Let Go" taken from a 1973 show and a very nice performance. Then it continues with a 3-song performance from 1975 playing some Snow Goose Stuff, beautiful moments, i love that album so seeing it was very nice to me, i enjoyed it. Next, from a 1977 show there is a 5-song performance, taken from Moonmadness and Rain Dances, and for the first time i saw Richard Sinclar in a video with Camel, fantastic, their performance was excellent, i particularly loved Lunar Sea.

Then we have the first 80s Camel sound with the short and catchy "City Life" from their (in my opinion) weak album Nude, the first video featuring Colin Bass. The following performances was 3 years later in 1984, but playing another Nude song, "Captured" and which i could only see in their Pressure Points DVD.

Next we have now the 90´s performances, one from 1992 where they play songs from Dust and Dreams and which i like a lot because it is not a profesional footage, it is an amateur footagr that may have been taken by someone from the audience, pretty cool; and the last from 1997 playing again a couple of Snow Goose songs.

I liked this DVD, because it shows you the band progression through time and their different "faces". My final grade is 3 stars, very good yeah, but non-essential, of course recommendable for you who like Camel.

Enjoy it!!