GIANT ON THE BOX

For those of us that have been tracking down Gentle Giant live material for years, there is nothing new here, with the exception of finally have a good sounding live version of Cogs in Cogs. Most of this material can be found on Playing the Fool, the King Biscuit live album, Totally Out Of The Woods, and various bootlegs.

But this is the first time (unless you were one of the lucky few to see them live back in the day) we get to actually SEE them perform these fantastic songs. There is no reason any fan of this band shouldn't have this already, but if you are relatively new, don't hesitate to pick this up. Watching them play switch between all the different instruments and play them all nearly flawlessly is enough reason to get this DVD. Absolutely incredible. The dual acoustic guitar in Excerpts From Octopus is mind blowing, as is Ray Schulman's versatility on bass, violin, trumpet and percussion. They all have a go in percussion at the end of So Sincere. On top of all this, they are animated (except for Kerry) and look like they are truly enjoying themselves.

Great performances all around, just as you would expect from such a great band. I would love to give this 5 stars, but I don't the performances are quite up to the excellence that is found on Playing the Fool (which was, of course, recorded 4 years later). But consider this absolutely essential for anyone with even a mild interest in this band.