ARRIVING SOMEWHERE...

All Porcupine Tree fanatics have waited with bated breath for this release and what do you end up with - a sonically brilliant recording (as expected) and cinematically a load of artistic bollocks (I hate to say).

The sound production is perfect as you would expect of Steven Wilson and in particular Gavin Harrison shines (his performance and clarity in the mix is breathtaking). If this had only been released as a live CD it would fully desearve 5 stars inline with Porcupine Tree's superlative studio output, however it is hard to comprehend how our progressive genius (SW) would give licence to the abysmal filming and artistic (!) editing of the concert. Honestly, it ruins the performance, the horribly blurred, grainy and pathetic filming techniques, saturated colours and the infuriating need to change from colour to black and white - why?? What does it add, nothing! It looks so amateur.

The set list is good, but would have been nice to include the likes of Shesmovedon, Gravity Eyelids and Strip The Soul which were also filmed over these two nights in Chicago.

The two bonus songs from Rockpalast (Futile and Radioactive Toy) demonstrate how the whole concert could have looked (ie. how you see it in the flesh).

It's probably because Porcupine Tree are my ultimate band that the failings of this release have upset me so much. This DVD has been a long time in the making, why would SW ensure the audio quality is exceptional and yet allow such utterly crap filming? It's beyond me. It will be interesting to see what other reviews say!

One suggestion for the future would be to re-issue this as it was actually filmed, then we may be actually able to enjoy the performance!

In summary - 5 stars for sound quality, 1 star for cinematography and 3 stars for track selection. NB