PBS Sounstage Special - Brian Wilson & Friends is coming on - 7pm PDT in LA 4/9

[Debbie Keil-Leavitt]

Head's up!

[c-man]

So...what songs are included?

[HeyJude]

Someone else reported in another thread that the hour-long TV edit consist of the following 17 tracks:

1. Our Prayer
2. Heroes and Villains
3. Good Vibrations
4. This Beautiful Day
5. Runaway Dancer
6. Don't Worry Baby
7. Wild Honey
8. Sail On Sailor
9. Half Moon Bay
10. Saturday Night
11. Hold On, Dear Brother
12. On the Island (studio w/She & Him)
13. God Only Knows (studio w/ She & Him)
14. The Right Time
15. Wouldn't It Be Nice
16. Help Me, Rhonda
17. Fun, Fun, Fun

But seriously, if the PBS website is accurate and they really do have the Blu-ray/DVD in stock, that’s the way to go. 27 tracks plus bonus interviews. I’m extra enthused about the potential for the Blu-ray, because it’s not airing for another week or so in my area, and it looks like it’s only initially airing on one of the “sub-channels” that isn’t carried in HD.

[Jim McShane]

The first showing of the Soundstage special in Chicago was last night. Honestly - the music was sabotaged by a terrible video and audio performance. The video was hardly even recognizable as HD, the sound mix was awful, the editing was poor - and to top it off WTTW's  (our PBS station)  broadcast sucked too.  Not only did WTTW do a lousy broadcast, they kept running a banner promoting the BW live date here in Chicago.  The banner was on the screen FAR too much, and was a real distraction and annoyance.

The video quality was mostly crappy - not sharp, poor contrast, just generally low quality. I thought something was wrong with the video gear at my house, but other channels looked fine.

The audio - where do I start? The mix was disgusting, you could hardly hear any of the background vocals, the audio was VERY heavily compressed,  the volume level varied up and down randomly it seemed. The few brief introductions that took place before some songs were inaudible - I could see Nate Ruess' lips moving, but the mix was so poor you couldn't hear what he was saying. At times the video and audio were out of sync. I would have to say that was the worst live concert audio I've heard in a very long time, maybe ever.

Just trying to write about it is so aggravating. I thought that Joe Thomas did a horrible job putting the show together - no continuity, choppy and too frequent cuts, no introductions of many of the people on stage (Special Guests?? It didn't seem so), and so on. No introduction of Ricky Fataar or Billy Hinsche, half-a**ed intro of Blondie, no mention of the band or Matt Jardine... It just seemed like a mad rush to get it over with. I think it was the worst Soundstage I've ever seen. Coupled with the ridiculous broadcast quality I almost turned it off after about 20 minutes.

Some of the musical performances were great - as best I could tell - some of it was not so hot. What's with the pounding drum in the God Only Knows performance by Zooey Deschanel? It sounded like a marching band drum  - far too prominent, inappropriate, and I thought ruined an otherwise nice performance.

I hope the DVD is a lot better - between Joe and WTTW I doubt many people found much to like. I was SO looking forward to seeing the show - but I now wish I hadn't. Brian and his band and guests deserve MUCH better than they got!! How could anybody have looked at that mess and said it was okay to put on the air? I'm SO disappointed.

I hope the other broadcasts are better, although Joe's handiwork is unfixable.

[The Cincinnati Kid]

Jim, how does it compare to what was posted on Youtube?

[HeyJude]

Sounds like at least some of those issues might be with the local broadcast. The YouTube videos (available in HD) look and sound just fine. I even ripped the audio from the live YouTube clips to my iPod and have listened with headphones and they sound fine. Occasionally, the lead vocal dips a bit low in the mix on something like Al’s vocal on “Sail Away”, but overall it sounds fine.

The direction on the clips on YouTube also seems just fine.

If the editing is choppy, it *might* be because they did the sort of “Master Edit” for the Blu-ray/DVD (which clocks in at apparently around 103 minutes, 27 songs), and then cut that down to 59 minutes and 17 songs. They were probably trying to cram as many songs as they could into an hour slot, so they cut out some intros for guests and whatnot.

It’ll be interesting to see what the blu-ray looks and sounds like. If it’s like the YouTube clips, then it should be quite nice.

[rn57]

Don't feel bad if you missed it. Heck, Brian skipped watching it to do his signing in Long Beach.

[Jim McShane]

Jim, how does it compare to what was posted on Youtube?

The You Tube stuff is FAR better!!

[Wirestone]

Jim, how does it compare to what was posted on Youtube?

The You Tube stuff is FAR better!!

The the same stuff, though. Same director, same footage, same mix.

[Jim McShane]

The the same stuff, though. Same director, same footage, same mix.

Maybe, but the previews seemed to be "cherry picked" - and (except for the trailer, which was made to be a trailer) they were shown as separate pieces, not as part of the total show. I'm not sure about the audio mix though, it could be different for broadcast. The video quality of the preview stuff was FAR better than I saw last night, which certainly could be WTTW's fault.

One of the reasons I was so pumped about seeing the broadcast was how great the teasers and previews had been. Sadly the broadcast version was not nearly what I expected. I mean. The near total lack of  continuity was really ridiculous though. People were appearing and disappearing from the stage almost like it was a Monty Python episode. Bad, just plain bad. I continue to hold out hope for the DVD though, it's already on order.

[Dan G]

The first showing of the Soundstage special in Chicago was last night. Honestly - the music was sabotaged by a terrible video and audio performance. The video was hardly even recognizable as HD, the sound mix was awful, the editing was poor - and to top it off WTTW's  (our PBS station)  broadcast sucked too.  Not only did WTTW do a lousy broadcast, they kept running a banner promoting the BW live date here in Chicago.  The banner was on the screen FAR too much, and was a real distraction and annoyance.

The video quality was mostly crappy - not sharp, poor contrast, just generally low quality. I thought something was wrong with the video gear at my house, but other channels looked fine.

The audio - where do I start? The mix was disgusting, you could hardly hear any of the background vocals, the audio was VERY heavily compressed,  the volume level varied up and down randomly it seemed. The few brief introductions that took place before some songs were inaudible - I could see Nate Ruess' lips moving, but the mix was so poor you couldn't hear what he was saying. At times the video and audio were out of sync. I would have to say that was the worst live concert audio I've heard in a very long time, maybe ever.

Just trying to write about it is so aggravating. I thought that Joe Thomas did a horrible job putting the show together - no continuity, choppy and too frequent cuts, no introductions of many of the people on stage (Special Guests?? It didn't seem so), and so on. No introduction of Ricky Fataar or Billy Hinsche, half-a**ed intro of Blondie, no mention of the band or Matt Jardine... It just seemed like a mad rush to get it over with. I think it was the worst Soundstage I've ever seen. Coupled with the ridiculous broadcast quality I almost turned it off after about 20 minutes.

Some of the musical performances were great - as best I could tell - some of it was not so hot. What's with the pounding drum in the God Only Knows performance by Zooey Deschanel? It sounded like a marching band drum  - far too prominent, inappropriate, and I thought ruined an otherwise nice performance.

I hope the DVD is a lot better - between Joe and WTTW I doubt many people found much to like. I was SO looking forward to seeing the show - but I now wish I hadn't. Brian and his band and guests deserve MUCH better than they got!! How could anybody have looked at that mess and said it was okay to put on the air? I'm SO disappointed.

I hope the other broadcasts are better, although Joe's handiwork is unfixable.

Jim, I couldn't agree with you more about the quality of the show last night.  I live about six blocks from WTTW and I'm a big fan of Soundstage.  I was very shocked at what I saw.  I will say this, they re-aired the show today at 2 and to me it sounded just like the audio on the Soundstage website.  Last night I also thought that the introductions of the artists in between seemed disjointed.  After watching it today, now that you can hear Brian actually announcing them, the show sounds much more fluent.  I bet there was an error in the feed last night on WTTW.  I wish I knew who to call there, or maybe I should show up at their front door.  But I agree with HeyJude that each individual PBS station probably feeds their own show.  I also would guess that PBS cuts the show up to fit their hour time slot.  So far everything on the Soundstage website, which is probably not controlled by PBS, sounds great. 

One other slight disagreement, the crawl on the bottom of the screen promoting tickets for Brian's concert was done about as tastefully as I've seen on PBS.  They are usually constantly begging for money, and at least with Soundstage you don't have those ridiculous pledge breaks with 30 people in the background answering calls like the Jerry Lewis telethon.  I checked my listing and it looks like the show airs again tonight.  Maybe you should watch it and report back.  It will be my third time, but I love Brian.

[shadownoze]

I watched the show on KLRU, the Austin PBS affiliate, and I didn't see any of the problems mentioned above. The sound was very good, the picture sharp and well-defined. It was a very well-crafted telecast...at least as seen in Austin.

[Jim McShane]

Dan,

I hope you got through the weather last night okay! It wasn't too bad out here in Orland Park, but I'm glad I don't live near Rockford.

I checked the schedule again, the show is on again tomorrow - I'll watch it and let you know. But that ugly banner was just awful - I'd rather have them take a break and beg than put that cheap crappy banner up on the screen. I guess we'll disagree on that.

Thanks for posting today's show opinion, I hope tomorrow will be okay, fingers crossed...

[jeffh]

I see the Chicago station is selling the blu Ray cd. Can you play a blu Ray on a regular DVDs player? Thanks! What a wonderful program that was. All of the new songs would have sounded great by the original Beach Boys with Carl and Dennis

[HeyJude]

I see the Chicago station is selling the blu Ray cd. Can you play a blu Ray on a regular DVDs player? Thanks! What a wonderful program that was. All of the new songs would have sounded great by the original Beach Boys with Carl and Dennis

You can't play blu-ray discs on a DVD player. But the thing they're selling is evidently a combo pack that has both disc formats, so you should be good.

[Debbie Keil-Leavitt]

I watched the show on KLRU, the Austin PBS affiliate, and I didn't see any of the problems mentioned above. The sound was very good, the picture sharp and well-defined. It was a very well-crafted telecast...at least as seen in Austin.

I saw it on KCPT in Kansas City this evening with the sound running through my amp and speakers and it was excellent.  Sorry the folks in Chicago had a bad first showing, but it appears that you have opportunities to view it again.  It truly must have been a local problem at the time, viewing the other comments here from other locations, as well as my own experience.

[rn57]

Well, I feel dumb - tuned in to Maryland Public TV at 9 tonight and found Miss Fisher Mysteries instead. I checked the site that I thought was MPT's, and it was actually MPTV - Milwaukee Public Television! So apologies for not letting everyone in SE Wisconsin know about the air date and to anyone in Maryland or nearby who relied on what I wrote.

[Tony S]

Brian and Friends was on at 9;00 last night here in NY/NJ area. Didn't appear to be in HD. I thought the performances were pretty good, though it was choppy. Regardless, Blondie steals the show, along with Al, who sort of closes it at the end.  I thought Hold On Dear Brother was pretty good too. More special than anything, seeing Blondie, Ricky, and Al on stage together for probably the first time since the early 70's. Somewhere, Carl and Dennis are smiling! Was it the greatest Soundstage ever....no......but I thought it was pretty special regardless. Can't wait for the DVD to come out at a reasonable price.

[RubberSoul13]

Seems like they did a nice job picking songs to use for this...heavy hits for the PBS crowd, but a few nuggets thrown in for us!

[Jim McShane]

As promised I did watch the show last night on WTTW Chicago - but on a different channel (WTTW has 4 broadcast channels). The broadcast seemed better, the video was definitely better and so was the sound. But while I'm not sure who is responsible for it, the audio in general (particularly the mix) was not close to the You Tube videos.  It was still the lousiest Soundstage in recent memory despite some terrific music. But I guess I'll just wait for the DVD and hope...