Dom Robinson reviews
Sly & Robbie
Superthruster
Digitally Re-mixed and Re-mastered
Distributed by
Palm Pictures
- Cat.no: PPDVD 7002-2
- Cert: E
- Running time: 12 minutes
- Year: 2000
- Pressing: 2000
- Region(s): 2 (UK PAL)
- Chapters: 3 plus extras
- Sound: Dolby Digital 5.1, Linear PCM Stereo
- Languages: English
- Subtitles: None
- Widescreen: varies
- 16:9-enhanced: Yes & No
- Macrovision: No
- Disc Format: DVD 5
- Price: £5.99
- Extras : Scene index, Trailers, DVD-ROM content, Interview
Director:
Music Producer:
Music:
(Drum programming and synpads)
Robbie Shakespeare (Bass Guitar)
Lloyd "Gitsy" Willis (Guitar)
Jony Rockstar (Programming)
Jeremy Shaw (Keyboards and tuning)
Howie B (Additional keyboards and programming)
Sly & Robbie: Superthruster
is a collection of three music promos on a DVD Video EP, created by Abbey
Road Interactive. There are two versions of the
main track, the first being a rather energetic and funky affair and featuring the duo as two SWAT team-type
guys with guns fighting all manner of weirdos and the second is a remix, albeit more for the
video rather than the music.
The other track is Zen Concrete, a four-minute piece of more sombre music, set against
a backdrop of clips from another recent Palm Pictures release, Ghost in the Shell.
Sly and Robbie have hardly been the most prolific of chart hit-makers in the UK, only making
the grade with "Boops (Here To Go)" (No.12, April 1987), while following it up
with a comparitive flop, "Fire" (No.60, July 1987).
The picture quality, on the whole, is fine. It's better for the main track - which is presented
in an approximate 2.00:1 ratio and is not anamorphic - and for Zen Concrete which shows
clips of the aforementioned film and is anamorphic, although it's just the 1.85:1 film squashed
into a 4:3 frame, so while it looks good on a widescreen TV, there's no standard letterbox
equivalent on here. The Superthruster remix changes ratio more often than it's possible
to keep track of. The average bitrate ia very high and varies between 8.99Mb/s and 9.21Mb/s.
The sound is very good too, but while I quite got into Superthruster, I didn't quite
warm as much to the other two. However, it's presented in Dolby Digital 5.1 and
will have the neighbours complaining if you turn it up...
Extras :
Chapters and Trailers :
There are 3 chapters on this disc - one for each track - plus trailers for four other Palm
Pictures releases:
Talking Heads - Stop Making Sense,
Baaba Maal: Live at the Royal Festival Hall,
Ghost in the Shell
and
Dancehall Queen.
Languages & Subtitles :
The only language that features here is English and only in the interview. No subtitles,
even though they're very necessary!
And there's more... :
A 7-minute Interview with Sly & Robbie, although throughout I could not make out a
single word they said. I think they mentioned Bob Marley at one point, although it looked
like they'd been on the loopy toast that morning...
The DVD-ROM content features music samples, info and rough-looking
video clips of a range of Palm Pictures produce: Sly and Robbie, Baaba Maal,
Mocean Worker, Ernest Ranglin and Kora Revolution.
Menu :
It's a silent one, but as for the animation it's one for epileptics to avoid
given the amount of flashing light and colours on it - almost on a par with
The Simpsons's Samurai Seizure Robots :)
Apart from the main track, Superthruster, this isn't really my cup of
tea, but DVD-owning fans of the pair will no doubt snap this up at its cheap
price.
MUSIC CONTENT
PICTURE QUALITY
SOUND QUALITY
EXTRAS
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OVERALL
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Review copyright © Dominic Robinson, 2000.
For more information, please visit
PalmPictures.com
