Stevie Ray Vaughan - Live At The El Mocambo
Performance
Production
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Stevie Ray Vaughan - Live At The El Mocambo
Performance
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Live At The El Mocambo captures a young Stevie Ray Vaughan on the verge of taking the world by storm. His debut album Texas Flood and just been released to critical and popular acclaim, and word was spreading that we had ourselves a new blues/rock legend in the making. This performance was recorded in 1983, at a small Toronto club called the El Mocambo. Stevie and his now legendary backing band Double Trouble could barely fit on the tiny stage, the lighting was minimal, the sound was raw, but the performance was huge. The small Mocombo crowd was probably dumbfounded by what they were witnessing up on stage that night. Here was this young Texas bluesman decked out in a bright, flowery, silk shirt, alligator-skin boots, a gaudy, beaded necklace and scarf, and his trademark black gaucho hat. This wasn't exactly Buddy Guy or Howlin' Wolf up there, but when he tore through covers of their songs "Mary Had A Little Lamb" and "Tell Me" the crowd knew he was for real, and remained entranced throughout the entire show. Vaughan performs seven of the ten songs from his Texas Flood album, of which most are covers of old blues standards, and he also adds a few more covers, most notably Jimi Hendix's "Voodoo Chile (Slight Return)", and "Third Stone From The Sun", as well as Lonnie Mack's "Wham" and John Lee Hooker's "Hug You, Squeeze You". Things really heat up by the third song when Stevie launches into the opening whah-drenched chords of "Voodoo Chile". I've always thought that Stevie's live version of this song was even better than Hendrix's, and this night was no different. By now Stevie was sweating profusely, probably from the stage lights, but also probably from the physical and emotional exertion he puts into his playing. "Pride And Joy" followed and quickly showed that many of his own compositions were also destined to become classics, just like the ones he was covering. The absolute highlight of the show, for me, was Stevie's remarkable performance of "Texas Flood", a slow blues jam that Stevie pours his heart and soul into. His vocals were as extraordinary as his guitar playing, which featured him effortlessly playing behind his back, like it was perfectly natural to him. The other show-stopper was Stevie's incredible performance of Hendix's "Third Stone From The Sun", which closed the first set. He ends up bouncing his poor guitar all over the stage, inducing ungodly noise and feedback, which he somehow manages to control and make an integral part of the song. The encore begins with Stevie sitting on the drum platform, lit cigarette dangling from his lips, and sweat dripping from his face, as he gently strums the delicate, jazz-meets-blues chords of "Lenny", the song he wrote for his wife at the time. There are some fabulous close-ups of his fingers effortlessly working the heavy-gauge strings on his Strat, as his eyes remain closed throughout the entire song. He closed the show with a fast, upbeat version of Lonnie Mac's "Wham", which left the won-over crowd wildly cheering for more. For a video that was recorded in 1983, and was first released on VHS in 1991, the overall production quality is quite good. There was the occasional out of focus shot, but the picture was reasonably clear throughout. The Dolby 5.1 surround remix turned out pretty well too. Stevie's guitar was piped across the three front channels nearly equally, as well as to the two rear channels, to a lesser extent. The instruments sounded fairly crisp and had decent separation. The bass came through deep and strong from the subwoofer. A PCM stereo track is also included and sounded nearly equally as impressive, for those without a surround setup. Although there were only a few basic camera angles used, the camera work perfectly captured the intimacy and atmosphere of the small club, as well as the brilliance of Stevie and Double Trouble's performance. Close-ups were used effectively to focus on his fretwork, the emotion on his face, and the awe of the crowd. Bonus material includes an excellent 20-minute, interview with Double Trouble members Chris Layton and Tommy Shannon, which was conducted in 1999. A timeline features career highlights between 1983 and 1999, and a discography lists all of Vaughan's albums and the song list from each album. Live At The El Mocambo is a truly historic performance of a young and hungry Stevie Ray Vaughan, back when he still had something to prove - and prove he did! This is an essential DVD for any Vaughan fan, or fan of great guitar playing in general. Reviewed by Paul M. Roy - November 2004 |
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Running Time: 63 Minutes |
DVD Release Date - October 2002 |