After a plethora of album retrospectives, it's time to go into other forms of Ramones media!
Ramones: It's Alive 1974-1996 is a 2-DVD live show set that sets out to be the ultimate retrospective of the band's many live performances. This is a collection of fan recorded footage (primitive era recording!), actual film footage of the famous 1977 It's Alive concert (thus this collection's name), and other recorded concerts and international TV show appearances. As much as it wants to be the ultimate retrospective, this DVD collection feels like someone is dangling a bigger collection of concert footage above you, only to take it away when you try to reach for it. It's a good, albeit incomplete retrospective of the band's concert run.
The available footage is good as you do get a retrospective of the band's progress and evolution from playing "Blitzkrieg Bop" in CBGB to headlining at River Plate Stadium in Argentina. The early fan footage on Disk 1 is the hardest to watch and listen as it was recorded with early camcorders and the tape those shows were on had aged significantly. It's also unfortunate that only one piece of footage was included from their initial year, as everything else on the disk (1976-77) has been well documented and represented. Setbacks aside, it's fun to watch the fan footage and the TV clips of the guys.
The compilation's marketed pièce de résistance is the 1977 It's Alive concert that was only seen in 30-second clips on numerous documentaries and Ramones related programs. I've written about the qualms I've had with the live album that was recorded from this concert, and I can unfortunately also write the same sentiments about the film footage. Yes, you are seeing the band play on stage in front of a live audience in England but you are not listening to the actual music that was played that night, and at this point you probably wont listen to the actual recording of the show's audio unless you dig deep somewhere. Again, I have to reference the Mark Prindle interview with Marky Ramone and the discussion about It's Alive's re-recording. The footage is also far from complete, but some of the missing songs have appeared on Youtube, and the footage itself appears to have been sped-up in some points.
Disk 2 jumps between different band eras, from the start of Marky's run all the way to CJ replacing Dee Dee and the end of the band's incredible run. The footage is better as most of it was professionally recorded and none of it is damaged. It's always great to get some bits of the brief time Richie was with the group (more would have been gladly accepted), as it always feels as if he's an unperson when it comes to Ramones merchandise. The songs vary greatly compared to the last disc, but it's fine to see how "Blitzkrieg Bop" became an experiment in speed playing.
While the rest of the footage is good, there's two great bits of footage missing: The rest of the River Plate Stadium concert, and the We're Outta Here footage. Again, you can see this footage on Youtube so there probably was a rights issue or a timing constraint that prevented the rest of the footage to come out. It puts a bit of a damper on things as those two concerts were a big deal for the band and need to be seen.
This DVD looks to be out of print, but you can get it for as low as $8 online on a few sites. It's a bargain price for what you're getting and I gladly recommend it for fans and even newcomers. Casuals listeners may be annoyed by the thirteenth version of "Blitzkrieg Bop", but you're getting a ton of music and history for a cheap price.
NEXT: Probably a book...
For my review of the It's Alive live album and its comparison to NYC 1978, click here!
