Review of Music In High Places: Alanis Morissette Live In The Navajo Nation

Introduction

Although many people first heard of Alanis around 1995/6, she`d actually been around in the music business for a while longer. However, it was only after signing for Madonna`s Maverick record label, teaming up with Glen Ballard and releasing "You Oughta Know", that she became popular with the masses. Her earlier career in dance/pop is probably best forgotten as is her first single recorded in 1984. Hir first album has now sold something like 20 million copies, and follow ups have performed well, despite being a little disappointing.

This DVD combines "the culture, history and spirituality of the Navajo Nation" with the sound of Alanis unplugged (and yes, she`s already done an MTV Unplugged album).

Video

A non-anamorphic 1.85:1 transfer, which while there`s little wrong with it (for an NTSC source) begs the question "why bother with widescreen if you`re not going anamorphic"? Particularly given some of the amazing scenery on show here (which is half of the point of the Music in High Places series!)

It`s all watchable enough with only the odd digital artefact and a bit of softness along the way. It`s just a shame that they stopped at the halfway house of non-anamorphic. If this all sounds a bit familiar, it`s because almost all of the releases in this series "suffer" in this way.

Audio

A DD5.1 soundtrack, with the option of stereo if needed. It works pretty well, although most of the sound appears from the front speakers. There is some nice work for the surrounds now and again, trying to re-create the acoustics of the rather fantastic locations. Very good overall.

Features

A brief biography, interview and two short and pointless featurettes "Getting There" and "Behind The Scenes".

Conclusion

What you get is good enough, although I question the choice of songs, as I think that there`s much better material that could have been performed. The performances themselves are good, as Morissette shows herself to be a good performer as well as a songwriter. If you`re a mega-fan, you`ll probably want this, but you might find it cheaper to import from another region. More casual fans might just pass up on this one, I probably would.

As with other discs in the series, my one gripe is that it`s far too short, and it would have been much nicer to see a lot more music. It`s bad value for money at £19.99 for about 30-40 minutes of music and 10-20 minutes of other stuff.