Gary Moore & Friends: One Night in Dublin - A Tribute to Phil Lynott on Blu-ray Disc Review
By Brandon A. DuHamel
The Performance
The Irish Hard Rock band Thin Lizzy will always be remembered for their worldwide smash hits "The Boys Are Back in Town," "Whiskey in the Jar," and "Jailbreak." Their pioneering twin guitar attack against a Heavy Metal backdrop and the melding of Irish folk, Celtic mythology, and Blues created a unique and instantly recognizable musical style.
Regrettably, as is often the story in the world of Rock and Roll, feuding egos and drugs would not only break the band apart by the early-80's, but would claim the life of frontman and bassist Phil Lynott. On August 20, 2005, a statue of Phil Lynott was unveiled in Dublin by his mother to commemorate what would have been the late musician's 56th birthday. In honor of the occasion, Gary Moore, one of the former members of Thin Lizzy, organized a concert with all the former members of the band to honor Phil Lynott.
One Night in Dublin brings together the former members of Thin Lizzy for an energetic night of Hard Rock. With Moore taking on most of the lead vocal duties, Thin Lizzy numbers such as "Black Rose," "Cowboy Song," and "Don't Believe a Word" were all played to the crowd's obvious amusement, in addition to the aforementioned hits "Jailbreak," "The Boys Are Back in Town," "Whiskey in the Jar," and more.
What was a solemn occasion turned into an exciting celebration of a life cut short.
One Night in Dublin is good Rock 'n' Roll, and proves that though Lynott is gone, his music still endures.
The Picture
The original high definition 1.78:1 1080i/60 recording is transferred to Blu-ray in a strong AVC/MPEG-4 encoding that is free from macroblocking and posterization, displays little in the way of motion artifacts and has solid blacks and natural flesh tones. Video noise is subtle and detail is sharp with clear, lifelike imagery throughout the presentation. This is another strong effort from Eagle Rock.
The Sound
DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 (48kHz/24-bit), PCM 2.0 (48kHz/24-bit) and Dolby Digital 5.1 options are provided for this release. The lossless DTS-HD MA mix is the way to go here, with a nice wide soundstage, balanced instrumentation, smooth high frequencies and musical lows. Vocals are clear and dynamics are reasonably well preserved for program material such as this. Unfortunately, the sound on both the 5.1 and 2.0 mixes suffers from some clipping, but it is difficult to tell whether it is in the mastering or coming from the source itself. Either way, I found it to be distracting.
The Extras
The sole extra provided on this release is a series of interviews with the musicians wherein they discuss their experiences in Thin Lizzy and their relationship with Phil Lynott. It is informative and saddening at the same time.
Final Thoughts
Eagle Rock continues to prop up the BD concert video catalogue with solid efforts like this Gary Moore & Friends release. If you can get past the issue with the clipping in the soundmix, this is another rather enjoyable release.
Where to Buy
Product Details
- Performers: Gary Moore & Friends
- Video Codec: AVC/MPEG-4
- Audio/Languages: English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 (48kHz/24-bit), LPCM 2.0 (48kHz/24-bit) Dolby Digital 5.1
- Aspect Ratio: 1.78:1
- Number of discs: 1
- Rating: NR (Not Rated)
- Studio: Eagle Rock Ent
- Blu-ray Disc Release Date: April 21, 2009
- List Price: $24.98
- Extras:
