Though he was a cult favorite from the moment he first appeared in “New Mutants” #98 in February of 1991, Deadpool has since joined the ranks of Dr. Strange, Ant Man, and Ghost Rider as one of Marvel Comic’s best love second stringers. Now he’s been given the ultimate honor — no, he’s not on the cover of Mad magazine…or hosting Saturday Night Live…or finally getting his own movie starring Ryan Reynolds — he’s gotten his own table on Zen Studio’s Zen Pinball 2 for the PlayStation 4, PlayStation 3, and PlayStation Vita, and for Pinball FX 2 on the Xbox 360.
In 1975, Alejandro Jodorowsky — a Chilean/French avant-garde filmmaker best known for such cult movies as 1970’s El Topo and 1973’s The Holy Mountain — tried to turn Frank Herbert’s epic 1965 sci-fi novel Dune into a movie. But while the film never got made, the story of this spectacular failure is chronicled in the documentary Jodorowsky’s Dune, which Sony Pictures Home Entertainment are releasing as a Blu-ray/DVD combo pack. But this is small consolation because while the doc is engrossing, what Jodorowsky had planned for Dune would’ve been quite spectacular.
Released in 2011, The Raid: Redemption became an instant cult classic by injecting raw martial arts fighting and an unflinching attitude into an Die Hard-esque action movie. Now we have The Raid 2, which Sony Pictures Home Entertainment are releasing on DVD, Blu-ray, and digitally. But while sequels typically soften their edges or rehash the same ideas — y’know, like Die Hard 2 did — The Raid 2 is one of those rare sequels that matches, and in some ways surpasses, its predecessor.
With a name like Sniper Elite III, you’d expect this World War II third-person shooter to have a lot of long distance gunplay. And it does. But thanks to the inclusion of a silenced pistol, stealth kills,and general sneakiness, Sniper Elite III — which was made by Rebellion for the Xbox One, Xbox 360, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 3, and PC — also lets you get up close and personal…and the game is all the better for it. It’s just too bad it isn’t better overall.
When the sci-fi show Helix was first announced, potential fans wondered if it would be as good as the other one produced by Ronald D. Moore, Battlestar Galactica. And while we now know that no, no it isn’t, after seeing Helix again on DVD or Blu-ray, it’s clear that this freaky medical drama is worth checking out. Well, at least once.
For the last few years, Transformers fans have taken comfort in the knowledge that while the movies were terrible, the games were decent, sometimes even good. Sadly, this is not the case with Transformers: Rise Of The Dark Spark, a piss poor third-person shooter that Activision are releasing on the PlayStation 4, PlayStation 3, Xbox One, Xbox 360, WiiU, and PC.
It’s interesting: put a mellow song on an album of otherwise upbeat tunes, and it’s a nice change of pace; but put an upbeat song on an album of otherwise mellow tunes, and it’s a mood killer that potentially ruins the album.
It’s this latter condition that slightly impedes Last Dance (CD, vinyl, digital), a collection of mostly moody jazz duets album from pianist Keith Jarrett and bassist Charlie Haden.
With vastly improved sound, which makes these classic albums sound more vibrant and alive than they have in decades, the first batch of Led Zeppelin reissues — 1969’s eponymous debut, 1969’s II, and 1970’s III — are clearly worth the upgrade. But when deciding whether to get the regular, single-disc versions or the two-disc deluxe editions, things get a little more murky.
The easiest choice comes with the deluxe edition of the first album, the second disc of which presents Led Zeppelin’s October 10, 1969 show at the Olympia in Paris, France. A blistering concert, this seventy-minutes-plus-long show has the band tearing through such tracks as “Dazed And Confused,” “How Many More Times,” and the one-two punch of “Good Times Bad Times” into “Communication Breakdown.” It even has them playing “Heartbreaker” and “Moby Dick,” songs from II, which came out less than two week later. While the band may have played longer shows back then, they didn’t play many that were better.
Unfortunately,
the second discs of both the II and III deluxe edition are far less impressive.
Instead of a live show, the deluxe edition of Led Zeppelin’s II presents a half hour of outtakes, most of which are just alternate versions of songs from this second album. But while the slightly different “Rough Mix With Vocal” version of “Whole Lotta Love” is interesting enough that you’ll actually want to listen to it more than once, the same can’t be said for most of the other songs. The “Rough Mix With Vocal” versions of “Heartbreaker,” “Ramble On” and “What Is What Should Never Be” are, as advertised, are basically rougher-sounding versions of these songs, while the “Backing Track” versions of “Thank You,” and “Living Loving Maid (She’s Just A Woman)” just sound like the originals with Robert Plant’s vocal stripped out.
Even less interesting? The “Backing Track” version of “Moby Dick,” which is just the beginning and the ending of the song, and has none of John Bonham’s impressive drumming. In fact, the only truly new bit of music on the deluxe edition of Led Zeppelin’s II is “La La,” an instrumental that actually doesn’t sound like Led Zeppelin at all. Which means that, aside from the alt take on “Whole Lotta Love,” the deluxe edition of II is as waste of time.
Things are a little better…
on the second disc of Led Zeppelin’s III’s deluxe edition, though really not until the end with the instrumental “Jennings Farm Blues,” which includes elements of “That’s The Way,” and a jam on the blues classics “Key To The Highway” and “Trouble In Mind.” Sadly, though, the rest of the second disc isn’t as impressive. Again, the lack of vocals on the “Track (No Vocal)” versions of “Friends” renders it useless, while the “Alternate Mix” editions of “Immigrant Song” (called “The Immigrant Song”) and “Celebration Day,” and the “Rough Mix” of “Gallows Pole” (save for some guitar strumming at the end), don’t make them different enough to be of interest.
Only the “Rough Mix” of “Since I’ve Been Loving You” (which has a totally different vocal track and guitar solo, among other things), and the “Rough Mix With Dulcimer & Backwards Echo” edition of “That’s The Way” are really all that different, as is “Bathroom Sound,” which is basically “Out On The Tiles” reworked into an instrumental. And even you may not think they’re different enough to warrant keeping.
What’s annoying is that there are other tracks that have been floating around collector’s circles for years that are more interesting than what’s included here. Stuff like the acoustic blues jam that had them going from “Feel So Bad” into “Fixin’ To Die” into “That’s Alright,” which was supposedly recorded around the time of III. Or one of the many live versions of The Yarbirds’ “Train Kept A Rollin’” that Led Zeppelin played a lot in the early days.
There’s also a lot of stuff that’s already been released, though it’s still relevant. Coda, Led Zeppelin’s 1982 posthumous collection of outtakes, included an unused track from the III sessions called “Poor Tom,” and if you also include unique songs only played live, you could add “We’re Gonna Grove,” “C’Mon Everybody,” and “Something Else” from the Albert Hall show part of the Led Zeppelin DVD, as well as the songs “The Girl I Love She Got Long Black Wavy Hair,” “Traveling Riverside Blues,” and “Something Else” from 1997’s BBC Sessions.
Then there’s the question mark that is 1975’s Physical Graffiti. Nearly half of that album’s fifteen tracks were originally recorded for other albums, including “Bron-Yr-Aur” during sessions for III. What isn’t known — at least by me — is whether the versions on Physical Graffiti are the originals, or were reworked for that album, and if the latter, how different were those original tracks? Because if they were different, it would be cool to hear the original version of “Bron-Yr-Aur.”
But perhaps the biggest annoyance about the deluxe editions of Led Zeppelin’s II and III is that they don’t come with great live shows from their relevant tours like the first one does. Heck, they could’ve just put an audio version of the Royal Albert Hall show onto the II collection, especially if they restored it to its original running order.
Though I do appreciate that Led Zeppelin didn’t tack the extra tracks onto the same disc as the albums, even though there is room on the CD. While it might’ve made them slightly cheaper, it’s better that they preserved the sanctity of these albums.
Still,
if we’re judging these collections on what they are, instead of what they’re not, the deluxe editions of Led Zeppelin’s II and III still fall short, if only because most of the stuff on their respective second discs aren’t much more than curiosities, interesting artifacts you’d only listen to once, not new songs or radically different versions of old classics. Let’s hope the deluxe editions of Led Zeppelin’s other albums do a better job.
SCORE:
Led Zeppelin: 9.5/10
Led Zeppelin (deluxe edition): 9.5/10
II (regular edition): 9.5/10
II (deluxe edition): 6.0/10
III (regular edition): 9.5/10
III (deluxe edition): 7.5/10
To read my review of Led Zeppelin’s untitled fourth album and Houses Of The Holy, click here.
It always strikes me as funny when something considered high brow clearly has roots in things once, or still, considered low brow. Take HBO’s Southern Gothic crime drama True Crime, which is now being released on DVD and Blu-ray. While critics rightfully applauded its direction, writing, acting, and cinematography, the show is firmly rooted in the kind of pulpy, noir-ish crime novels that were once dismissed as junk. Which is why True Crime will appeal to those who enjoy quality television dramas as well as dark crime stories, especially if they watch it on this collection, which presents it with the picture and sound quality it deserves.
