DVD Review: Carly Simon Live From Martha's Vineyard (B-)

Carly Simon: Live from Martha's Vineyard (1988)
Starring Carly Simon
MPAA: UR
Grade: B-
Review by Scott Standish

Carly Simon is a true survivor, one of those singer/songwriters that you can't help but like. This live concert (filmed on the docks on Martha's Vineyard) from 1988 shows off her skills fairly well and for fans of Carly, this is probably a must have.

The concert film starts with sweeping shots of Martha's Vineyard: boats coming in, seagulls playing on the shore. All of this sets up the casual nature of the concert quite well. Carly walks onto the docks like she does these kind of concerts all the time, when in fact it's widely known that she suffers from stage fright and rarely performs live.

Carly and her quite capable band churn out the hits here and for fans of Carly, it doesn't get any better. Anticipation, You're So Vain, Nobody Does It Better - the list goes on and on. The performance here is good, but as many have pointed out, the audio is very strange during the show. It sounds over-filtered, almost like the band is lip-synching (although they obviously were not).

Carly Simon: Live from Martha's Vineyard is an excellent concert film for true Carly fans. But for the simply curious, I doubt this will blow you away.

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