Black Country Communion

There are a dozen ways to skin the cat of performance DVDs and all too many ‘artists’ fall into the camp of believing that they have to create lasting filmic statements of their ‘journey’ while many others feel that the backstage battles and the rehearsal sessions are far more important than the actual gigs that their fans pay to go to see.
Thankfully BCC seem to have taken the view that the fans want to see them laying it down live and the filmic elements are confined to giving insights into the make up of the performance – the bead of sweat rolling down the side of Bomassas face in the middle of ‘Battle For Hadrian’s Wall’ or the looks between Hughes and Bonham during ‘Black Country’ signalling the changes in tempo and interviews between the tracks that are about the band and the music and not their views on Global warming or local politics.

End result is is what I – and I suspect many others – wanted, a close up of the songs and solos and the sheer power of the finest straight rock band on the planet.

I was lucky enough to see Black Country Communion twice last year and |I can say that this DVD really does capture the band in full flow.
Anyone who knows the band will know the tracks: ‘Black Country’, ‘Crossfire’, ‘Save Me’, ‘Battle For Hadrian’s Wall’ – look at the two albums and you can see the tracklisting. But what you can’t see from the tracklistiong is the way that all four musicians play as a unit and how the individual performances add together rather than being subsumed in to the overall sound.
Just looking at Hughes and Bonamassa leaning into each other at the climax of ‘Song of Yesterday’ while Bonham is hammering out the power and Sherinian’s keys are creating a huge soundscape for them to play against you begin to understand BCC as a band rather than four superstars.
All over the DVD you see Hughes as the total Rock frontman, all poses and grimaces alongside his belting bassplaying but watch Bonamassa to see how it frees him to play when he isn’t worrying about being the vocalist as well and similarly watch Derek Sherinian to get a greater insight into what a great keyboards player can bring to a rock band.

The DVD is filmed sumptuously but the producers have kept to the job of getting Black Country Communion over as a live outfit and satisfying the thousands who weren’t luckey enough to see them live: Job done and very well at that.

For one night only, on Tuesday November1st 2011 at 7:30pm, participating Vue Cinemas will screen Black Country Communion’s debut concert film “Live Over Europe” in high definition and Dolby 5.1 surround sound.
This one-off rock & roll cinema experience will feature an exclusive filmed introduction from all four members of Black Country Communion, and by pre –booking tickets via www.myvue.com/bcc, you will be automatically entered into a prize draw to win a guitar, signed by the band.
There is a signed guitar up for grabs at each of the 16 participating cinemas nationwide. The full list of participating Vue Cinemas is as follows:
London West End
Cambridge
Oxford
Portsmouth
Exeter
Bristol
Doncaster
Leicester Hull
Leeds
York
Birmingham
Edinburgh
Dublin
Bury
Swansea