It's good but not great. It is more realistic than the Boston dvd since it has all but one song from the concert. I may be the only one, but I prefer the Boston dvd as a viewing experience over this one. The Elevation Boston concert dvd is tighter and Bono sounds a lot better, IMO. Plus I thought they nailed Bad/Streets beautifully in that dvd and I liked the ending better than Yahweh/40.
The 16:9 aspect ratio is a big deal for those of us with widescreen TV's. Kudos for them filming the Chicago concerts in widescreen. The Boston dvd was in regular 4:3 ratio.
Gripes for Chicago Vertigo dvd (not many at all):
- I get somewhat irritated at the lack of wide shots on the chicago dvd during some songs, but I understand that is Hamish's style. To be fair he nails a lot of great shots, especially with Adam strangely enough.
- Bono's voice is shot early on and he has real problems during certain songs. Nothing they can do about it since filming date is set way in advance.
- I thought the whole Africa speech was too long in the first leg. You can skip it easily though. I also kind of think the short Africa speech segue into Streets seemed to suck the life out of the crowd for some reason right before the Great Song started.
- Under-utilization of the curtain of lights in Leg 1. JMO, but when you have something that cool, you have to use it on more than just a handful of songs.
The song highlights for me are:
- COBL/Vertigo. I know a lot of people seem to dislike Vertigo, but it's a great concert song and COBL is an awesome opener and they hit it very well that night.
- Electric Co. Just an awesome awesome version of that song!
- New Years Day. Love the toned down efficiency with Adam prancing around the ellipse.. "Adam Clayton.. bass.. guitar".
- Love and Peace. The band really nailed this one as well.. Bono at his best smashing those drums.
- Bullet the Blue Sky with the cool Edge blues solo and distorted jet flying behind them on the curtain of lights.
- Running to Stand Still. Great to have this rare gem from the tour on dvd!
- Zoo Station/ The Fly if for nothing else than the fullest possible utilization of the lighting, stage and curtain of lights during those two songs.. man can they make those lights around the stage sparkle! This is where I had my biggest beef with the shortage of wide shots on the dvd.
- Mysterious Ways.. just an awesome performance of that song.. really cool. Too bad they didn't use the curtain of lights backdrop for that song like they did in Leg 3.
- OOTS was excellent as well and I believe it was the version of the song used in the Ipod commercial which is cool.
I am anxiously awaiting the Milan dvd!
I preferred Boston over Slane.. I just think that when all the people are closer to the stage in an indoor arena it kind of adds something to the show. Also the lighting is better indoors. And there aren't people a mile away squinting to see the stage like there were in Slane. I felt sorry for some of those folks.