Other Extras:
Interview with Brian & Clive
Slideshows
OK class, time for a history lesson. Once upon a time, the Reading Festival used to be an excellent rock festival. And by that I mean a proper Rock Festival, not the weak Radio One defined Killers / Kaiser Cheifs type of rock either. And they had prog bands there. Bands such as Marillion, Pallas, Pendragon and local boys Twelfth Night.
Twelfth Nights appearance at the festival in 1983 saw the band at their peak with Geoff Mann. Indeed this may have been his last appearance with the band, as he left soon after.
Their gig was supposedly professionally filmed, though this footage has never materialised, but recently audience camera footage of the bands set has surfaced and, although only 4 of the 6 tracks performed that day were usable, the band have painstakingly mated the visuals with archive Radio One Friday Rock Show audio.
So thanks to all that we get to see the band blast their way through The Ceiling Speaks, Creepshow, The Poet Sniffs A Flower and the classic Sequences.
As this is an historical piece, to criticise it would be like finding the Holy Grail and whinging that "it's a bit dented, isn't it". But still, it is a bit dented. This is in essence a handy cam audience bootleg albeit with near perfect sound. The action on stage is sometimes a little indistinct, some of the footage had to be replaced with stills, and you'll wish a sniper had taken out the pratt with the flag. Even given all that it still has it's charm.
On top of that, you do get an insightful interview with Brian Devoil and Clive Mitten and another four live tracks; We Are Sane, This City, Fact and Fiction and Afghan Red; recorded at the Reading University in January 1983. The DVD is rounded off with some slideshows and a couple of Easter Eggs. Which I didn't find.
This is not a DVD for the casual fan of the band, or the curious outsider, but it never set out to be that. This is a piece of history for real fans to reminisce over.
