You know how a lot of what makes The Office so funny is how downright unfunny David Brent is? There's something of a similar atmosphere to the documentary that takes an important hour-long place on this double DVD set. Keane come across as jolly nice middle class boys with good manners, but not everyone can be interesting all the time and this fan-made featurette seems to focus far too much on the dull moments.
Following the band on tour in the US, the documentary is introduced with vocal commentary from the man who made it, explaining that he is a fan with little experience of documentary-making, who can't believe he managed to persuade the band to let him film them.
You'd think someone at the label could've helped with the editing process to make it look a little less amateur, but rather this seems to have been left looking like no one bothered editing it at all. The interesting bits could have been fitted in to about ten minutes; the rest is filled with Tim, Tom and Richard sitting around, being ordinary guys who just happen to live on a tour bus and play songs at night. Even their mums might fall asleep with boredom.
There's a section towards the end that tries so hard to be a little bit controversial, showing the band having a little fall out. However, with no real hint towards why they had the tiff, and just a bunch of camera shots of the boys sitting around in the bus talking about "talking about it", it looks like the fan wanted to show every side of the band but his sense of loyalty to the three individuals meant he also didn't want to give anything away.
The live portion of the DVD is equally awkward and poorly thought through. Unlike most live DVDs, this one takes each song from a different gig. This means there is no sense of continuity in the DVD and it feels like having loads of little snacks instead of a proper meal. The performances are good, and like the documentary, it will delight and amuse the hardcore fans perfectly.
But for those who aren't quite at the point of blind adoration, the strange patchwork show may give the impression that Keane can't perform all their songs well on every night (which isn't true - regardless of opinion on the music itself, Keane play it very well live from my experience, at least).
Nobody really seems to have thought this through at all, but perhaps with the Christmas rush fast approaching, they knew fine well they didn't have to. This will sell because it's Keane, and it'll sit in people's DVD collections gathering dust, because one watch through is really more than enough.
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