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Simple Plan's first DVD consists of 18 short chapters, first introducing the band, then following their tour of various locations worldwide from Europe to Asia and Australasia, with the final chapter (Looking Back) being sub-divided into sections about the fans, playing live, and the MTV awards etc.
The editors clearly realised that a film of unpunctuated footage would have been extremely tedious and so they have cleverly packaged each section into mini films of three to six minutes' duration and somehow this actually does manage to make them quite interesting.
Because each chapter has a different title one has the impression of moving on to a new subject at the end of each chunk, although the reality is that each is much the same as any of the others and none of them tell any kind of story, chronological or otherwise; they are simply a collection of performance shots, transport shots and shots of the band playfully kidding around, interspersed with oblique comments from the lads themselves.
The five are basically quite entertaining when presented like this (i.e. in small doses) and I managed to watch for nearly 50 minutes without a break. The final chapter, Looking Back, has some more serious armchair and hillside reflections by the boys, each of them giving as much depth and sincerity as they can muster after the highs and lows of the tour (don't expect too much).
Much like Green Day in lyrics and musical style, Simple Plan have little to say of great interest or importance to someone who, like myself, woke up and started the day with The Ruts. I would classify the music as American Teen Rock, but I have also heard it called Power Pop and that seems just as applicable.
Essentially what they give is plenty of amplified rhythm guitar behind tuneful poppy singing, which carries the melody in the absence of anything else (e.g. lead guitar). There's nothing too aggressive or challenging here; the lyrics revolve around teen angst topics such as lonely obsessions with shallow love objects, not wanting to get out of bed in the morning and not wanting to be told what to do by anyone (yawn).
Musically we're on the safe side of tame here as well with Simple Plan being a very straight five piecer: drums, bass, rhythm guitars and a singer. Certainly they do sound okay live, as the additional three-track music CD shows, but really more along the lines of some of the bands I remember my schoolmates playing in than what I would think of as world class material. (Okay, maybe Simple Plan's timing is a bit better than a school band.)
Nevertheless, if you're one of the million-plus people who like Simple Plan, then you should be fairly entertained by this package.
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