Band of Gypsys: Live at the Fillmore East

Watch it. ...if you love music, you'll agree that its one of the top 5 -10% at least.Amazing...The best combination of lyrics and music that's also an antiwar song. Listen to what he does with the guitar. The sounds of machine gun fire and bombs blazing. It's iconic and legendary for so many reasons. It's probably the best antiwar song of all time. This is peace...This is coming together. This is a recognition that we are all connected. We are we, and we are us.

The DVD delivers exactly what is advertised. The Black and white footage from the Third Show of the 4 total concerts played on December 31st, 1969 and January 1st, 1970. The footage is on the "Second Look" option on the main menu. If you press the first option you will only get the documentary. I'm surprised that a lot of people don't know to navigate around the menu to find everything. My only complaint is that I wish the footage wasn't so grainy and fuzzy looking. I get it was filmed over 50 years ago but plenty of other concerts from that era look much better. Also not all the footage that was filmed was included. The back of the box has photos from one of the other shows which was also filmed at least partially.

OK Documentary but not the main reason for buying this. The concert (Second Look) BW meh video but 5.1 sound. I actually like it a lot even with the marginal video but very good sound - really cool to see them play regardless. Someone bitched about number of songs. It's 58 mins long and if your a fan of the Machine Gun/Band of Gypsys excellent sound. Essential Hendrix. Kind of a time machine.

I've had Band of Gypsies on cassette since I was a schoolboy 20 years ago. I played it non stop in every car I owned, until they stopped making cars with cassette decks - then I had to get the CD. To this day if you get in my car, you're listening to Band of Gypsies. End of story.Finally decided to buy this DVD and I'm glad I did. The documentary is really interesting, I'm ashamed to admit I never knew there was so much back story to the Band of Gypsies. As pointed out in other posts, there is full concert footage in the extras so no one's ripping us off.The combination with Buddy Miles gave Jimi a totally different sound to anything else he ever did, and the innate understanding between Billy Cox and Jimi is always a pleasure to observe. It will always be my favourite Hendrix performance, and I'm grateful to this DVD for giving me a better understanding of the history around it.Could have done without comments from Slash, but I dunno I guess they decided they needed a white guy?

I was pleasantly surprised by this video. I was expecting to see just the raw b&w early-generation Sony video. It does include this. Plus, it includes great interviews with Buddy Miles, Billy Cox, and Eddie Kraemer, among others. Nice documentary that captures the excitement of the performances on 12/31/69 and 1/1/70 (my brother and I were there for the later show on New Year's Day). A lot of people have put down Buddy Miles' vocals; I don't agree. What they may fail to realize is that, on stage, he was a powerhouse drummer who added depth and strength to the total sound that Jimi was striving to create. Listen to the other recordings of Machine Gun later in 1970 with Mitch Mitchell on drums and you'll see what I mean. The DVD includes both the documentary (inspersing the b&w video with color interviews), plus, as a separate track, the complete original b&w taping. Well worth the money. Enjoy!

For those of you that are expecting a live concert, this has concert footage but it is broken into clips with talking in between in the typical documentary style. For me that diminishes the concert experience. I think it is deceptive marketing to title it "Band of Gypsys Live at the Fillmore East." The live footage is really blurry with ghosts coming off Hendrix and everything else, but the sound is good for 1970. The documentary part is pretty interesting as well but I would not have ordered it if I had known it was a documentary. For me, Hendrix did his most creative work with the Experience and the BOG period was less innovative and closer to typical R&B (although nothing about Hendrix is really typical!)

Despite what other reviewers might say this is INDEED a concert dvd! The documentary is the first selection on the menu but don't be fooled...there is an hour of concert footage in the "second look" title of the menu. Here you'll find the concert performance and in my opinion it's stellar!! There is two glitches where neither camera was recording..one in "who knows" and one in "stop" but that is really the only incomplete parts of the show, otherwise it's COMPLETE.The footage is grainy, black and white bootleg type camera work but the audio remastering by Eddie Kramer is killer...crank it up and enjoy show, it's EPIC Band of Gypsys! Jimi's playing at the zenith of his career and the musical collaboration between Jimi, Buddy Miles and Billy Cox results in a groundbreaking performance! Anyone who knows this music, is a fan of guitar or Hendrix MUST BUY THIS!!The documentary footage is awesome too...a lot of bang for your buck here!!!

It is tough to find good stuff on Jimi seeing that he was before the time of video cameras being everywhere, and the quality of some things is not very good. I liked this DVD. The footage of the Band of Gypsy's concert is not high quality, and it is black & white, but it is a historic moment captured by the film camera. There are some songs that didn't make it on the concert album. The sound quality is very good. If you collect all things Jimi, or are just looking for something you have never seen before, you should get this. It is worth the price.

Not what I was expecting, but not bad.