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My beef with live DVDs in general, and KMFDM's Sturm & Drang 2002 Tour DVD in particular, is that watching a live performance on DVD is dull. There's no spontaneity. Either the show is staged and shot by a professional film crew or the performance is assembled from the tour's best takes; either way, it's unlikely that you'll see the gig where the vocalist falls off the stage and breaks his leg, or over-eager audience members pull the keyboard player's top off, or an unpopular single is greeted by a hail of bottles and broken glass. Most of the bands who'd be inclined to air their dirty laundry like that can't afford to release a DVD.
Sturm & Drang followed a route explored by many other bands, interspersing "video tour diary" material with the live songs. It's actually far more interesting to see what a touring band does when they're not on stage -- to watch them while away endless hours on the tour bus, visit truck stops and gas station convenience stores at all hours of the day and night, hang out at hotels and restaurants and generally look incongruous in the "real" world beyond the club stage. After viewing Sturm & Drang, I suggested that I'd far rather see a full disc of offstage material than another live DVD.
To a great extent, WWIII delivers. There's still a live performance, of course, made even more redundant by the fact that the same set was released as a live CD, but the production and editing seems more dynamic; perhaps the band's association with major label offshoot Sanctuary Records allowed a higher budget. Happily, there's twice as much road footage, or at least there seems to be. Although the loosely structured narrative begins during the band's tour rehearsals and ends at...well, the tour's end, a quick glance at the tour dates suggests that we're not seeing a particularly linear story. This isn't reality TV, after all; we're mostly treated to hijinks and backstage silliness and conversations that may or may not have been staged for the camera, while the more dramatic tour issues (health concerns, arguments with venue personnel, family problems) are not touched upon. In other words, it's not a documentary, on the offchance that you were expecting one.
Early on, we're re-introduced to the band members. Band leader Sascha Konietzko is an amiable cipher this time around, maintaining a low profile on video and leaving most of the clowning around to his fellow players. Debauched vocalist Ray Watts makes every effort to steal the show with his broad mix of rock star antics and character comedy, tossing in a few bursts of prima donna behavior for good measure. Vocalist Lucia Cifarelli comes across as a lot more fun this time around -- she's warm and funny and friendly and doesn't seem at all bothered by being the only girl on the tour. We first meet her as she models her new "tour costume" -- a yellow and black latex catsuit -- in which she looks a bit like an evil superhero as played by actress Rachel Weisz. (It looks pretty damn hot, too, 'til you read Lucia's tour diaries, thoughtfully included on the disc, and get the mental image of the costume's legs actually filling up knee-high with sloshing sweat...at which point it's still "hot", I guess, but not in the same way.) Guitarists Jules Hodgson and Steve White are something of a double act: White seems perpetually bemused and delighted by the rigors and vices he encounters on tour, while Hodgson alternates between bursts of calm maturity and drunken rock star caricature. Drummer Andy Selway pops up periodically to dole out nuggets of punk rock misanthropy.
Oh, screw it -- those are generalizations at best. Over the course of the disc, we get to know not only KMFDM but their whole touring ensemble. Crew-members score as much screen time as band-members, and are even featured in the DVD's bonus interview material. As a result, we're reminded again and again of the important roles played by all of these behind-the-scenes pros, and we see how they fit into the tour's odd but wonderful extended family.
KMFDM also love their fans, and they show it -- not just by thanking them repeatedly on the DVD, but by getting as many of them on screen as possible. We see a lot of them, including a few whose parents may well have met during the group's first US tour. Once again, the group's attitude is commendable -- they truly seem to care about the fans and the music, not the money and the perks of touring. If that's not the case (and I think it is), they've done a masterful spin job here.
Other than the live footage and other video material, WWIII features a handful of extras, some of them already alluded to in previous paragraphs. There are interviews (of varying length) with pretty much every band and crew member, photos, studio footage, fan club meet and greet footage, electronic press kit stuff, lyrics and text reproductions of Lucia and KMFDM webmaster Jeff Cohn's tour diaries. (If you take the time to go through these, you'll get a more accurate, less sugar-coated idea of some of the less-pleasant tour experiences.) Hardcore fans will be busy for hours. There's also an easter egg: twenty additional minutes of Lucia modeling her costume. Actually, no. I'm lying about that part.
All told, it's a greatly improved package, and one that I can see watching several times. There are a few annoyances -- the initial menu animation gets annoying very quickly, and a few features offer no easy exit if you don't want to sit through them -- but overall, I was very satisfied.
Now if only Sanctuary could keep the band touring six months out of the year... think of the TV show we could get from that.
-- George Zahora
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