‘Pill, Live’ Delivers Frenzy, Not the Depth : ALANIS MORISSETTE “Jagged Little Pill, Live†Maverick/Warner Reprise Video (** 1/2)
This video document of Morissette on tour is most effective when it depicts the magnitude of the success that exploded during this 20-month world tour. With a rapid-fire pastiche of TV appearance introductions and award announcements, press conferences and interviews, “Jagged Little Pill, Live†(to be released Tuesday) conveys some of the dizzying nature of Morissette’s experience.
The singer appears to take it all in stride, but you can’t really be sure, because “Live†isn’t designed to be a probing look at stardom. Its less ambitious emphasis is on the music itself and, although it’s presented with some invention, it’s not enough to sustain the video’s 90-minute length.
Instead of showing a single complete performance of a song, the video combines footage from different renditions, demonstrating the development of Morissette and her band while underscoring the repetition demanded by a marathon tour.
Morissette is one of the intriguing new singers and songwriters of the decade, but she’s a limited performer who still hasn’t found a way to tap her charisma on stage, and “Live†tends to bog down in footage of her restless stomping and pacing. Some informal back-porch acoustic sessions and chamber-like performances are intimate and genuine, contrasting with the more faceless spectacle and arena-anthem approach of the big shows.
The video also revisits the familiar territory of life on the road and spends a lot of time on the horseplay of the singer and the guys in her band. Most of these scenes should have been saved for the participants’ family albums.
Morissette’s role as a co-director and co-producer guarantees an inside view, but it’s one that makes it hard to see the big picture. A detached eye might have given us a more compact account and a more revealing perspective.
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