The Concert for Bangladesh

Rating:
Summary: Never mind George/Bob/Ringo - look at Billy Preston!
Review: Billy Preston almost steals the spotlight from Eric Clapton on his One More Car, One More Rider DVD with his infectious smile and swirling Hammond B3 sounds. On the Concert for Bangladesh he absolutely brings the house down with "That's The Way God Planned It". This and "Jumpin Jack Flash" is worth the price alone.

Rating:
Summary: The First & Greatest Benefit Concert. Ever.
Review: Great concert, great music, inept camera work (thus only 4 stars). Sound, produced by Phil Spector, is actually excellent. It is the same as the theatrical version of the concert movie. It can be hard to find.

This came at the end of a running, multi-year collaboration between George Harrison, Eric Clapton, the Delaney & Bonnie Band, Dave Mason and a whole host of others including a young Phil Collins. Many of the main musicians except for Bob Dylan had been playing together for years and it shows on the strong renditions of Harrison's songs. Harrison, Clapton, the D&B band and Phil Spector had just finished the All Things Must Pass epic album, and Clapton and others from the crew had recorded the Layla album, also epic. After this some of the same people went on tour with Joe Cocker as 'Mad Dogs and Englishmen.' You simply could not have assembled a better band than this in the early 70s.

For this concert, it is the D&B musicians backing Harrison, Ringo Starr, Clapton and every great session player in the vicinity. These performances launched the careers of Billy Preston and Leon Russell and returned Bob Dylan to the radio after a long absence.

It starts with Harrison explaining the notion of a benefit concert and how he came to organize it. This was the first benefit rock concert and really has not been equalled since. It also has some songs by Ravi Shankar and a small, all-star band of Indian musicians, as well as a few scenes of the suffering of the starving people of Bangladesh.

Rating:
Summary: Nothing Short of Fantastic!
Review: I have not viewed this film since it made the theater rounds back in 1972. What a rare treat to see it again. It was hard to find a DVD of this classic performance, and I wonder why the U.S. distributors are not offering it. I had to go to an auction site to find one. Anyway, due to the passage of time, the songs sound better now than they did back then. Seeing George, Leon, Dylan, Preston, and Ringo again on that stage was a true breath of fresh air, and a macro burst of nostalgia. Makes me glad to have lived in that era as a young adult. You just do not see talent like this anymore. If you can find one, buy it.

Rating:
Summary: One of the best rock concerts !!
Review: I purchased this DVD several years ago. It is made by a company called Panorama, distributed in Hong Kong. The quality is not that grea, in fact it looks like they gave a twelve year old a a camera and told him to have fun but.....who cares? Harrison sings "My Sweet Lord", "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" w/ Eric Clapton displaying how to make a guitar weep. Dylan, Billy Preston, and Leon Russell doing a GREAT rendition of Jumping Jack Flash. The spririt of the enterprise is pure George Harrison: music should be a spritual endeavor, and music should ultimately benefit humanity.

Rating:
Summary: Concert For Bangladesh ( George Harrison )
Review: I WAS VERY VERY LUCKY TO FIND THIS DVD OF THIS CONCERT. I LOOKED ON AMAZON QUITE AWHILE BACK AND COULDN'T FIND IT AND TRYED TO FIND IT IN STORE'S ALL OVER TOWN BUT NO LUCK. I WAS SURE I'D FIND IT IN THE MOST POPULAR MERCHANT OR DISCOUNT STORES, BUT SADLY FOUND OUT I WAS WRONG. I EVEN TRIED TO ORDER IT IN SEVERAL LOCATION'S INCLUDING A POPULAR BOOK STORE AND THEY SAID THEY OWN AMAZON.COM BUT TOLD ME IT WAS OUT OF PRINT AND RECENTLY FOUND IT ON AMAZON.COM BUT IT SAID IT WAS ALSO "OUT OF PRINT " BUT HAD A LINK TO BUYING IT " NEW OR USED SO I LOOKED AND FOUND WHERE TO ORDER IT FROM AND DID. I COULDN'T BE MORE HAPPY, I FIRST SAW IT AT THE MOVIE THEATRE MANY, MANY YEARS AGO WHEN IT CAME OUT AND WAS QUITE SURPRIZED TO FIND THAT THIS DVD WAS EXACTLY AS I REMEMBERED IT, "EXACTLY". THE PICTURE WAS EXCELLANT AND THE AUDIO WAS FLAWLESS. I LOVE THIS DVD AND ANY TRUE FAN OF GEORGE AND/OR THE BEATLES NEEDS TO ADD THIS TO THEIR BEATLES COLLECTION THEY WON'T BE DISAPPOINTED IN THE SLIGHTEST IN MY OPINION OF COURSE, FOR WHAT IT'S WORTH! IF ANYONE DOWNGRADES THIS DVD THEY ARE DEFINATELY NOT A DEVOTED OR REAL TRUE BEATLES FAN OR THEY WOULD SHUT UP, THIS IS ONE OF MY BEST BEATLES DVD OR BETTER YET, BEST OF ALL MY CONCERT DVD'S. YOU MUST BUY IT, BUT THAT'S JUST MY OPINION

Rating:
Summary: The Concert For Banla Desh, First true Live Benefit
Review: Long before "Farm Aid" and "We are the World", George & Ravi put together this fantastic show. Although I wasn't anywhere near Madison Square Garden, I read an article about this benefit in my doctor's office. The show was billed, George Harrison & Friends benefit for Bangla Desh. Can you imagine the surprise those lucky ticket holders experienced when they saw George's friends? A few weeks later, I saw the show advertised in the local newspaper and that the film was showing at a local movie theater. My friend and I went and stayed all day (watched it over and over). Many people don't realize the reason the sound is excellent. Up to that date, it was the most microphones/tracks ever used to record a concert. The engineer was none other than Phil Spector! Order this concert, it is the Best Of The Best for the era. You won't be disappointed!

Rating:
Summary: Pricey, but worth it!
Review: On August 1, 1971 at New York City's Madison Square Garden, George Harrison set the stage for the plethora of rock and roll benefit concerts that followed in its wake. Upon the request of his friend and fellow musician, Ravi Shankar, Harrison gathered a group of musicians to raise funds to aid the starving people of Bangladesh. This DVD presents the highlights of that concert.

The DVD opens with press conference footage of George Harrison announcing his participation in the Concert for Bangladesh. It moves swiftly to Harrison introducing Ravi Shankar and his accompanying musicians, Usted Aliakbar Khan, Alla Rakah and Kamala Chakravarty. Harrison asks the rock-and-roll oriented audience members for their patience during the Indian music session of the program.

George introduces Ravi Shankar and the Indian musicians. Shankar discusses the starvation problem inn Bangladesh and also asks for the patience of the audience during the Indian music set. When the audience applauds after the musicians tune their instruments, Ravi quips. "If you appreciate the tuning so much, I hope you will enjoy the playing more." His comment seems to endear the audience, who are clearly waiting to rock out with two former Beatles and other rock icons.

When George Harrison first introduced 'his' Indian music to us in the 1960s, I really tried to appreciate it. A friend and I even went to a Ravi Shankar performance when he appeared in our city. (Coincidentally, it was in the same movie theater where we had seen A Hard Day's Night and Help!). It was a little too much for me those 30-plus years ago. But after learning more about eastern philosophy and embracing meditation as part of my life, I find myself thoroughly enjoying this portion of the DVD. I was even actually disappointed that it wasn't longer!
After the Indian music set, we see a brief backstage glimpse of George Harrison, Ringo Starr, Leon Russell, Phil Spector and Allen Klein.

Onstage, we see the ever intense George Harrison, all in white with his long beard, looking so un-Beatlesque. Ringo Starr is on drums. Eric Clapton is on guitar. Leon Russell is on piano and Billy Preston is on keyboards.

This DVD offers an hour and a half of the best music from this concert. It's refreshing to see straight concert footage, shot documentary style, with none of the MTV-style editing and obscure camera shots. You really can kick back and just enjoy one of the best "supergroups" ever assembled on one stage.

Track Listing

Indian Music - Ravi Shankar
Wah Wah - George Harrison
My Sweet Lord - George Harrison
Awaiting On You All - George Harrison
That's The Way God Planned It - Billy Preston
It Don't Come Easy - Ringo Starr
Beware of Darkness - George Harrison
While My Guitar Gently Weeps - George Harrison
Jumpin' Jack Flash - Leon Russell
Youngblood - Leon Russell
Here Comes The Sun - George Harrison
A Hard Rain's Gonna Fall - Bob Dylan
It Takes a Lot to Laugh/ It take a Train to Cry - Bob Dylan
Blowin' In the Wind - Bob Dylan
Just Like a Woman - Bob Dylan
Something - George Harrison
Bangladesh - George Harrison

Musicians

George Harrison, guitar and vocals
Ringo Starr, drums and vocals
Jim Keltner, drums
Billy Preston, keyboards and vocals
Leon Russell, piano and vocals
Klaus Voorman, bass
Jesse Ed Davis, guitar
Eric Clapton, guitar
Bob Dylan, guitar and vocals
Badfinger - Pet Ham, Tom Evans, Joey Molland, Mike Gibbons
Hollywood Horn Players, led by Jim Horn
Ravi Shankar, sitar
Allan Beutler
Chuck Findley
Marlin Greene
Jeanie Greene
Jo Green
Jim Horn
Delores Hall
Kamala Chakravarty
Jackie Kelso
Usted Aliakbar Khan
Claudia Lennear
Lou McCreary
Ollie Mitchell
Don Nix
Don Preston
Carl Radle
Alla Rakah

Credits

Directed by Saul Swimmer
Produced by George Harrison and Allen Klein
Music Recording Produced by Phil Spector and George Harrison
Edited by Howard Lester
Editing Staff: Roger Rodewald, Harvey Bekowsky, Sharon Goldberg
Negative Supervision: Charles Diana
Production Manager: Steve Bono
Photographed by: Sol Negrin, Richard Books, Fred Hoffman, Tohru Nakamura
70mm prints by Film Effects of Hollywood
Film sound mixed by Bob Fin
Title Design by Perri & Smith
Original soundtrack recording available on Apple Records
Released by Apple and 20th Century Fox Film Corporation
1972
Lyric subtitle choices: English and Portuguese

The DVD is in color, although I had to adjust the usual color level settings on my television set to bring up the color - otherwise, it appeared in a sepia tone.

The DVD is a little pricey considering there are no "extras" as we DVD aficionados have come to expect, but hey, it's George Harrison and Ring Starr and I'm a Beatles DVD completist!

Rating:
Summary: Brilliant
Review: The musicians who came together for this event are all so amazing, and make the experience of watching this pure magic.

Rating:
Summary: magnificent: a door for benefit aids
Review: this film represents more than a single appearance of rock stars and indian music genius Ravi Shankar: is the open door to all new support aids, from Live Aid to Concert for Unicef and We are the World.
the help that george harrison, with a little help from his friends, was the most generous act of Love that world meet in the XXth century, almost a Jesus act...

greetings...

JOnAS Gould as a paquito's guest...

Rating:
Summary: RE-ISSUE 'Concert for Bangladesh' on DVD, Pls...
Review: Who single handily influenced me, at a tender age of 12, to care about the suffering from the great flood that year, George did. And, with kudos from my father, I brought my first ever Benefit Concert record that same year. I am still proud to have had contributed to George's cause that year, and I know I am a better person today because of it. Thanks to him and to my father for opening my eyes to the great many humanitarian causes and needs.

I still have the same record some thirty-two years later, and although I had brought the CD several years back, I think it is a high-time for me to buy a DVD to show my kids; my contribution to the Generation X I fondly call them, how a mass of people in this country, regardless of their race, age, gender, religion, all came together under one great flag that year and actually gave God something to smile about.

Rumors of financial scandal in the distribution of relief fund immediately following the year of the concert notwithstanding, the noble action of great many that year counts for something. Also notwithstanding, a seemingly lack of sophistication in the making of that concert, but the musicianship and the genuine fan participation still out-shine many present day events. A true `Jewel' and a true `Triumph of the Human Spirit'! And it would be a shame and a mockery, if the re-issue of this watershed DVD were being debated today on the ground of profitability. This event is a `Public Domain', and should belong to the entire human race.