Rating: 
Summary: fantastic audio - adequate video
Review: Man am I glad I didn't let the negative reviews talk me out of grabbing this concert dvd. Even if there was NO video the DTS 5.1 sound would be worth the price alone. Too many current concert dvds use the rears for mostly audience ambience and not for music. This disc uses all 5 speakers to the max with each having their own discreet sounds, truly one of the best sounding concert dvds I have heard. The video is not on par with a brand new movie but on my sony that squeezes the picture with it's anamorphic capabilities it is certainly adequate. If you are a Gabriel fan don't let this one pass you by, you will love it.
Rating: 
Summary: Audio and video out of sync
Review: One of my favorite concerts on video; however, the audio and video are out of sync for the entire video!
Rating: 
Summary: Great concert. Wish this DVD let me hear it.
Review: I'm a fan of Peter Gabriel's from way back. I bought this DVD excited to be able to see a concert I wasn't fortunate enough to attend in person.While I find the concert to look like a great one, the sound is absolutely horrible. Without using technical terms to describe the sonic attrocities here, I'll simply say that it sounds like someone is playing with the volume control. The volume is contantly changing and not by small amounts. Some of the tunes sound like they're fading out shortly after they begin. Makes me wonder if Peter Gabriel listened to the DVD before approving the release. If not, whoever did the final audio approval should not be hired again as it sounds like they didn't even bothered to listen. And this is touted on the package as being re-mastered for this disk. Had I rented this prior to purchase, I don't think I would have bought it. If I didn't like the concert part so much, I might even return the disk as defective, which the audio portion certainly is.
Rating: 
Summary: A must for Gabriel fans!
Review: Peter Gabriel does not disappoint on "Secret World Live." The performances of Peter and the band are excellent. There are a lot of complaints I have read about the video quality, but I find these to be exaggerated. I own a great deal of concert DVDs and this is one of my favorites. It's well worth the small price.
Rating:
Summary: Great concert...Poor video and sound quality
Review: I agree with all the other negativ ratings. Just one addition, the DTS Soundtrack is simply unusable.
Rating:
Summary: The BEST Concert DVD Disappointment Ever!!!
Review: Let me not waste too much of your time: Frankly, this is, hands down, the most amazing concert I have seen! This DVD offers a glimpse of why Peter Gabriel has a superb reputation as a live performer. The sound quality is spectacular! Unfortunately, I am SURE that Peter Gabriel had next to nothing to do with the planning for this Laser Disc converstion to DVD format. The picture quality is mediocre at best, due to the grainey picture quality. Peter Gabriel is one of the greatest showmen ever, and I am sure when you see this DVD that you will be in full agreement with me when I say that Peter Gabriel was violated by his video production company. An improved picture quality could make this the best concert DVD in publication. Still, this is a nice DVD to own if you've missed Peter Gabriel's shows. Just don't expect much from this DVD as an example of year 2003's DVD picture quality capabilities.....Sorry!
Rating: 
Summary: EXTREMELY DISAPPOINTED!
Review: What a letfdown. Gabriel should be ashamed of himself for letting this get released. I have videos from the 1960s that have video quality twice as good as this. I thought my copy was defective until I read the other reviews. Try again guys....
Rating:
Summary: Heartbroken
Review: I've been waiting for this concert to come out on DVD since the launch of the format. Hoping that it would improve on picture quality (which it does, slightly) and match, if not improve on the sound of the laserdisc were the primary reasons. Like most filmed concerts, it favors being shown on analoque displays with minimal processing. Video scaling just can't handle the lighting and color of most stage events. The picure is notabley quieter than the laserdisc version. The real bad new is that the recorded sound on this DVD is not the of same performance as either the CD or the Laserdisc (I've not heard the VHS). There is a different set of compromises from the previously mentioned versions, what's alarming and extremely disappointing is to watch one performance while hearing another. It's reverse lip syncing. What we see is an energetic live performance full of life and excitement. What we hear on the DVD is some compressed live sound way in the background with layered studio sound in the "foreground." The studio sound is of a performance with little energy at best. It's lifeless and awful. The laserdisc and pressumabley VHS versions on good gear will move the viewer to tears, or raise goosebumps, this is a mockery of the live performance it attempts to convey.
The fidelity of live performance is never the same as studio recordings. What makes live shows work is the complete performance, warts and all, if you will. The laserdisc and CD are not great from a pure fidelity standpoint, but they were "live" for the most part. The previous versions were "enhanced" with some studio gimmickry. The track:"In Your Eyes" on laserdisc being obviously rerecorded with some of the flaws evident on the DVD, only to a lesser extent. There is plenty serious compression too, but at least we got to see and hear the performance more as it happened. I had hoped the DVD would be better, I hadn't guessed it would be taken back to a studio and completely recorded over again. This is not "live" anymore.
I can only guess that Peter Gabriel is getting poor sound advice, the technical aspects of his recordings has generally gotten better over the years. There was the announcement that his catalogue was being re-released in the questionable at best SACD format which is some cause for concern for those concerned with fidelity, and now this. Where these decisions come from is an unknown, but we have no choice in the matter. We want to hear this music, so we buy them as they are. This concert is absolutley stunning. We just don't get to hear it on the DVD.
Too bad, as consumers, we aren't given a choice between the sing along audio version we have here and the sound from the actual show as two audio choices instead of the DTS/Dolby Digital options.
Make sure you know what you are buying. This is NOT live sound.
I vote with my dollars and support my favorite artists with loyalty. I can only hope this concert will be re-released someday with the performance we are seeing in the film in tact. I'll buy that one too. The show is that good.
Rating:
Summary: DVD worse than VHS... too bad...
Review: I love this concert. At least the VHS version. I have been waiting for this DVD for two years and I am very dissapointed. The grainy video is distracting, and the concert is different than my VHS version. The tempo is not the same, and the energy seems less intense. I guess if I hadn't watched the VHS version so much I wouldn't care, but I love that video. Maybe one problem is the Dolby 5.1 mix which (on my system) supresses Paul Cole, which is a big negative to me. It is still one of the greatest concerts ever (IMHO). Guess new isn't always better...
Rating:
Summary: The Good, Bad, and the Ugly
Review: At the risk of being very unpopular (given the previous reviews of this video), I can only give the "Secret World" DVD two stars. Before detailing the reasons for that rating, let me say that I love Peter Gabriel's music - the deep spirituality conveyed in his songs and the intensity in which he delivers each musical offering are beautiful every time I see him perform. Also, he is such a beautifully unique visual performer - the movement he seemingly improvises to the music as he performs reminds me of a cross between Twila Tharpe and Bob Fosse (as done by an aging guy with the beginnings of a paunch :~)
Now for the critique...
Knowing the exacting technical standards P.G. has brought to his music videos and recordings, I find it hard to believe he would have approved the technical production of this recording. In regards to the audio, I can't believe I listened to the same disc as previous reviewers (althought this review refers to the DD5.1 mix, not the DTS). It sounds almost like AM radio - muted highs, muffled lows, and the vocal mix is WAY in the back of the 5.1 soundstage. I finally had to crank up the center channel to adequately hear his and Paula Cole's vocals. And, the post-production studio-added musical bits were NOT seemless - they stood out like a sore thumb, sometimes relegated arbitrarily to the surround speakers, sometimes panned around. The added vocals sounded like they were done in a cheap basement studio and then rather ham-handedly thrown into the mix. Even the levels were off, sometimes hugely - several times my wife and I jumped as a chorus of tinny, disembodied voices shouted at us from the rear. On some tracks, the sense of "additional music" added in post-production to the live mix was so overwhelming that I felt that I was watching a video with a different CD providing the audio. Also disconcerting was the use of pre-recorded rhythm tracks. I realize that the sound P.G. was aiming for would have made for a very complicated live mix and would have required more musicians and staging, but sometimes the pre-recorded tracks (or maybe they were midi loops from the keyboards?) completely overwhelmed the competent (I think?) drumming by Manu Katche... All in all, not engaging or enveloping, but claustrophobic and disjointed.
As for the video portion, the film stock that the DVD was transfered from was grainy, washed out in color, and with terrible shadow detail. You would have thought this was footage from a late 70's concert rather than shot in 1994. The grain and video noise in the picture was distracting, and the washed out color palette rendered what looked to be a wonderful lighting design pretty impotent - Either hot whites or murky grays. I will say that the camera shots and coverage, in fact the entire visual concept of the show were beautiful and creative. Too bad about the lousy capture of both audio and video.
That being said...if you can fight your way through the poor audio and video, Peter Gabriel himself is a revelation to watch. Each song is a psalm of praise or discovery- pure poetry that transcends the banal and the earthbound.
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