Revival69: The Concert That Rocked the World DVD review
Jul 02, 2024- Permalink
As a Torontonian and a huge fan of John Lennon and The Beatles and the artists that inspired them, I had heard of the 1969 Toronto Rock and Roll Revival music festival. Over the years, I had seen footage from the documentary by D.A. Pennebaker, Sweet Toronto, that captured the performances by the Plastic Ono Band, Alice Cooper, The Doors and the rock’n’roll legends Chuck Berry, Bo Diddley, Jerry Lee Lewis, Gene Vincent and Little Richard. However, I didn’t know the story behind the concert. That story is as wild as the performances. Kino Lorber is releasing Revival69: The Concert That Rocked the World on DVD and I had a chance to take an early look.
The doc, directed by Ron Chapman, tells the story of two Toronto-based promoters, John Brower and Ken Walker. Multi-act festivals were the in thing and they decided they could put one together in Toronto that would feature the kings of early rock after Berry had a huge reception at an earlier pop festival they did in the city. So they set about assembling rock’s forefathers. It was suggested by a PR maven that they get John Lennon to emcee, since the Beatle worshipped the ground these greats walked on. Little did Brower and Walker know that Lennon was itching to go out on his own without the Fab Four. Suddenly, Lennon wasn’t emceeing, he was bringing over a whole new band. Then they landed documentarian D.A. Pennebaker and his team to film it. I really don’t want to give out too much more about the events leading up to the Festival as the pure joy of watching Chapman’s doc is discovering all the events that led up to the big day. Interviewees like Alice Cooper, Robby Krieger, Klaus Voormann, Geddy Lee, Danny Seraphine, Shep Gordon, Claudia Barry, Anthony Fawcett, Robert Christgau, Brower, Dan Richter, Edjo Leslie, Hugh Leggat, Danny Taylor, Chris Dalrymple, Lea Harper and Rodney Bingenheimer appear to have as much fun telling the stories as we have learning about them.
This Kino Lorber DVD release looks really good and on the audio side we get an English Dolby Digital 5.1 track with English subtitles.
The DVD does not come with any extras except for two other documentary trailers from Kino Lorber.
Kino Lorber’s DVD release of Revival69: The Concert That Rocked the World is highly recommended for music lovers and great doc fans alike. I had a blast learning the story of the concert that rocked my hometown back in 1969 and I think you will too.