A worthy release by Bad Wizard in covering an integral piece of the British Invasion and all the guitar heroes it nurtured along.  The Yardbirds are an interesting story but more for the revolving guitarists than anything else I would say, in terms of the story and popularity of the band.  But you get into this DVD and flash back to the catalog of hits (and non-hits!) and the music was simply great.  I'm hoping the original members still touring today are garnering the appreciation for what they did in the 60's.  It's just too bad Keith Relf isn't around to enjoy that too. 

I had to dig out the downloaded version I had to compare pieces a bit and can say this is technically more of a project for Bad Wizard than just releasing a compilation somebody else produced.  At least they included as much as they could get their hands on but that downloaded source did get injected here along with alternate sources - without much differentiation in quality, some repeated which is a bit annoying but you can simply skip over those tracks.  The crux of the video performances are from 60's TV shows from both sides of the Atlantic and to nobody's surprise feature the Jeff Beck period and thankfully the brief overlap of the Beck-Page tandem, which is very cool to watch.  The early clips with Clapton just leave you wishing there was more from that slice of time, the core of The Yardbirds was always the Blues but this early stuff was so disciplined and precise - which makes the band seem like they had so many lives when you slice it up.  It's fun to see the transformation from this into the more progressive sounding stuff that arrived with Jeff Beck but taken to to a whole different level when Jimmy Page joined up with the group.  Great version of "Dazed and Confused" form Bouton Rouge French TV here.  My favorite clip on this disc, or the most interesting, is the Ravi Shankar interview by the British audience on the Whole Scene Going program from June 8, 1966 where Keith Relf and Jeff Beck ask him some questions.  This is the stuff that is so unique and cool, who knew this was even out there?

With so many sources, you need to expect an inconsistent ride in the quality and these 60's compilations are notorious for that as it's tough to come up with "the best" sources - a daunting task, always.  This Yardbirds disc is no different and goes from great (1964 Tell It On The Mountain clips and 1966 NME Pollwinners Concert clips) to the abysmal (For Your Love Promo).  The audio is generally very good and if you can get around the puzzling repeated clips you will enjoy this trip to the heart of the British Invasion with Yardbirds quite a bit.  I think the historical value of getting this stuff out on silver disc is there but don't feel the label needed to "pad" the offering by repeating anything.  As one afficianado, Scottzep73, over on the Led Zeppelin Presence site pointed out, there are other video clips out there that should have been sought out and included, but maybe Scorpio/Bad Wizard tried:

- "Music Hall de France" French TV (June 1966)
- "Ready Steady Go" (July 1966) (footage believed to be lost)
- "Hey Presto! It's Rolf" (July 1966) (footage believed to be lost)
- 1966 BBC TV interview
- "Top Of The Pops" (October 1966)
- possible appearance on "Ready Steady Go" (December 1966) (footage believed to be lost)
- possible appearance on French TV show "Tete de Bois" (March 1967)
- "Grand Spectacle de Jeunes" French TV (April 1967)
- possible appearance on "The Smothers Brothers Show" (1967)
- 1968 BBC TV interview 

The DVD is a picture disc that replicates the cover art and is nice, however the packaging by Bad Wizard leaves much to be desired and would be appreciated if they would put a little effort in wrapping these great compilations up.