Melissa Etheridge

This lengthy two-DVD set chronicles Melissa Etheridge's solo tour supporting her Skin album in 2001-2002. The main part of the package is a two-hour concert filmed at the Kodak Theatre in Los Angeles on December 8, 2001. Etheridge, accompanying herself on acoustic and electric guitars, piano, harmonica, and a Peter Frampton-style "voice box," runs through a 22-song set including her biggest hits, such as "Come to My Window" and "Bring Me Some Water," plus numbers from Skin and such rarities as a cover of Joan Armatrading's "The Weakness in Me" and a previously unreleased song she wrote as a teenager, "Ready for Love." Without a band, the impassioned, husky-voiced singer has tremendous rapport with an adoring audience who probably would object to a critic's observation that her songs often sound alike, especially in this stripped-down format, and that, even with changes in instruments to provide variety, two hours seems like a long time. Fans won't mind, of course, and it must be fans at whom this collection is aimed, since there are plenty of other goodies. There is a commentary track on which Etheridge spends the two hours commenting about various aspects of the show from the technical (microphones, guitars) to the mundane ("I like it when people clap along"). Toward the end, she admits, "I don't know what else to say." A second disc provides a "tour diary" of backstage footage shot throughout the tour; a half-hour interview; versions of "Yes I Am" and "Dance Without Sleeping" shot at other venues; excerpts from a 1987 club performance and a 2002 show at the Roxy nightclub with her band; and audio versions of a new song, "Alive," and "The Weakness in Me." Fans will wish that those 1987 and 2002 sections lasted more than a couple of minutes apiece. ~ William Ruhlmann, All Music Guide