Group: Marillion
Title: Broken Promises
Date: June 18, 1988
Venue: Radrenbahn, Weissensee, Berlin, East Germany
Media: 1 DVDr - 108:26 NTSC
Catalog: Duley Digital - DD-M880618-D
Source: Secam TV Broadcast > Secam VHS > 1st gen PAL VHS > PAL DVD > NTSC AVI > Color Correction & Sharpen > NTSC DVD

Setlist
01. Slainte Mhath
02. Assassing
03. White Russian
04. Sugar Mice
05. Fugazi
06. Hotel Hobbies
07. Warm Wet Circles
08. That Time of the Night
09. Waterhole (Expresso Bongo)
10. Lords of the Backstage
11. Blind Curve
12. Childhoods End?
13. White Feather
-----------1st Encore----------
14. Kayleigh
15. Lavender
16. Heart of Lothian
-----------2nd Encore----------
17. Incommunicado
18. Garden Party
-----------3rd Encore----------
19. Market Square Heroes / Let's Twist Again

Before playing Market Square Heroes, Fish promises that this show won't be the last time they play this location, and promises to come back on the next tour. Of course, the band never played there again with the then current lineup. Thus the title "Broken Promises", taken from Slainte Mhath.

Production Details:

There are a few versions of this show in circulation. Some are in black and white, and some with washed out colors. Having recieved a first generation copy of this on PAL DVD, I found that it was badly afflicted by a very red tint; so much so that the show was unpleasant to watch. I'm guessing this has something to do with the way it was filmed or broadcast, as the equipment used in East Germany at the time was behind current western standards. I suspect there weren't many people with good recording equipment. Also, the broadcast standard there is Secam. The discs I had were PAL. So, somewhere along the way, this red tint was introduced. I believe this is why most versions of this show are in Black and White or washed out color, as people attempted to get rid of this overpowering red tint, but went a bit too far.

I used a red tint reduction filter myself. In order to apply this filter, I had to work on this video in uncompressed .avi format. This meant that once the filter was applied, I would have to re-encode the video. Since a re-encode was require anyway, I took the opportunity to convert to NTSC. It would have remained PAL if the reencoding had not been neccessary.

Applying this filter was a painstakingly slow process, requiring about 18 hours. I did a few run throughs, trying to get the proper amount of tint reduction. Not everyone will agree with my final choice. However, as I made the disc primarily for my own enjoyment, it is myself that I must ultimately please. There wasn't going to be any way to get the whole show perfect. I could have it one of two ways: 1. Normal color through most of the show, but some distracting red tint in spots. 2. Very little red tint anywhere, but washed out color in most of the video.

I chose option 1. To me it was preferable to have decent color throughout, even if this meant putting up with some
red tint from time to time. Like I said, not all will agree with this approach, but there you have it.

Video for this is pretty clear. Also, the sound is quite nice.

Artwork is included on disc, as usual.

Enjoy,

Duley - December 2005