When he emerged in the mid-‘80s, Chris Isaak wasn’t the only good looking, vaguely Americana singer with a taste for sharp, thrift store clothes and vintage guitars. But somehow Isaak surfaced with a polished gleam the others lacked. He was a complete package, ready for big stages, music videos and name recognition, even if he would never be a big star.
Filmed in 2005 for PBS‚ “Sound Stage,” the new DVD Chris Isaak Greatest Hits—Live is true to its title. The singer and his sympathetic band, the Silvertones, serenade the audience with “Wicked Game,” “Can’t Do a Thing (To Stop Me)” and other songs that come in a choice of 20 shades of blue. He is the master of melancholy, singing in a Bakersfield voice clear as a tolling church bell and rising occasionally to a place somewhere between a soft cry and a blue yodel. He understands the feeling behind “Only the Lonely,” the Roy Orbison song he covers here, and executes a killer version of Neil Diamond’s “Solitary Man.” The DVD includes “Blue Hotel” and two other numbers omitted from the original PBS broadcast.
