VH1 re-aired the edition of "Storytellers" featuring the Bee Gees (made in '95) last night. It was just Barry on amplified acoustic guitar with Robin doing only vocals and Maurice on keys or guitar (aided by one backup keyboardist is all, though I didn't much care for some of the keyboard sounds they chose to employ), recorded live in an intimate church hall setting in Miami with mucho reverb and an in-the-round audience. Although the instrumental accompaniment couldn't always show all the material off to full advantage - and excepting a few of the disco-days tunes, which simply didn't translate as well sans rhythm section as their earlier classic pop hits - the set was a powerful reminder of just how much music these guys made together, and were still capable of recreating through their harmonies despite bare-bones arrangements and a couple of extra decades on the old vocal cords (though you really couldn't tell in Robin's case). While The Bee Gees' lyrics and melodies may often seem deceptively simple, as they reeled off song after well-crafted and -remembered song (with my girlfriend singing reflexively along on the sofa next to me), you really began to get a sense of the magnitude of their accomplishment, both in quality and over time. Having weathered many changing trends through fortunes both high and low over such an unusually lengthy and varied career, it was quite clear watching them that, whatever success they enjoyed together, it was the firm result of their never having deviated from truly being themselves (and not having tried to be anything other than themselves). Lightweight and easy going down (not to mention the blueprint for at least a few less-loved groups that followed)? Sure - but as I'm still pleasantly humming the songs in my head hours later while I write this, there's no question why that was more than enough to earn the Brothers Gibb their deserved lofty spot in the pantheon. It's sad to think that it may turn out to have taken Maurice's needless death (if what the remaining brothers are now charging - that bad medicine played a decisive part - shows to be the truth) to remind today's audience of that fact.
