Screamin

The first time I heard this cd I had one thing to say about it, WOW. I was completely surprised and impressed with this band's ability to perform and recreate their music live, with such energy, flair and well, perfection. So I took a couple of days to let this sink in, and really absorb it, and make sure it wasn't just that since they are one of my favorite bands, that I wasn't showing favortism, or letting the fact I loved the band so much, cloud my good judgement. So its a couple of days later, a few dozen listens into the future and well, what can I say? This is awesome from start to finish. There are mostly songs from Scream on here, but they also mix in a few of their classics from all their previous albums. The songs themselves are very VERY strong, in the first place, but the way they execute them in the live setting is really what shows just how great this band truly is. Pretty Maids have been around for way over a decade now, and it was just a few months go when they were introduced to me, and it was love at first listen. Of course, the way a band sounds on the studio record, quite often is drastically different from the way they sound live, but not with Pretty Maids. They manage to capture all the sound, they have this huge live sound, its very round, and three dimensional, and it pulls you right in. This owes alot to a very slick but not overly done production job, its polished just enough to let the talent shine right through. Ronnie Atkins has a superb voice, that translates perfectly in this setting, without sounding raspy. I was surprised at just how well his voice held up, and he put a few really neat spins on several of the songs, giving them added personality. Guitarist Ken Hammer is awesome, he really holds it all together with his crunchy riffs and spiraling solos, and heavy bottomed melodies.

Of course the songs are classics themselves. They cover a variety of really great tunes, including some of my favorites from the album, Scream of course. You have some of the heavy hitters from the album, Psycho-Time-Bomb-Planet-Earth, Rise, and the explosive title track from Scream. Walk Away is one of my favorite PM ballads, and its beautifully represented here, and expanded on in parts. Yellow Rain is nailed to perfection, with its gorgeous and emotional beginning, opening up a bit more, with a nicely mid paced sound, and everything is intact!!!! Nothing has been left out of this classic! Even the thundering middle section, is as brutal as it was on the studio track, back in 1987. Savage Heart is the Stripped version of the song, it was originally done on Jump the Gun, but the band redid it on Stripped and turned it into an emotional classic. The piano opening and gently haunting vocals, and that huge heart gouging chorus restrained from drums and guitars and other explosive instruments, is then moved into some crowd interaction with them singing the chorus, that rises to a feverishly peak with the spiraling, pristinely clean guitar solo, that packs as much punch as it does on the record, is just hauntingly beautiful. This song is perfection in itself. The whole band breaks out then, but if it wasn't for the strong vocal performance of Atkins, this song would be almost impossible to recreate live. The next cut, No Messiah, has alot of life shocked right into it, and makes a great hard rocking song for this concert. Their cover of Please Don't Leave Me, became a hit for them back in the early 90s, and it shows up here with all the flair and beauty as their version on Sin-Decade. With that unmistakable opening riff. Atkins shows that he can sing absolutely beautifully here too, he's like two or three singers in one, he gets up in this aggressive gritty range, but when he wants to he can sing just like a angel from heaven, and he really drives this observation home on this live disc. The last two songs on the album, Back to Back, just simply kicks so much ass, and Red Hot and Heavy, were from their second album, released waaaaay back when in the early 80s, and I never really got into that cd, but live, WOW, they are hard, driving and simply.....red hot and heavy....the band does such a superb job with these two finishers, that it'll leave you breathless and wanting more, I guarantee it.

This CD is really amazing, I haven't heard many live releases that are THIS good, this is DEFINITELY one of the best live albums you can get your hands on. And having heard their whole collection before, its easy for me to compare the live version with the studio cuts, and I really can't get over how well this band recreates everything so picture perfectly on this cd. And I didnt even mention classics like Future World and Lovegames.... with 14 songs, and clocking in at over 70 minutes, there is no way to go wrong with this release. My only complaint is the song selection, I would have LOVED to have heard Credit Card Lover, Don't Turn Your Sex On Me, Come On Tough, Come On Nasty, and many more others, but I know its impossible for them to play everything, and with Pretty Maids, all the songs on every album are top notch superb. It seems that they selected more serious type songs, than some of their feel good 80s sounding releases. Which really is fine with me, they made an excellent selection considering their catalogue. I would recommend this to anyone that is just getting into the band, anyone that loves live releases, or hard rock music in general. No need to recommend it to Pretty Maids fans, because, they already have it! And if you don't, shame on you! You should!

Keep in mind this is a live album, and is rated as such by measuring it up to other live releases.

Production	Songs	Lyrics	Performance	Overall
9.4	9.7	9.8	9.9	9.7