Obviously taken from his solo show at last year's Gods, the former Malmsteen/Takara/Eyes/Humanimal and current Talisman vocalist is in fine form! There is also the added bonus of the superb guitar playing of Howie Simon, who is now a member of Talisman. Soto is a natural frontman and knows how to work a crowd well plus he has the voice to back it up. After the acappella opening of ‘2 Your Heart’, it’s straight into a cover of Queen’s ‘Let Me Entertain You’ and he sings it well. There are solo tracks like ‘Love Parade’ and ‘How Long’, both benefiting from the heavy riffing of Howie Simon. Guitarist Pontus Norgren joins the band for the Humanimal track ‘Nowhere 2 Be Found’ and it comes out very heavy. Talisman’s ‘I’ll Be Waiting’ sounds superb, with its catchy chorus line and its call and response time with the audience. The acoustic medley is fun, covering Seal’s ‘Crazy’ and Prince’s ‘4 U’. There is Yngwie medley as well including a short run through ‘Don’t Let It End’ and some great soloing from Howie Simon on ‘I’ll See The Light Tonight’.

As a CD only bonus you get a new studio track ‘Good Love’, a slow AOR song with glorious backing vocals. The DVD includes an interview with Soto and backstage footage. The whole album is well recorded and clear sound throughout, except sometimes you have trouble hearing the audience responses!

If you were there you obviously will want this and if you weren’t like me, just buy it anyway as this album rocks!

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Review by Jason Ritchie