Stephen
After two surprisingly infectious melodic rock albums, Brother Firetribe launched a CD/DVD package of their recorded performance in 2009, in front of their hometown crowd at Apollo, Helsinki. This release caught me off guard as I rarely see a band will have a live album released in only two years after their debut, not to say that this is basically a side project of Nightwish's Vuorinen and Leverage's Ansio.
Seeing how the band performed a tight set of the greatest songs from "False Metal" and "Heart Full of Fire" flawlessly with a captured atmosphere of intimate interaction between the band and the Finnish audience is convincing enough to claim this as the best live album of the decade. Pekka Ansio snatched every difficult note in each song perfectly, but I understand how this effort absorbed a lot of his energy as I can feel he sounds exhausted in couple of songs. Vuorinen also delivered a super play that it's hard to tell the difference between "Live at Apollo" and the studio albums.
However, this came into another problem that it lacks of huge improvisation that's often found in another spectacular live albums, say Guns N' Roses' "Live Era" or Led Zeppelin's "How The West Was Won". Some lengthy solos, medleys, or some covers are required to spice up the album. I will also see this will be much more interesting if they include a Nightwish or Leverage song that's done in BF style, but the appearance of Annete Olson in "Heart Full of Fire" is refreshing and a gap-filler. Ansio should also lead the crowd frequently to assemble a giant choir to give the listeners a goosebump moment when the chorus of "One Single Breath" or Wildest Dreams" exploded.
Brother Firetribe is on top of their game here, definitely a strong buy for the fans and also can be a good 'greatest hits' starter for those who want to experience a fine combo of delicate AOR and melodic metal for the very first time.