I have long had a soft spot for Iced Earth, probably due in all honesty in no small way to the best promotional item I ever received some fifteen or so years ago, namely a fairly large metal letter opener with the Iced Earth logo carved into the handle. How they got it through the post I’ll never know! Anyway, since then I have followed their career with great interest and in many ways have linked them in my mind to Annihilator as yet again here is a band that is very much the focus of the guitarist, in this case Jon Schäffer who started this band as long ago as 1988, but who also seemingly seems to have issues with keeping singers and other band members. Ripper Owens even had that role for a while, on what is still my favourite album of theirs, 2004’s ‘The Glorious Burden’. Since then there have been three other lead singers, but hopefully current incumbent Stu Block will be there for a while as he certainly gives the band a real edge. I was lucky enough to holiday in Greece some years ago, and was surprised to find that Iced Earth had pride of place in a record shop window, but there again they did release a triple CD live set ‘Alive In Athens’ in 1999 and have always had a very strong affinity with fans from that area. For this their latest live venture they have gone to Cyprus to film a headline show in an ancient theatre, and have then made that available in various formats including a limited edition deluxe book that features the main show and a plethora of bonus content on DVD and a Blu-Ray Disc, as well as the entire concert on a 2 CD set. Sadly I haven’t got that in front of me, so I’ll just have to concentrate on the music.
The tour was to promote 2011’s ‘Dystopia’ where Stu had already made his presence felt and the band had received high praise, so this was just a matter of transforming that into a live performance and that has not been a problem at all. Power metal with a hefty hint of Iron Maiden and some Kreator, and a singer who can sing low or high with plenty of screams and a real presence and you just know that you are onto a winner. They play plenty of old stuff as well as the new and one thing that makes this album work for me is not just the performance but the raw production which makes me feel that I am actually there, instead of just playing that has been over-sanitised and over-dubbed. The crowd obviously had a great time, and if you enjoy solid metal then you will as well. But which version to get? Decisions, decisions.
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