Alice Cooper - Brutally Live

Few performers are still around 30 years after their first album release, but Alice Cooper is still alive and kicking.

The undisputed founder of Shock Rock, Alice's live performances bring music and show-business together in ways that few other artists use. Don't be surprised to see devices such as electric chairs, guillotines or gallows on stage - usually with Alice being the victim of the evening.

Brutally Live showcases Alice's current Brutal Planet Tour, having been filmed at Labatts' Apollo Hammersmith in London, England, in July of 2000. As such, it contains a large number of tracks from his most recent album, Brutal Planet, but also contains a number of Alice classics. With a running time of around 105 minutes, there's a lot of music on this disc.

Track Listing:

1. Brutal Planet
2. Gimme
3. Go to Hell
4. Blow Me a Kiss
5. I'm Eighteen
6. Pick Up the Bones
7. Feed My Frankenstein
8. Wicked Young Man
9. Dead Babies
10. Ballad of Dwight Fry
11. I Love the Dead
12. The Black Widow
13. No More Mr. Nice Guy
14. It's Hot Tonight
15. Caught in a Dream
16. It's the Little Things
17. Poison
18. Take It Like A Woman
19. Only Women Bleed
20. You Drive Me Nervous
21. Under My Wheels
22. School's Out
23. Billion Dollar Babies
24. My Generation
25. Elected

"...and this guy's wearin' a Marily Manson t-shirt - that really p***** me off!"

There's really only one word needed: Wow!

But, to be fair, I'll type a few more. The video quality on this disc is astounding - both the concert and the bonus video clip. There's a lot of variation on stage in the levels and colours of lights used, but nothing is missed - not colour nor sharpness. Even the quality of Alice-Cam is good. With it's 16x9 presentation we're able to see the entire stage without missing a beat.

In fact, on the whole disc, there's only one flaw - during School's Out there is a single frame that has the top third duplicated at the bottom of the screen, and this only occurs on the Director's View, leaving Alice Cam perfect.

It's a concert - it's all about noise. And this disc delivers three times, giving you the choice of Dolby 2.0, Dolby 5.0, and dts 5.0.

The Dolby 5.0 mix puts you right into the heart of the concert, with the a wide sound stage in front and even the rears getting some action from the guitars and keyboards. Whereas the dts 5.0 soundtrack really opens up the soundscape and is a further enhancement to the Dolby soundtrack. Even though both seem to have a missing .1 LFE channel, the bass here is routed through the front mains channels which can in turn be passed to your sub providing some very, very deep soundwaves.

With this performer and this disc, there's only one thing to do - crank up the volume!

• Alice-Cam An alternate angle available on tracks 1, 3, 13, 18, 22 and 25 provides a constant tracking of Alice, rather than switching between the various cameras available to the director. A small Alice icon appears in the left hand corner (courtesy of a subtitle track) to let you know when the alternate angle is available. A bit of a gimmick, I'd rather it be here, than not.
• Bonus Video Clip for the song Gimme. Watch it - the end clip, and what it implies with the song, had me rolling around laughing.
• Weblink for the DVD-Rom enabled.

Personally, I find it odd that Brutally Live has been released before he's actually been on the Brutal Planet tour in Australia. (Alice is touring during mid-April, before heading to Europe.)

Either way this is a great disc of a rockin' concert. If you're an Alice fan, or simply a fan of rock, you simply can't go wrong with this disc.

Get it for your collection - Alice says so.