SAXON – Greatest Hits Live!

Maybe the cover of this DVD – done by the legendary Roger Dean – is confusing for some of you, but I believe most of the older Saxon fans will immediately notice that this material is equal with the 1990 video release by the band. At then Saxon celebrated their 10th year of existence and they crowned it with a European tour called “10 Years of Denim and Leather”. The release of yet another live album was kind of a surprise, because a year earlier they also came out with one called “Rock’n’roll Gypsies”, which was the second live record in the Saxon discography.

But they planned something really special with that anniversary tour, so they recorded and released the whole live set on VHS as well. The 16 songs (including the intro) on the live album and the video shows some of the greatest moments of the entire Saxon history (by then), but as it often happens with compilations and “best of” materials it hugely depends on each individual fan’s taste. Biff and co mainly played songs from the harder edged albums. There’s nothing in the set from “Power and the Glory” and “Rock the Nations”, but maybe the other reason is that songs from these albums were selected for the previous live record “Rock’n’roll Gypsies” in 1989.

On this Greatest Hits there’s one song from both the debut album (Frozen Rainbow) and the then latest one “Destiny” (Ride like the Wind). And also there are other classics like Wheels of Steel, 747, Heavy Metal Thunder, Strong Arm of the Law, And the Band Played on, Crusader, Back on the Streets and Rock’n’roll Gypsy. The whole band play with real enthusiasm and even Biff talks a lot between the songs, even telling the crowd how he feels about football (to my surprise he hates it – what an Englishman?!).

This material from 1990 finally saw the light on DVD this year thanks to a great British company that really cares about the good old music of the eighties and the seventies. This release can be interesting for both new and old fans of this great band.