WIRED

A fan of mid-period MMEB, I had high expectations after perusing the track list before obtaining this album. Well, it turned out to be a let down. There is nothing much wrong with the actual performance, except that the same tunes were recorded in much better versions on the studio releases.

Right off, they've ruined an otherwise great tune "Road To Babylon" by almost completely removing the dynamics that made this piece so enjoyable in the first place. The rest of the tracks suffer from similar neglect due to re-working.

I am not immune to variations in a live context, indeed, my preference is for such that contains extended solos, even jamming. Well, this performance is not one of those, leaving me substantially unimpressed.

The tracks here are poor cousins to the originals and in some instances the performance is rather awkward as if the band were only rehearsing. There are some fine moment,s but overall, they don't save the rather uninspired delivery as a whole.

The vocals are generally strong and there is some good guitar work in places, but frankly, I can't imagine that the band were only able to do a mediocre performance on stage. With that in mind, the release of "Wired" doesn't appear to be a wise decision.

I couldn't call it good and if you have the originals, there is no reason to bother with this. In my books, it doesn't quite reach the criteria for 3 stars, so it's a regretful 2, only.

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