CAPTURED

Greg Rolie has left the building (and the band!)

Although they have toured extensively throughout their long career, Journey have released very few live albums. For many years, this 1981 set was the sole representation of the band playing live. Released in the same year as the massively successful "Escape", this album was actually recorded during the tour to promote the previous "Departure" album. This would prove to be founding member Greg Rolie's last appearance on a Journey album, as he left the band prior to the recording of "Escape".

The songs here are taken from the first three Journey albums to include Steve Perry in the line up. Five tracks come from each of these albums, with a further previously unreleased song "Dixie highway" being added to the live set. The recordings are primarily from a two night residency in Detroit, USA, with the first 4 tracks being recorded in Quebec, Canada and the following two from a gig in Tokyo Japan. All took place in 1980.

The album is rounded off with one new studio track, recorded after Rolie's departure. Stevie "Keys" Roseman plays keyboards on the track "The Party's Over (Hopelessly in Love)", his sole appearance on a Journey album. Keyboard duties were taken over thereafter on a permanent basis by Jonathan Cain.

While clearly being live recordings, the songs are performed faithfully generally without embellishment or enhancement. The wonderful "Lights" for example is recreated as a virtually perfect facsimile of the studio original. Here, it is paired with "Stay awhile" from the then new album to form a fine two part number. The aforementioned "Dixie highway" which runs to over 6 minutes, is introduced by Steve Perry as a brand new song. This upbeat rock and roller sounds very similar to the Kiss song "Detroit rock city", perhaps explaining its exclusion from a studio album. Whether this is just coincidence, the recording coming from a gig in Detroit, is a matter for conjecture.

Two tracks, "Walks like a lady" and "La do da" are significantly extended from their original versions, both running to over 7 minutes. The extensions are primarily due to frivolity (including the ubiquitous drum solo) rather than any serious embellishment or development. They are real crowd-pleasers though. Greg Rolie takes lead vocal for a couple of the songs, "Feeling that way" and "Anytime", with Perry adding harmony.

The set list is geared very much towards the rock songs, with ballads being few and far between. Likewise, the early (prog) years are ignored altogether, with nothing from the first three albums remaining in the set. While disappointing for fans of those albums, this is perfectly understandable given that the vast majority of the audience would only be familiar with the band's AOR output since Perry's arrival.

The new studio track's title "The party's over (Hopelessly in love)" might appear to indicate that a soppy ballad is coming, but the song actually maintains the rock mood of the album, it is just the lyrics which are wet. Although a minor rarity, I would not recommend tracking down the album just for this one track.

In all, a fine summary of where Journey were in 1980. Many of the band's biggest hits came after this time and are therefore absent, but there are probably a few more familiar numbers than you would expect from a cursory glance at the track list.

A lengthy, double-sided release rounding up the best of the group's 1978-1981 period, this seventeen-track live compilation showcases just what a tight instrumental outfit Journey were in their heyday, something that shouldn't really come as a surprise considering the musical backgrounds of the various members. Core creative contributors Neal Schon(guitar) and Gregg Rolie(keyboards, vocals) both enjoyed stints with Santana - one of the premier live groups of the 1970s - whilst Steve Smith(drums) was a former alumnus of both Dutch symphonic proggers Focus and multi-talented jazz virtuoso Jean-Luc Ponty. The performances are therefore supremely slick. However, with the bulk of the material being culled from album's such as 'Infinity' and 'Departure', the progressive instincts of Journey's earlier days are all but gone. Instead, the five-piece whiz though soft-rock hit after soft-rock hit - though fans of the group should lap this up. An expertly-delivered live album, 'Captured' shows just why Journey are as popular as they are.

STEFAN TURNER, STOKE NEWINGTON, 2012

Journey was always known as a tremendous stage band and toured constantly throughout its career, so it is odd that for over 18 years, Captured was their only live recording. Recorded after their Departure CD, this is also the last time founder member Gregg Rolie (keyboards, vocals) appeared on a Journey record. So it seems it was put out while the band was still adapting to their new member Jonathan Cain (who was appointed to the band by Rolie himself). Although the blow was hard, it would also sign the peak of the group´s career, so Captured kind of close an era for the band. A middle period where Steve Perry joined in and Rolie was still one of the mainstays of the band., between their former jazz rock roots and their mega success with Cain.

Recorded mostly in Detroit, with some material coming also from Quebec and Tokyo, Captured it´s an excellent display of how good Journey was live: their playing is energetic, but note perfect, with some songs being elongated, but not much. It´s surprising that no long jamming was included since their jazz rock past should make some believe they would do that. Their perfectionism is evident by the tight vocal harmonies they reproduce live with apparent ease. the repertoire is totally based on their LPs done with Perry and there are much more rockers than ballads around (contrary to their recent albums). As a bonus there are two new songs: a live rendition of the rocking Dixie Highway (a tune they would never release a studio version) and the middle paced The Party Is Over (Hopelessly in Love), which was recorded after Rolie left the band, but before Cain joined, and thus featuring a studio musician, Steve Roseman, handling keyboards duties. Nice additions, both songs.

If you want to know why the band is so beloved by the fans, just listen to their powerful performances and see how good they were on stage then (and now too, but that´s another story). One of the few groups that used their tremendous talent and skill to enhance the music and could take any of their songs to a live environment and make them at least as good as the studio counterparts. Some did sound even better.

Journey is just one of those bands that can generate very strong, fan-boy level of enjoyment... or groan filled, nausea inducing levels of syrupy sweet distaste. As one of the first rock bands that I fell in love with during my adolescence, for me Journey music is mostly filled with good memories. While only their early releases qualify as fusion, and therefore just prog enough to make it to this site, Captured is still a solid a showcase of the band's talent for crafting excellent pop-rock songs with all the right combination of hooks and melodies and feel-good memorability to make it a great live purchase for fans of the band.

The setlist covers the three albums from the band's middle period (1978-1980). This means there's no "Don't Stop Believing" or "Faithfully," which may make it more appealing to prog fans. I consider this to be one of the best periods of Journey's output: they're still crafting good old fashioned rock and roll, but with a high level of polish and approachability. Highlights from Infinity and Departure are the clear winners. The band plays quite well, with Schon being the obvious standout, though not so much that he steals the show. Greg Rolie's piano are very strong throughout; while he never gets much solo duty on these songs, the tones of his keyboards are easily heard throughout thanks to a nice production. Ditto for Ross Valory's bass; he even gets a groovy solo during the vamp of "La Do Da." Fans of the group will be interested to know that Captured features two songs not heard on other albums... bonus!

The band plays extended versions of a few of their tunes, such as a second solo verse in "Lights," and chorus extension in "Walks Like a Lady." Overall though these are very clean versions of songs so don't expect many "wow" live moments. Captured's production shows the band playing very tightly, doing what they do best. If you're into Journey, that's a good thing. If you aren't, this probably won't change your mind unless you're open minded about their '70's output.

Setlist: 3 - Instrumental Performances: 3 - Lyrics/Vocals: 3 - Stage/Energy: 3