Search - Asia: Ultimate Collection on DVD

An excellent collection and comparison of Asia's line-up

moviemusicbuff | Walnut, CA United States | 08/11/2006

(4 out of 5 stars)

"If you're an Asia fan, you'll definitely want to check out this collection.



1) Live in Moscow



The first disc is Asia's famous live concert in Moscow in 1990 (w/ John Wetton, Geoff Downes, Carl Palmer, and Pat Thrall).



It features the songs:



Only Time Will Tell

Sole Survivor

Cutting It Fine

Days Like These

Rendezvous

The Heat Goes On

Book of Saturday

Prayin' for a Miracle

Go

The Smile Has Left Your Eyes

Open Your Eyes

Heat of the Moment

Bonus track: Kari-Anne



The performance is quite good but the sound quality is mediocre and somewhat muddy at times. It is really hard to hear the electric guitar at certain moments. However, this is such a historic performance that die-hard Asia fans won't mind. It also features the song "Kari-Anne" which a lot of Asia fans really like.



2) Live in Nottingham



It features the same line-up as the Live in Moscow (Wetton, Downes, Palmer, and Thrall). The sound is a bit better than Live in Moscow. The song set is a little bit different and features songs from the Alpha album:



Sole Survivor

Don't Cry

Voice of America

Time Again

Praying for a Miracle

The Smile Has Left Your Eyes

Only Time Will Tell

Days Like These

The Heat Goes On

Heat of the Moment

Open Your Eyes



3) Live in the USA



This features a new line-up of the band (John Payne, Geoff Downes, Chris Slade, Guthrie Govan) and the songs feature some of the new songs in Aura.



The Song Set:



The Heat Goes On

Days Like These

Awake

Arena

Military Man

Wherever You Are

Bad Asteroid

Don't Cry

Ready to Go Home

Sole Survivor

Free

Only Time Will Tell

Go

Heat of the Moment



It is fascinating to compare this new line-up with the "classic" line-up of Wetton, Downes, Palmer, and Thrall. Personally, I like John Wetton much better than John Payne. John Payne sings too melodramatically at times and punctuates the lyrics at odd places, which is distracting. The guitarist Guthrie Govan is quite good, especially on the solo parts on famous songs such as "Heat of the Moment", where he plays with much distinction and clarity. Govan sticks very closely to solos of the studio version. Chris Slade does a great job on the drums. The sound quality is a lot better than Live in Moscow. However, one can readily see by comparison that the songs written by the classic line-up (Wetton, Downes, Palmer, Howe) are way better than the songs written by the new line-up (Payne, Downes, Slade, and Govan).



I give this collection 4 stars because it is such a good deal --it is much less expensive than buying the 3 performances separately. However, I delete one star due to the mediocre sound quality of "Live in Moscow" -- which needs badly to be improved, and the "Live in USA" performance, which I did not like as much as the Moscow and Nottingham performances. I hope someday they will release a live performance with the classic line-up with Steve Howe.



I highly recommend this generous DVD collection for casual and die-hard Asia fans. You can judge for yourself which line-up is better, both in performance and the quality of the song-writing.

"

Asia rocks

Cassandra Coit | San Diego, CA | 10/04/2009

(4 out of 5 stars)

"I've been in love with this band for over 27 years. It's just fun to watch."