Tag: Jeff Scott Soto

Jeff Scott Soto – ‘The Authorized Biography’ by Frank Tunney and Ronny Hahn’ (2014) – Book Review (The Jeff Scott Soto Series)

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Back in December 2021 when I announced I was doing a Jeff Scott Soto Series, I got a lot of response on the picture of my collection. One such person contacted me on Facebook and offered to send me a hard back edition of a biography on Jeff Scott Soto, so I quickly thanked him and agreed. He quickly mailed out this glorious copy of the book. His name was Sundeep Pooni and that book has been a massive reference guide for my review series up to this point. So, a big thank you to Sundeep and his very generous gift!! From here on out in the review series, we are past the date of the book so none of the albums I’ll be reviewing from ere on out are in the book, so I am on my own.

Before we get to the next review, let’s go through this book. It was originally written by Ronny Hahn and it was written in German and only an electronic book. For the 30th Anniversary of Jeff’s career, it was released thanks to Frank Tunney who took the original book and added more chapters and re-organized the structure. It is now a hard back book and chock full of the details of his career that all hardcore fans love to know. The book is called “Authorized” so it has the blessing of the man himself and that is good enough for me.

The book starts off with the original foreward written by Ronny Zahn and then there is a great dedication to the late Marcel Jacobs who played with Jeff in several bands and was a very close personal friend. It was a terrible loss, but thankfully he left behind a great legacy of music. Afterwards you get a brief biography of Jeff’s very early life, but the rest of the book is all Jeff’s music career.

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W.E.T. – ‘One Live – In Stockholm’ (2014) – Album Review (The Jeff Scott Soto Series)

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The band W.E.T. consisting of Robert Sall (Work of Art), Erik Martensson (Eclipse) and Jeff Scott Soto (Talisman) was originally going to be a one off project. However, the success of their debut and the fun had by the three main guys has turned in to a band. With two albums under their belt, the band hit the road and for only their second show ever as a band, it was captured in video and released as both a Live Double CD and a beautifully filmed DVD. What we get is ‘One Live – In Stockholm’!!

Recorded on January 17, 2013 at a really small club in Stockholm, Sweden called the Debaser Club and the reason behind the small venue is interesting. The guys only were expecting less than 100 people and so they figured a smaller venue would still look full on camera. What they got was hundreds of people and they had to delay the show by an hour to make sure everyone got in that wanted to (and hopefully legally could for fire codes and all). The band’s second album, ‘Rise Up’, hadn’t been released yet, but it was about too so the band had 2 full albums of material to now draw from plus they few in several surprises along the way. And to top it off, the CD version of the show has two bonus tracks of previously unreleased songs from the last album. Now, there is absolutely no reason a fan of this band wouldn’t want it. A live show on 2 CDs, two bonus studio tracks and a DVD of the show…DAMN!! What is not to like about this release.

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Jeff Scott Soto – ‘LA Rocks Demo / Vinnie Vincent Demo 1988’ Bootleg (2008) – Album Review (The Jeff Scott Soto Series)

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I was scouring eBay for a few of the remaining Soto albums I don’t have, and sadly, none were for sale at the time. However, I cam across something I had never seen before. It was a bootleg of Jeff Scott Soto demos. And to top it off, it was actually signed by Jeff Scott Soto. The person I bought it from lives in Germany and his name was Stefan. It turns out, Stefan is the lead singer of the band Speed Limit (check them out, they are pretty cool) and he had opened for Soto on a tour and actually met Jeff and got him to sign the CD. I thought all that was pretty cool and I love having a story behind my purchase.

LA ROCKS DEMOS:

So, what is this CD? It is a bootleg, mostly of demos from Jeff’s early years with LA Rocks and with Vinnie Vincent. We never got any albums out of those two projects, but at least we have some demos. The first set of songs say they are from his band LA Rocks. Back in 1986, Aldy Damian approached Jeff about joining the band. Jeff was busy with his own band called L’amour at the time and so he wasn’t really interested in joining LA Rocks. However, he did agree to do a couple demos for them and they paid him, so how could he say no. After Jeff, turned it down, they went after James Christian and he agreed. James became known for his other band House of Lords later.

The project didn’t end up going anywhere and the band later on became known as something you are more familiar with as we have discussed them in this series and that is the band Eyes of which Jeff sang on a couple of their albums. It all comes around full circle in the end. These set of songs here under the LA Rock Demos section, are a mixture of LA Rocks and Eyes demos and some aren’t even either band. The tracks “Hands of Time” and “Heart of the Fire” were demos for songs used on the movie ‘Rich Girl’. The songs “For You”, “Till the End of Time” and “Nobody Said it was Easy” are all demos for the band Eyes. And the song “Hold On”, not really sure where that is from but maybe it is from LA Rocks.

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W.E.T. – ‘Rise Up’ (2013) – Album Review (The Jeff Scott Soto Series)

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W.E.T. includes Robert Sall of the band Work of Art (The “W”); Erik Martensson of the band Eclipses (The “E”) and Jeff Scott Soto of the band Talisman (The “T”). All three bands are Swedish bands and all on Frontiers so it made it easy to bring these three guys together. They were originally going to be a one-off project, never tour and never do another album. Well, they did a small tour and here we are now reviewing their 2nd album, ‘Rise’. And this time, they are giving more credit to Robben Black and Magnus Henriksson as full time members. Both guys are also from the band Eclipse along with Erik.

The album came out on Frontiers Records since it was all Serafino Perugino’s idea anyway. It was released on February 22, 2013 and was actually produced by Mr. Erik Martennsson himself. Along with the songwriting, guitar playing, bass playing, keyboards, he was rather busy on this album. But Erik wasn’t alone on the songwriting as Robert Sal was heavily involved as well as Jeff Scott Soto and Magnus Henriksson. Come to think of it, everyone who did songwriting on the debut, pretty much contributed here as well. The sound on this album didn’t change, it is pure 80’s melodic rock or AOR if you want. Think Journey, Bon Jovi and the like and you pretty much have an idea of what this album will sound like.

The album opens with “Walk Away”, a lusciously sounding lick and then some heavy drums goes right in to a groove that brings it all together. Soto’s vocals are so smooth and slick you are transported to another era. With a hook that has you singing along as you ride down the rode with this beautiful melodic rock extravaganza.

Then we get the delicious “Learn to Live Again” which is a duet between Erik and Jeff and it is nothing short of delightful. You get more of the same hummable, singable magic as they figure, if it ain’t broke, why fix it. Jeff, again, sounds fantastic with his almost falsetto singing at times, and with this wicked riffs and a killer solo backing him up, it is more greatness.

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Jeff Scott Soto – ‘Damage Control’ (2012) – Album Review (The Jeff Scott Soto Series)

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It had been 3 years since Jeff’s last solo album, 2009’s ‘Beautiful Mess’. That album was good, but a lot of people didn’t like it’s direction as it wasn’t the hard, melodic rock that fans of Jeff love. And I get it, but let’s be honest, Jeff should be able to make whatever music he wants to make. I wasn’t a massive fan of that album, but it had some great moments for sure. ‘Damage Control’ sees Jeff listening to his fans and giving them what he they want. He is always good about that. And I wonder if the title is in reference to that fan reaction from the prior album. It seems pretty tongue-in-cheek if you ask me.

I want to say the album dropped around January 6th, 2012, but I could be mistaken. But before that release date, Jeff put in a lot of work on this album and he worked with a ton of writers and a ton of musicians (and sometimes both). Some of the writers were old friends such as Jamie Borger (Talisman) and Gary Schutt (solo band) and then there were names we hadn’t heard yet in his career like Joel Hoekstra (Whitesnake/TSO). Jeff has known Joel for awhile and Jeff would return the favor a couple years down the road (which we will review as well.

Jeff had a total of 21 songs ready for the album, but they needed to dwindle it down to 11 which somehow he did. The songs were recorded all over the world on three different continents including Europe as well as North & South America. The album wound up on Frontiers due to the long standing relationship he has had with Serafino Perungino. They agreed to do a Deluxe Edition where Jeff could actually include 14 of the 21 songs as long as there was a DVD with an EPK (Electronic Press Kit) and some music videos and that is the copy I have and will review.

The album kicks off with “Give a Little More” and it is nasty piece of a rock with that gritty guitar riff, the heaviness of the bass the drums. Jeff attacks the vocals with in equal intensity. An almost anthemic, melodic rock song that is proof that Jeff can still deliver the heavy rock like fans complained about. This song is a statement and the guitar solo by Leo Mancini is the exclamation point on that statement.

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Jeff Scott Soto – ‘Live at Firefest 2008’ (2010) – Album Review (The Jeff Scott Soto Series)

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Firefest is festival in Europe that came about after the end of another festival called The Gods of AOR. Firefest started in 2004 and it was bigger and even better than the Gods festival. Jeff Scott Soto performed at the Gods festival in 2002, and even released the show on a live CD/DVD. Jeff got the call again to do the festival in 2008 and he said Yes, obviously or this discussion would be ridiculous.

It wasn’t easy for Jeff because at the time of the festival, he was in the middle of rehearsals for the Trans-Siberian Orhcestra’s annual Winter Tour. TSO rehearsed 12 hours a day and Jeff was probably exhausted, but he jumped on a plane on a Friday in the U.S and landed in London by Saturday morning. He had to rush to Nottingham and meet his band. Luckily, it was his band so it was Howie Simon, Gary Schutt and Dave Dziaklak, but they hadn’t played in over about year and had like an hour to rehearse and get ready for the show. Did they pull it off…well, of course they did! They are professionals. It is a great show and another great live album from Jeff.

But…I have a major problem with this release and it isn’t the quality of the show as Jeff sounds amazing and the band is tight and all is good. It is the fact that this setlist is almost identical to Jeff’s last live release ‘One Night in Madrid’. Every song on here was played at that show in this order. The only difference is that the Madrid show had more songs (and was a totally killer show). I feel like I just reviewed this show and not really sure what new I can say about it. I could basically cut & paste that review here, delete out the songs that aren’t on here and BOOM!…the review and you probably wouldn’t know the difference.

So what I will do is walk through the little differences between the shows so I at least give you something different. Like the Madrid show, this one kicks off with the opening track “21st Century” from his latest album ‘Beautiful Mess’, but the big difference is when Madrid goes in to the next song “Colour My XTC” you get the whole song while her you get a small prelude portion before going in to the great “Soul Divine”. One of the highlights on this and the other live show is “Our Song” from his latest album. Jeff sounds amazing on this one and the band nails the song. A power ballad with a lot of Jeff’s powerful vocals. Such a great song.

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W.E.T. – ‘W.E.T.’ (2009) – Album Review (The Jeff Scott Soto Series)

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After Jeff Scott Soto was let go from Journey, Serafino Perugino of Frontiers Records really wanted Jeff to record an album a pure hard/melodic rock album that is the same vein of Journey. Jeff had different ideas. Jeff had been working on his solo album ‘Beautiful Mess’ which was a far cry from that type of music. However, Jeff agreed but on one condition. That condition was that ‘Beautiful Mess’ was released first…and it was.

Serafino also had the idea of doing a supergroup with Jeff in it. When he heard the first handful of songs, Jeff was really in to it and signed up. It also helped who else was in the band. The original name of the band was called Lost in the Shadows and I don’t think anyone liked that name at all. They come up with the name W.E.T. and that was because who was in the band. That included Robert Sall of the band Work of Art (The “W”); Erik Martensson of the band Eclipses (The “E”) and Jeff Scott Soto of the band Talisman (The “T”). All three bands are Swedish bands and all on Frontiers so it made it easy to bring these three guys together.

The songs were written by a number of writers, but Erik and Robert wrote a majority of the songs and Jeff wrote the lyrics. Magnus Henriksson was also involved with writing along with Johan Becker and Miqeal Persson. On instruments, of course Erik and Robert played, Jeff sang, but there were others. Magnus Henriksson from the band Eclipse played most of the lead guitars and Robben Black, also of Eclipse, played the drums and was actually the fourth member of the band and since he was in Eclipse, technically he is part of the “E” as well. This rag tag group of musicians actually pulled it off and brought one of the best Supergroups Frontiers has put together (and they have put together a lot and most are forgettable).

The band was only going to be a one-off project and were not going to tour. however, the fans wanted more. When Warrant pulled out of the the 2011 Firefest, they asked if W.E.T. would fill in. After a lot of phone calls and changed schedules they made it happen. The next thing you know, they agreed to do another album and the band played on. We don’t want to get ahead of ourselves, so let’s dive in to the debut album called ‘W.E.T.’ (simple enough). The album came out on November 29, 2009 in Europe and the U.S. got it some time in 2010. The reception of the album was fantastic and it helped solidify me as a massive Soto fan. In fact, when I met Jeff back in April 2022, I brought 5 CD covers of my favorite Soto albums and this was one of them. As you can see above in the header photo, Jeff signed this CD for me. I think I now have about 7 of the albums signed by him.

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Trans-Siberian Orchestra – ‘Night Castle’ (2009) – Album Review (The Jeff Scott Soto Series)

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Jeff Scott Soto has become well known for his work with Trans-Siberian Orchestra especially with the annual Christmas Tours as Soto can usually be found on the West Coast group for that annual tradition. But for Jeff, it all started back in 2007 when his name was brought up to Paul O’Neil as a possible singer. As things would have it, Paul loved Jeff and he was brought on to play a role in TSO’s next album, 2009’s ‘Night Castle’. The album was released on October 28, 2009 and actually went platinum. Normally that means it sold over 1,000,000 copies, however, it was a double CD set so it only needed to sell 500,000 copies which it did. The album went to #5 on the Billboard 200 Album chart as well as #1 on the Top Hard Rock Albums Chart.

‘Night Castle’ is a Rock Opera or you could even call it Rock Theatre. It is a concept album where the story revolves around a young child on a beach late at night, where she encounters a mysterious but non-threatening stranger. While they build a sandcastle together by the light of a bonfire, he tells her a tale that takes her all around the world and throughout history. The characters of this story include an American Vietnam War soldier named William Cozier, the Renaissance era philosopher Erasmus who is keeper of the eponymous castle of lost knowledge, and a Communist general based on the dissident Tran Do. There is a beautiful 60 page book included that tells the story along with the lyrics of each song (each song that has vocals). It is an intriguing little story, but there is so much more that is in the story in the book than I can garner from the music.

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January 2023 Purchases – Vinyl & CDs

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Last year flew by and now here we are in 2023 and already at our first month purchases wrap-up. It was a good start to the year if I do say so myself. I started a new collection, found some stuff for other collections I have, treated myself to an album I’ve been wanting for years and even found a Jeff Scott Soto CD that I didn’t even know existed. I would say that all makes for a solid month.

The month kicked off in full glory when 2nd & Charles kicked off the year with a buy 5 get 5 free sale on their CDs and so I pounced on it. Sadly, my memory sucks and one is one I already had, see if you can guess which one because it was in my November purchases as well.

If that wasn’t enough, later in the month I went by Repo Records here in Charlotte and found a handful of picture sleeve 45’s. I love the picture sleeves and so I bought about 9 this time around. Some great stuff to add to the collection…

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Jeff Scott Soto – ‘One Night in Madrid’ (2009) – Album Review (The Jeff Scott Soto Series)

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Back in 2003, Jeff did his first ever solo tour and at the stop in Madrid, the energy from the crowd was insane and he said that if he made it back he would record the show for a live DVD and CD. It took 6 years before his next solo tour brought him back to Spain and he delivered on that promise and now we have ‘One Night in Madrid’. The tour was in support of his latest solo album ‘Beautiful Mess’ and the show as on April 18, 2009 at Sala Heineken in Madrid, Spain.

This time the band was not his usual cast of characters, but a brand new band consisting of Jorge Salan on lead guitar, Fernando Mainer on bass, Edu Cominato on drums and BJ on keyboards and acoustic guitar. Now, of course Jeff Scott Soto was their singing as it is his tour. I have the CD of the show and it is a 2CD set and includes 22 tracks including solos and the ever popular Funky Medley. Let’s go ahead and jump right in to another great show by Mr. Soto.

The show opens with a radio being changed from station to station and each stop was a classic Jeff Scott Soto song. Then a voice comes on says, “That was then…this is now!” and the show starts with the lead song from ‘Beautiful Mess’ called “21st Century” and it sounds great. Jeff really sounds on point and the band captures the essence of the song. The guitars sound fantastic, the backing vocals are all perfect and I would say this new band clicks pretty well together. And if you need further proof listen to “Colour My XTC” from his Talisman days. The bass on this one is key to make it work as Marcel was a beast on bass and Fernando holds his own on this one, really great job.

We get more of Jeff’s solo work the classic “Soul Divine’ off ‘Lost in the Translation’. A true highlight of his career. Then we go in to the 2nd track from ‘Beautiful Mess’ with “Our Song” and the crowd is clapping along. It is the softer side of Jeff and then goes more power. On the album it had an irritating electronic drum track, but here it is raw and real drums and so much better. Then it is back to the rock with “Drowning” another from the ‘Lost in the Translation’ album. The guitars on this one are badass, some great riffs and real heavy. A real barn burner with this one.

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