It’s Holiday season and what a time to be a metal fan with a year chock full of solid memorable releases as we count down to 2025. As an early Christmas gift, and sneaking in just under the wire for ’24,the legendary Helloween has released a 2 CD, 3 LP live album Helloween – Live In Budokan… and I, for one, couldn’t be more excited. This was recorded on the final night on their 2022-23 tour in Tokyo. This tour encompassed thirty countries across three continents showing that Helloween is not slowing down anytime soon. The band released their first studio album in 1985 with Walls Of Jericho leading into the legendary albums Keeper Of The Seven Keys (Part I and Part II in ‘87 and ‘88, respectively).

These early classics quickly catapulted the band into one of Germany’s top power metal bands and they haven’t looked back. Being a young lad in the mid ‘80’s Helloween spoke to me and really opened my eyes to power metal and I was instantly hooked. Live At Budokan captures that magic and celebrates how special this band truly is. The triple-guitar attack of Michael Welkath, Kai Hansen and Sascha Gertner create this fast aggressive sound, working in tandem with vocalist Michael Kiske and Andi Deris often supported by original vocalist Kai Hansen. Kai does a killer medley celebrating their roots and beginnings.

This album is a fast paced live offering that doesn’t let up. The sound and production is fantastic and the track selection is spot on. It begins with the intro ‘Orbit’ and builds anticipation leading into the magnum opus ‘Skyfall’ from their latest self-titled release Helloween from 2021. You can feel the crowd participation and excitement. Being over two hours in length this live album covers so many classics such as ‘Dr. Stein’, ‘Keeper Of The Seven Keys’, ‘Eagle Fly Free’ and ‘Forever And One (Neverland)’, just to name a few.

I love the track ‘Future World’ from ‘Keeper Of the Seven Keys – Part I’ as the fans take over singing and it will give you goose bumps how beloved this track is. This is more of a celebration of how Helloween has managed to give long-time fans an impressive listening experience while presenting a great cross section of their catalog for new listeners.

Being a live album fan I need two things, I want to feel the album transporting me to that time and space, immersing me in the experience and I need a gigantic, well produced sound. On this album you get both, plus they will be releasing DVD/Blue Ray versions to capture every angle of the performance. I recommend picking this up and blasting it at eleven… it’s sure to elevate your holiday!