letlive. is a band that I can thank Kerrang! for introducing me to when they dropped their third album, titled Fake History, in 2011. This album won the Kerrang! album of the year, and fast-tracked letlive from a small regional act to a fairly well known progressive metal group. Most recently, they landed a spot opening for The Devil Wears Prada on their North American Dead Throne tour.

While I really enjoyed Fake History, and in fact put it on my list of best albums of 2011, letlive was still on the fence for me – they could either be a decent band with one really good album, or they could be a breakthrough band that with great things on the horizon. As it so often happens for me, the make or break judgement call would be made based on their live show. It came down to this: Was the album overproduced and making a mediocre group look better than they actually are, or was this group really talented, and ready to kick my ass? I went into this show with high expectations – letlive, lets party.