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I'm not the biggest live album fan; they normally have to be really good to warrant a listen. I always felt Crystal Viper was a cool band, but I really think that at two albums into their career (at the time of pressing) a live album was a little soon. From 10 tracks on offer, six of them are from the live show itself. The rest of the album is made up with a track from their upcoming album Legends, a Virgin Steele cover and two rarities.

The live selection of tracks is quite good, being three tracks from their debut and three from their last album Metal Nation. Of course the cuts from the debut stand out the most as they're actually stronger tracks, the three we're treated to are "Shadows on the Horizon", "The Island of the Silver Skull" and "The Last Axeman". My favorite is "Shadows on the Horizon" which is a particularly cool rendition of an already kick ass track. As far as the performances go everyone is pretty much on form, although Marta sounds like she might be having a little bit too much fun and the quality of her performance wavers from time to time, nothing major though.

The rest of the tracks are cool enough, "Secrets of Black Water" is a quality mid-paced cut from Legends. "The Wolf and the Witch" is a track that allegedly hadn't been released on CD up until now, it's an enjoyable track and could be an incentive for a fan purchase (although if you were that die-hard a fan you'd have picked up the vinyl). Rounding off the rest of the release we have "Stronghold Under Siege" from another single which is a nice speedy power metal number and probably the better of the bonus cuts. The final track is a cover of Virgin Steele's "Obsession (It Burns for You)" which is quite faithful to the original, and a boat load of fun Marta's vocal work really kicks ass here.

Overall Defenders Of The Magic Circle: Live In Germany would serve as the perfect introduction to this band and while not great, it is surely fun enough. Previously established fans won't really need this unless they're a completist.