While an audio recording can't come close to replicating the sheer exuberance of seeing The Hold Steady Live, the CD half of this package is an excellent live album, capturing the band in fine form. There's a nice selection of material from across their four studio albums, as well as a couple of rare songs (You Gotta Dance and Girls Like Status) which are also both ace. There's also a suitably raw feel, with no attempt to disguise any mistakes, which does well to capture the band's warts and all vigour.

The dissapointment here for me is the DVD, which is basically an extended promo for the Boys and Girls in America tour and album, and contains little insight beyond how, like, totally rockin' the band is. A mish-mash of fawning talking heads, boring interview questions and a relatively small amount of uninterrupted performance footage (2 songs), it lacks any real focus or clarity.

You basically get a new album and a film for the price of one, which helps! Plus fan or not, the DVD is a fascinating little watch, it makes you realise that your little band could one day make it big, even if you are all the wrong side of 30 and pot bellied. Whiskey can be converted into stage presence and vigour, you can lead the children to the promised party and at the same time actually talk a lot of sense lyrically. It's real rock n roll stuff, as the live album disc also perfectly testifies.

All in all, its like a sepia toned snapshot of how you want rock n roll to work, looking out for the little guy and providing good times to all involved. Brilliant.

The Hold Steady are an astonishingly good live act and although their studio albums have been uniformly excellent it's about time they produced an official live album. Of course to get nearer the proper experience ideal Positive Rage listening conditions would involve inviting about 50 of your mates into your living room and get them all to jump up and down together for the duration, screaming out the lyrics whist listening to this at full tilt. Still, this will do until the next show.

With this the first official live album from arguably one of the best live bands the Hold Steady look certain to attract a new, discerning audience to add to their sizeable, even more discerning original one. Sound quality is pretty good throughout the album with singalong favourites like Chips Ahoy and Lord I'm Discouraged getting the full treatment. Disappointing though is the DVD, a mishmash of sound bites and music clips which don't really do justice to the full spontaneous energy that the band generate on stage. Perhaps plans are afoot for an independent DVD of the band live to cash in on their growing popularity - if so then hopefully it will take in some of their Uk shows from December 2008. Enjoy the music and the atmosphere - it's as good a reminder of them until the next tour.