Pain

Live at the Whisky a Go Go

West Hollywood, CA

September 21st, 2017

Review and photos by Travis Baumann

Pain are the industrial metal project of renown producer Peter Tägtgren who is also the vocalist and guitarist for death metal titans, Hypocrisy. Pain gives him an outlet to experiment with a multitude of vocal styles as well as incorporate heavy electronic atmospheres and industrial song structures.

Their self titled debut release came out twenty years ago and last year saw the release of their eighth studio album, "Coming Home". In promotion of this new release and their two decade mark on the world, they embarked throughout North America with the tour culminating here in Los Angeles.

They kicked off the set with "End of the Line" from their sophomore album, "Rebirth". While Hypocrisy is predominantly an extreme metal band with harsh vocals, Pain has melodic vocals, often layered with effects. Powerful synthesizers accompany the dual guitar assault and bass lines combine from both string and electronic sources.

"Zombie Slam" was up next and on this song, Peter's voice falls into a deep gothic sound, reminiscent of Andrew Eldritch from The Sisters of Mercy or Peter Steele of Type O Negative. It really shows his vocal diversity and is a great moody song coming off of the "Psalms of Extinction" album.

Moving to a song from the latest release, they did "A Wannabe" which basically asks "Do you want to be the judge? Do you want to be the president? You just want to be a wannabe, or do you want to be the real deal?" It is a catchy industiral-pop metal anthem that is fun to listen to and actually poses an important question to the listener.

Going back to their sophomore release, they did "Suicide Machine" which was quite a bit darker and heavier than the previous song. While Pain is heavily embraced in the metal community, I am surprised they don't have more hardcore industrial followers as fans of Ministry, Rammstein, and KMFDM would love this material.

Speaking of Rammstein, their lead singer, Til Lindeman's solo album is completely produced, performed, and executed with none other than Peter from Pain as Til's sole partner.

"You Only Live Twice" is the second to latest album out and provided "The Great Pretender". This song was one of my favorites of the set but that may be because I have listened to this album repeatedly since it was released and was able to sing along with the crowd.

Cherry picking a piece from their "Dancing With the Dead" album, they did "Same Old Song". Peter took a moment to introduce the band before proceeding. Jonathan Olsson was on bass guitar, Greger Andersson on guitar and Peter himself on guitar and vocals. He said that their regular drummer David Wallin had family issues to contend with and so was not able to be on this tour but filling in on the drum throne was Peter's son, Sebastian Tägtgren.

Coming back to their latest release they did one of Pain's more crass songs, "Pain in the Ass". I am sure this attitude and demeanor is partially what brought Til and Peter together in the first place, as they share a similar sense of humor in this regard.

Staying in that vein for another song, they did "Dirty Woman" off of "You Only Live Twice". At first listen, it appears to be an ode to strippers but Peter seems to have a bigger heart than that and certainly a stronger intellect. The song could be seen as a sympathetic look into the circumstances and motivations of said person if you wanted to dig deeper.

Up next was definitely my favorite song of the set with the high-energy "I'm Going In" from the "Cynic Paradise" album. This is a great album and still one of my favorite releases of theirs.

They finished up the set with one from "Nothing Remains The Same" with the straight forward "Shut Your Mouth". They touched upon seven of their eight albums, skipping the debut completely and only double dipping on a few including the latest.

This was my first time seeing them live so I thought it was a great span of their career but with so many albums out, there were of course things I wish they would have played. There are rumors on their social media that we may not have to wait that long for a second coming, so hopefully they can do another North American run and cover even more Pain.

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