Reflections of Darkness - Music Magazine - Nightwish

Details: Written by: Carsten Leopold; Published: 20 March 2009

Palladium, Cologne, Germany
17th March 2009
Nightwish, Pain & Indica

At Tuesday the 17th March we went to Cologne to enjoy again the well-known Finnish band NIGHTWISH at their second part of the “Dark Passion Play tour”. At this time they were supported by two bands - INDICA and PAIN. Latter one we already knew from the first part of the tour.

Indica

The evening started with INDICA, a band founded by Jonsu , Heini, Sirkku, Jenny and Laura in 2001. Before this, the girls had already spent their entire childhood surrounded by classical music and had also played in a few different band line-ups. INDICA's music and lyrics are written by the band's charismatic singer Jonsu, who started her composer's career even before she went to school, writing little “symphonies” two bars long. Jonsu has explained that to her, the biggest inspirational source for writing music is the music from movies. The lyrics stem from her own life, the lives of her friends, and also from dreams. The fourth INDICA long-player ‘Valoissa’ was produced by Tuomas Holopainen from NIGHWISH and released in autumn 2008. INDICA are Jonsu (lead vocals, guitar, violin), Heini (bass, vocals), Sirkku (keyboards, vocals), Jenny (guitar) and Laura (drums). http://www.indica.fi/ / http://www.myspace.com/theindicaband

Music & Performance
The start was announced for eight o’clock but already five minutes before that time the lights went out and the crowd welcomed INDICA with rhythmic applause. The five beautiful girls satisfied with a great performance and rocked the crowd. Jonsu sang all songs in English to enable the German audience to understand the lyrics (which are usually in Finish) and it seemed that the musicians had a lot of fun to play this show. The setlist consisted of five songs, highlighted by a great cover version of KATE BUSH's ‘Wuthering heights’ and after about 20 minutes they left the stage already. Sound and light were very good too. Altogether the show of INDICA was a nice surprise for me.

Rating
Music: 8
Performance: 9
Sound: 9
Light: 9
Total: 8.6 / 10

Pain

After a short changeover of just ten minutes, the evening went on with PAIN, an industrial metal musical project from Sweden. The project started out as a hobby project of front man Peter Tägtgren, whose idea was to fuse metal with techno influences. Tägtgren, who is also the vocalist/guitarist of HYPOCRISY and producer of his own The Abyss studios, is the only current member. On tour he is supported by Michael Bohlin (guitar), Johan Husgafvel (bass) and David Wallin (drums). http://www.pain.cd/ / http://www.myspace.com/pain

Music & Performance
The long hairs stayed on stage but now it were not ladies but men with long hair and the music was some harder as like before. The head banging PAIN rocked the crowd too and did a powerful performance. They animated the crowd and prepared them perfectly for the headliner. The set ran about 30 minutes and included seven songs. Such famous songs like ‘End of the Line’ or ‘Same old Song’ were included in the set. The show finished with ‘Shut Your Mouth’ and the guys from Sweden gave way for NIGHTWISH who were already awaited wishfully by the fans.

Setlist
01. I'm going in
02. End of the Line
03. Zombie Slam
04. Just Hate Me
05. Same Old Song
06. Monkey Business
07. Shut Your Mouth

Rating
Music: 8
Performance: 8
Sound: 9
Light: 9
Rating: 8.3 / 10

Nightwish

After another changeover, at half past 9 the stage was ready for the show of NIGHTWISH and again the lights went down in the Palladium in Cologne. NIGHTWISH is a Finnish symphonic/power metal band, formed in 1996 in the town of Kitee, Finland. Although the band has been prominent in their home country since the release of their first single, ‘The Carpenter’ (1997) and debut album ‘Angels Fall First’, they did not achieve worldwide fame until the release of the albums ‘Oceanborn’ and ‘Wishmaster’, which were released in 1998 and 2000 respectively. Their 2004 album ‘Once’ led to NIGHTWISH video clips being shown on MTV in the United States and inclusion of their music in U.S. movie soundtracks.

After the recording of the live DVD ‘End of an Era’ in Helsinki on 21 October 2005, the four other members of NIGHTWISH decided that it was best to continue NIGHTWISH without Tarja Turunen, a feeling they expressed through an open letter which was given to Turunen by Tuomas Holopainen after the concert, and afterwards posted on the band's website. In May 2007, Anette Olzon was revealed as Tarja Turunen's replacement, and in the autumn 2007, the band released a new album ‘Dark Passion Play’ for which still the band is currently touring. Current members are Anette Olzon (vocals), Tuomas Holopainen (keyboards, vocals), Erno "Emppu" Vuorinen (lead guitar), Marko "Marco" Hietala (bass, vocals) and Jukka "Julius" Nevalainen (drums). http://www.nightwish.com/ / http://www.myspace.com/nightwish

Music & Performance
During the long instrumental intro already we could have a closer look at the beautiful romantic stage with a big anchor besides the drum set and an ancient boat on the left side in which the keyboards of Tuomas were placed. After the intro the band entered the stage and began their rousing show with ‘Seven Days to the Wolves’. Right from the start the crowd was infected by the bewitching and impressive performance. All in the well-filled hall were dancing, clapping hands and singing along and the temper in the venue was great. Anette had developed to a confident lead singer and the dynamic performance of the musicians satisfied the audience. The fantastic lightshow was perfected by some fireworks, flying streamers, snow and confetti.

The setlist included songs from the current album ‘Dark Passion Play’ like ‘Amaranth’, ‘Sahara’ or ‘The Islander’, completed by songs taken from the last album ‘Once’ like ‘The Siren’, ‘Dark Chest of Wonders’ or ‘Wish I had an Angel’ and older songs like ‘Dead Boys Poem’ or ‘Walking in the Air’. The song ‘The Islander’ was performed acoustically and during the song the whole venue was illumined by torches (stage) and lighters and mobile displays (crowd) - a very romantic temper. After about 75 minutes, Anette announced the last song and the main set finished with ‘Dark Chest of Wonders’. Of course the crowd requested an encore and NIGHTWISH came back to play two more songs. After ‘Wish I had an Angel’ the great show finished finally.

Setlist
01. Intro
02. Seven Days to the Wolves
03. Dead to the World
04. The Siren
05. Amaranth
06. Romanticide
07. Dead Boys Poem
08. Walking in the Air
09. The Poet and the Pendulum
10. Nemo
11. Sahara
12. The Islander
13. Escapist
14. Dark Chest of Wonders
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15. Ghost Love Score
16. Wish I had an Angel
17. Outro

Rating
Music: 8
Performance: 10
Sound: 9
Light: 10
Total: 9.1 / 10