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La Loco, Paris, France
April 23rd 2005
Pain Of Salvation and Dark Suns

The Locomotive (La Loco) is a small venue in the Pigalle neighbourhood, very near to the famous Montmartre hill, (just a few hundred meters southwest from it) It is not unusual for metal events, but it's actually not a real concert venue, rarely used for that purpose, though the sound can be very good. It's in fact used as a night club with 3 different floors, and there  are sort of balconies on the sides and stairs far from the scene, but from the balconies you can get a clean view over the stage.

Dark Suns

Music
The band is a German five member formation composed by two guitar players, one keyboard player, and of course a drum and a bass. They played a kind of progressive hard-metal music, quite good but not as well inspired and not with something really special of their own, at least at "first ear" but it was coherent with Pain of Salvation musical direction. The sound was pretty good for a support act, and they got enough place on stage despite drum kit and more installed.


Performance
Quite a good performance. Approximately 5 different songs or so. At least one of the tracks was a medley from various songs. They "ended" with their favourite track, a very long one lasting maybe 10 minutes or more. Two guitarists and the singer was the drummer! He sung very well, had a beautiful voice, and sometimes it was deep yelling ( roaring ?
more shouting. but all right, and in purpose, of course) but having never heard that band before, I felt like the singing lines were falling a little bit out of tune, but hey, who am I anyway to say what's well written, ok you may keep on stabbing me, somehow I just thought they could have found even better singing lines sometimes. The Left-handed guitarist sings very well, but only from time to time as a supporting second voice, and is not heard from everywhere in the venue. Good backing vocals, but he didn't move too much really, compared to the other front guys. He was the Only one with short hair, the other 4 guys were head banging.

Singer "I know this will be the best show of the tour". A very big applause, which didn't last more than 30 seconds. The 5-strings bass player was moving a lot and seemed thrilled to be there. They were all really pleasing themselves I mean really enjoying their performance. They left the stage with big smiles, happy to see how the crowd responded. about 45 minutes, sorry didn't check my watch good lightshow, sober yet quite nice, fine with me, nothing exceptional but I enjoyed it.


Rating
Music 8
Performance 8
Sound 6
Light 7
Total 8 (7.5)




Pain of Salvation

Music
The band choose to play more a kind of best of gig, than just play only titles from their last BE album.
The rest of the show was well balanced between atmospheric and more heavy tunes, such as crowd favourites.

A downside to the concert: the level of the sound : unwisely high, why did they HAVE to play THAT loud? At one point, Daniel said "we have earplugs just as you do", well, ok but then , again, what's THE POINT? Why on earth ? Ok, I knew they were not sissies, I knew they would play loud, but that much seems a bad idea, and the result WAS that : the sound was not always nice and good, on the contrary. One really big deception, for me and but also for some other fans I talked with at the "after gig".

And that "level-of -sound problem" seems to contrast with the fact that they are quite calm on stage, they don't jump , they do not go pogoing nor head banging. only Daniel showed real special energy, okay he moves a bit faster than the other two front men, but still quite gently and slowly, compared to most of the metal bands in town, that I know of, at least. I guess !!!


Performance
The set was a perfect mix of emotion and power, as a great rendition of Pain of Salvation discography.
Daniel told us from the very beginning that we should not expect the BE tour show, but that we would rather attend? Witness a mix panel display from all the albums, the band were really together, they seemed to play very easy,
Christopher enjoying a lot of nice backing vocals, and they gave to a in love-crowd a fantastic evening. Most of the time Daniel was playing guitars and singing at the same time, though not always; for instance, he was only singing on Dea Pecuniae

Long intro with videos on the big screen at the back of the stage. Almost used during the whole set.  Images from the classical string players, especially from the Swedish female violin player. During two songs, the images from the videos showed the players, specially Daniel and the drum player, playing and singing at the exact same speed as they did live in front of our eyes, a funny synchronicity, obvious with the singing lips matching the words sung. a nice performance, but little space left to improvisation or new unplanned events in the show. well, that's no problem, the songs are good and made to be enjoyed that way, quite complex structures too. right ?

As usual, drum and guitar players were top-naked. Sometimes the guitarist put his "bonnet" on. Was it during the second song ?... Daniel was very charismatic, talked a lot, very easily and often with jokes, he sung astonishing well, and also sometimes reminded me of Faith no More singer, Patton, just as he often reminds me of him on the
albums. He first wore a darkish t-shirt, then a more white and coloured "comic-stripped" one, and eventually an all-white shirt under a fancy light jacket, along with his superstars sunglasses, on the Dea Pecuniae song , of course !

The five guys salute several times and are given a fantastic incredibly loud enthusiastic roar and applause.
Beautiful attitude !  beautiful band and beautiful crowd.

I did not enjoy at all the whole lightshow, at least two or three songs were very painful, real eye ache, a pain in the eyes.


Setlist
1. Breaching the core
2. Passing by
3. One Hour By The Concrete Lake
4. A La Tierce
5. Ashes
6. Ending theme
7. Second Love 
8. 2500 BC Million People
9. Dea Pecuniae


Rating
Music 9
Performance 8
Sound 5
Light 5
Total 8 (7.5)



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