Pain, Ensiferum, Eleine, Ryujin @ Frankfurt Batschkapp
08.11.23 Frankfurt Batschkapp, Germany
It’s been a while since Pain’s last European tour, correspondingly the fans were longing for their music. Therefore the joint “I amTour” with Ensiferum and Eleine as well as the Japanese Ryujin came just in time to bring down the walls of every venue on this tour with the concentrated energy that Pain are known to transfer to the audience.
On this evening, Peter Tägtgren and his men were guests at the Batschkapp in Frankfurt and the event was scheduled to start at 19:00.
To the surprise of some fans, already at 18:30 it was the turn of the Japanese Ryujin, who had attracted attention in the past under the name Gyze. Unfortunately, the Batschkapp was only sparsely filled at this time, but Ryujin played their gig more than well and offered the present crowd their own brand of melodic metal with death, symphonic and power metal influences. The Japanese guys had unfortunately only half an hour playtime, but the band used this chance to convince and received a good response from the small crowd.
Eleine from Sweden were the next to take to the stage in the now well-filled Batschkapp and they conquered the audience right from the start. Front woman Madeleine Liljestam skilfully used her multi-faceted voice and was constantly on the move – a real eye-catcher alongside her good vocal performance. The rest of the band impressed with their tight interplay and the fans celebrated Eleine’s partly black/death metal-influenced songs frenetically. The band themselves define their style as dark symphonic metal, which is probably the best description. The Swedes were able to maintain this high level of performance for the entire duration of the set and deserved the reward of enthusiastic applause from the Frankfurt audience. A very good Swedish act to remember!
Setlist Eleine:
Enemies
Never Forget
We Are Legion
Was That All
Blood In Their Eyes
Ava Of Death
We Shall Remain
Death Incarnate
With the “From Afar” intro, the Finns Ensiferum entered the stage and offered, as could be expected, a brilliant show. Frontman Pete Lindroos provided a balanced melodic variety with his filigree guitar playing, and with his brutal vocals he offered a convincing vocal performance. He kept in constant contact with the fans and together with bassist Sami Hinkka, who used the entire stage, he created an overwhelming atmosphere. The still relatively new man on keyboards, Pekka Montin, is a master of his trade and, in addition to his brilliant playing, he set very good accents with beautiful clean backing vocals. Ensiferum captivated the audience and nobody managed to stand still due to the intensity with which the Finns performed their music. It wasn’t just during the brilliant “Twilight Tavern” that the atmosphere could be felt right up to the last row of the Batschkapp – as if that wasn’t enough, Ensiferum went one better with “Lai Lai Hei” and really got everyone going, by now noone was standing still!
Ensiferum’s gig came to a worthy end with the brilliant “Two Of Spades” and the guys were bid farewell by the Frankfurt audience with lots of applause.
Setlist Ensiferum:
From Afar (Intro)
Andromeda
In My Sword I Trust
Run From The Crushing Tide
For Sirens
Twillight Tavern
Heathen Horde
One Man Army
Lai Lai Hei
Two Of Spades
The fans were now in the right mood for PAIN and when Peter Tägtgren and his comrades-in-arms took to the stage, opening their gig with “Let Me Out”, the audience was ready to freak out. Their setlist was packed with classics for the Frankfurt audience and the fans celebrated songs like “Nailed To The Ground” or the extremely catchy “Call Me” as if there was no tomorrow. Peter Tägtgren once again proved to be an extremely professional and likeable frontman, whose guitar performance was completely convincing and who put his final stamp on the Pain songs with a first-class vocal performance. Especially during the legendary “Same Old Song” he brought the audience to the brink of ecstasy and Pain got a really big round of applause from their fans. The sound was excellent and everything was just right – the fans in the Batschkapp were completely satisfied and after the Rolling Stones cover “Gimme Shelter”, which ended the official programme, Pain didn’t have to be asked twice – they came back slightly “changed” with the cult song “Party In My Head” to heat up the crowd once again. But that was still not enough, after a total of 4(!) encores, Pain came to terms with the fans and sent an exhausted but completely satisfied audience on their way home with the legendary “Shut Your Mouth”. A crowning finale for a mega party, Peter Tägtgren and his boys once again underlined Pain’s status as a fantastic live band – absolute top grades!!!
Setlist Pain:
Let Me Out
End Of The Line
Nailed To The Ground
The Great Pretender
Call Me
Revolution
Zombie Slam
Suicide Machine
Monkey Business
Coming Home
Have A Drink On Me
Same Old Song
It’s Only Them
Bye/Die
Gimme Shelter
Encore:
Party In My Head
On and On
I’m Going In
Shut Your Mouth
Text & Photos: Hanzi Herrmann
