Missives From The Mosh Pit Edge

Good afternoon, Headbangers, from East Berlin. It’s bonkers, it’s exciting, it’s lively and I’m quite beside myself with joy to be here 😄.

Today has been a challenge against incompetence, both home and away; train strike, plane delay, hotel shuttle bus disappearance.

Armed solely with a map, a modest amount of confidence and a great deal of determination, I actually succeed in finding the way from Schönefeld Flughafen to my hotel. Possessing a non-existent sense of direction, this is a major achievement. Still, at one point, quite baffled, I wander through the streets of Berlin, suitcase in one hand, map in the other, arrow pointing at my head with ‘LOST TOURIST’ graffitied on the side in giant red fluorescent letters, ‘MUG ME NOW’. This arrow follows me ruthlessly on my travels. It jostles for space alongside another which warns ‘MIDDLE AGED WOMAN NOT TAKING ANY MORE CRAP’.

Not only is Hotel Osten in the same Straße as tonight’s venue, it’s rather handily situated directly opposite the entrance. Too early to check in, I leave my bag at reception and embark on a recce.

The Astra Kulturhaus enclosure is composed of an array of bars, restaurants and multi-purpose buildings constructed around a series of cobbled courtyards. I don’t exactly locate the venue itself but no matter, it will be SO much easier to find later on in the dark.

☝️Posters on a fence by the Astra

👇An outbuilding in the Astra compound

☝️👇The Wall

Back to The Osten. I check in, go to room, get iPad out. No internet. Straight downstairs. ‘Oh, there’s no wifi today’. Hmm, really? An arrow above my head bursts into life with a siren of flashing lights. It’s the second one, oh no, here we go.

Politely but most hand-on-hip insistently, I ask the hitherto unseen and completely unconcerned manager to fix it. He reluctantly sends for the IT engineer but, between them, nothing can be done. The offending router is actually in my room so after Fred n Barney shuffle off I have a go at fixing it myself, plugging it in, out, in, out, shaking it all about but still no wifi. 😱

No Internet. No YouTube. How do I distract myself now from the nerve-shredding, stomach-churning, nail-biting countdown to the start of tonight’s show? At six minutes to midnight on the Doomsday Clock, the seconds tick agonisingly closer to the point of Total Global Thermonuclear Metal Meltdown 😱……

Suddenly, through an open window, carried upon the cool breath of this beautiful October evening, I hear the first note of the first song played by the first band on the first night of PAIN’s Coming Home European Tour 2016. It’s happening. IT’S ACTUALLY HAPPENING!!!

Excited, nervous, I fizz around my room like a Lushbomb in a running bath. I antibacterialise my earplugs, polish my glasses, and try not to spontaneously combust 🔥😜🔥. Lippy, ticket, handful of Euros, oh my God, come with me, Headbangers, let’s go!

I venture into the night, traverse Revaler Straße and enter the Astra Kulturhaus compound. It is barely lit, deserted and unsignposted which can only mean one thing. In my defence, I’ve been awake since 4am and I’m not a compass. Creeping around in the darkness, trying not to look suspicious, hoping to spot a PAINhead to follow, I curse myself for not having found the precise location earlier. But there is nobody to be seen; they’re already inside the venue.

I come to my senses and track a dull thud pulsating through the air to a single storey building nearby. It is open on one side with interior walls made from horizontal strips of heavy duty plastic. As I tiptoe inside, the dull thud becomes a clear, thrilling blast of a rock band in full flight and with bated breath I walk on until I face a huge black curtain hanging the width of the hall. Beyond this, the dance floor. Beyond that, the stage, upon which is the Swedish band, Dynazty. The first band, Billion Dollar Babies, I will not get to see. In fact, this is the only time I will see Dynazty. O, woe my creaky knees.

Two metres from the stage, left side, is a fine spot, not too crowded, good view. I feel very aware, alive; colours are bright, sounds are sharp. I’ve been dreaming of this moment for a long time.

The final support of the evening, German Horror Metallers, The Vision Bleak, tread the boards but I am distracted from their set by the impending arrival of Zero Hour and will the time to pass.

Impatience simmering beneath quivering expectation, the wait is unbearable as the stage is set for the headliners. Amid strains of The Cult via No Doubt to AC/DC, Shoot To Thrill, the crowd swells and sways; anticipation is palpable, touching bodies with glances of excitement, strokes of want; butterflies with icicles on the tips of thrashing wings.

Without warning, Mr Johnson’s dulcet tones fade out to dimming lights, and through a swirling maelstrom of blue smoke engulfing the stage, PAIN emerge from the shadows, one by one, to detonate the first song with the power and volume of a strategic nuclear blast. I stand, transfixed, as the crowd explodes into a sea of waving arms and punching fists. Oh my God! OH MY GOD!!!

From the first ear-shattering note, the show is a sustained attack on the senses, an all encompassing barrage of sound, flashing lights and deep reverberations which relentlessly rip through your body, ignite your spirit and elevate your soul to the highest heights.

Three new members join Peter Tägtgren onstage, one of whom is his 18 year old son, Sebastian, on drums. The bass player is a former member, back in the team, André Skaug, he of the majestic headbanging technique and penchant for death-defying stage dives. The new guitarist, Greger Andersson, has an engaging stage presence and interacts enthusiastically with the crowd, clearly enjoying his new gig.  Lastly, Mr Tägtgren himself, chief whipcracker & creative tornado behind PAIN.

The band look great together, four individuals forming a strong, tight, powerful unit. Sebastian Tägtgren is a revelation. This young man is supremely capable, confident and it’s a pleasure to watch father and son make their own dream come true.

First and foremost, of course, are the songs. Some old, some new, all borne of a tirelessly creative mind, all delivered with swagger and strength. With fistfuls of rock, metal, orchestral & industrial, PAIN is an amalgamation of experimentation, imagination and derring-do. Bearing this in mind, there are two slower numbers on the new album, Coming Home, and both are played live. Certainly good songs and very popular with the audience, I’m just more receptive to tunes that whack you round the head and make your brain come down your nose. Oh, and if a song begins ‘been watching myself in the mirror for forty plus some years and seen how time makes you wrinkled and grey’, I am more inclined to put a bag over my head and wail rather than sing along 😳😄.

Do you know that deliriously happy moment in ‘Wayne’s World’ where the gang of friends are in their wonderfully crappy little car playing Bohemian Rhapsody on a cassette, singing along and start to headbang at the same time? Be-el-ze-bub has a devil put aside for me, for mee, for meeeee……..heads down, air guitars, air drums, oh, it’s marvellous!

Well, this is what a PAIN show is like! Yes, really! No, it is not five long haired blokes in a car listening to Queen 🙄.

It is the glorious combination of thundering sing-along songs, the delight of being amongst fellow PAINheads and the joy of those heavenly moments when everyone, band & fan alike, gets their head down to neck out the rhythm of an epic, headbangin’ tune. Wayne’s World is on repeat and you never want it to end.

But end it does, all too soon. With a bow and a wave to the cheering crowd they’re gone.

I return to the hotel immediately. Shell shocked, elated, I’m still awake at 4am, 24 hours without sleep. I look and feel like a hungover zombie having a very bad day. This is SO not good. I have to be up and out in four hours’ time to get to Berlin Hauptbahnhof whereupon I plan to board a train to Würzburg.

Combining my track record of navigational mishaps with the Hauptbahnhof’s notoriously confusing floor plan, if I’m not careful, I could end up absolutely bloody anywhere.

🎸  YouTube ‘ Pain Astra Kulturhaus’ and you’ll see ‘Monkey Business’.

🎸 YouTube ‘Wayne’s World, Bohemian Rhapsody’ 😄.