Life Of Agony Make Night On Their Own

The bill promised a lot when it was announced: Ill Niño, Life of Agony and Papa Roach in the Melkweg. Although I don't like Papa Roach the rest of the night promised to be good and heavy. Too bad Ill Niño had to pull out because of frontman Cristian Machado's injury. They were replaced with Jettblack a hair metal band from the UK. This didn't look good.

Life of Agony at Melkweg Amsterdam, August 2 2010 (Ronald Says 8 out of 10)
When we arrived at the venue Jettblack was just closing up with their last few songs. If you're into Bon Jovi kind of rock this may be your band, but I certainly didn't mind missing most of their set. Fortunately it didn't take long for Life of Agony to take the stage. Unlike their gig earlier this year where they played an integral set of their hit album "River Runs Red" this time their set consisted of a variety of their songs.

The sound was pretty good although I saw a member of the crew walking on stage many times. Singer Keith Caputo gave another strong performance prooving again how good a rock singer he is. His vocals were clear and powerful. Combined with the tight band it all sounded great. Since most people were there to see Papa Roach they really had to work hard to get the crowd going. But in the end there was a decent pit forming and I think they won over quite some people. We can only hope that they will start working on new material in the future.



When Papa Roach entered the stage they were welcomed with loud cheers. It didn't take long for us to leave though. Their superficial metal songs and overdone stage performance just doesn't do it for me. Hopefully they learned from the superiour performance by Life of Agony.
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Life Of Agony Still Alive And Kicking

Life Of Agony playing their succesful debut album 'River Runs Red' completely...that promises a nostalgic night with some heavy rock! So together with two of my old and dearest friends we headed to the Effenaar to see if we could bring back some memories

Life of Agony in Effenaar Eindhoven, April 2 2010 (Ronald Says 8 out of 10)
We got there early so we had to make it through the support act 'Panic Cell'. Although hard working they delivered a uninspiring half hour of nu-metal. All cliches were there: repeating blast beats, a grunt here and there, and the standard guitar riffs. The Seal cover 'Crazy' was the worst and fortunately their last song.

The main act entered the stage with singer Keith Caputo in an interesting outfit to say the least: a pink crochet thingy. But this was no fashion show and they kicked off the first song of the album. What followed was a great performance of all the songs with accompanying sound bytes in place. The slight slower tempo made them even more dramatic. With the theme of the album in mind (suicide of a young guy) it added to the whole dark vibe of the album. The contrast with the tempo changes was more obvious and suited the songs very well. The band was tight and Caputo showed he still is a skilled rock singer. His voice can be low, warm and melodramatic but he can also scream like the best. It did ask a lot of him because at the end of the gig he seemed pretty exhausted. Too bad they had some technical difficulties during the set. It resulted in some long breaks and sometimes breaking the nice flow of the set. At the end of the set they did a few more songs of their other albums to end in style.



It wasn't a trip to memory lane as I expected but more of renewed admiration for this band. Hopefully they will keep on playing like this in the years to come and eventually come up with new material as well.
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