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July 24, 2008 |
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DVD 1
01. Pride
02. Make Some Noise
03. Fuck It
04. Draw Blood
05. Fed Up
06. Life's Hard
07. Get Real
08. Stand Tall
09. Time Will Tell
10. In For The Kill
11. F.S.U.
12. Desensitize
13. Foul Taste Of Freedom
14. Shine
15. Make War Not Love
16. Political Suicide
Videos:
01. Can You Feel It?
02. Down For The Cause
03. Substance
04. In For The Kill
05. Don't Kill Yourself To Live
06. Time
07. State Of Mind
08. Make War Not Love
09. Pound For Pound
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Emerging from New York, PRO-PAIN were one of the early bands to combine the Hardcore sound with heavy/thrash riffs to create what is referred to today as metalcore. They've stuck to their guns no matter how the Metal world was changing around them and continue to offer their fans in-your-face, no-nonsense metalcore. They've apparently done a good job of it too. Ten studio albums and one live album have the band's worldwide album sales nearing one million units. The only thing missing from the PRO-PAIN catalogue was a DVD... until now.
My initial thoughts on this DVD are twofold. As PRO-PAIN remains my favorite band of all time, I was ecstatic to finally have the opportunity to watch PRO-PAIN live on my big screen whenever I felt the urge. However, after viewing the DVD, I am not certain how often I'll actually be doing that. Let me explain: The concert footage, like the title implies, is raw…very raw. Founder/bassist/vocalist Gary Meskil and bandmates (Tom Klimchuck - guitar, Eric Klinger - guitar, and Eric Matthews - drums) take to the stage at Die Rohre in Stuttgart, Germany during the band's 2001 European tour and up in the balcony is a single video camera to capture the performance. (One camera? We're filming for an official live DVD release and we're going to use one camera? Hello!?) For the most part, this single camera catches the entire band full-frame. Occasionally, the viewer is treated with a close-up of Gary singing or Tom's solo etc. as the camera slowly zooms in and out. I can't begin to explain how disappointing this was to a longtime fan. Regrettably, from what I can determine, the audio is also coming from up in the balcony…from the camera's microphone. The sound quality falls somewhere between bad and very bad with the vocals often being indistinguishable. The band plows through a varied setlist which includes songs from their first six albums, more than half of which are from the latest two releases (at the time). A good sample of all their material, but I find it hard to believe that the classic "Pound For Pound" from the debut release wasn't played during this set.
With today's technology, and push on video and DVD to promote bands, you would think a bit of a budget could have been put together to really capture the band's stage presence, wall of sound, and the energy that the band radiates in the live setting. Furthermore, I cannot believe that a performance taped in 2001 is just being released in 2005. It's not like the band doesn't do any touring and that was the last time they were on the road!
Every promotional music video PRO-PAIN ever made is compiled onto this DVD, which is certainly a nicety and almost nostalgic for the fans. Even though the budgets were clearly quite limited, they are, nonetheless, somewhat entertaining, and at times, almost comical. In most cases, the video is usually just the band playing, Gary yelling at the camera, and nobody looking overly excited about the whole premise either. I found the reverse chronological order of the videos to be slightly amusing as I watched the band get younger as each video progressed. PRO-PAIN saw some rotation on MTV and MuchMusic's Metal shows, but not a lot, so it's nice to at least have the videos available.
The lack of "bonus" material of any sort these days is unheard of. A band biography, a look behind the scenes, sound check, interview(s)…anything at all could have possibly moved this DVD closer to the top of my collection.
This is a DVD that will more than likely only be appreciated by diehard fans as the audio and video quality of the live performance is, at best, bootleg quality. Pick up the band's new release, "Prophets Of Doom", and take in this band live for a better understanding of where metalcore started, and how PRO-PAIN have garnered a following and continues to thrill audiences around the globe.
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