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THE ARCHIVES
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Morrigan's Pit has closed down as of November 2006. The site and its articles will stay online as an archive until September at least, but probably longer.
The Archives
2002-2006
» CD REVIEWS
» INTERVIEWS
» LIVE REVIEWS
» SPECIALS
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JON OLIVA'S PAIN - SAIDIAN
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Colos-Saal - Aschaffenburg (D)
October 7th 2005
http://www.jonoliva.net
http://www.saidian.org
Damn!! I never had that before, I swear!! I was on the way to Aschaffenburg with a friend of mine, to see Jon Oliva's Pain playing there, and between Frankfurt and Hanau I realized that I had forgotten my ticket at home. So I turned the car (no, not on the highway), got the damn piece of paper and drove on again.
And if that wasn't timing, then I don't know. We rushed into the Colos-Saal and immediately the first band started.
SAIDIAN, a German melodic power metal combo, plays quite ordinary music, not too bad but nothing special. To bring it down to one word: solid! It must be mentioned here that the Saidian bassist looks just like one half of the German comedy-duo Badesalz, Henni Nachtsheim, but he isn't related to him.
But the main reason for the people who came to Aschaffenburg that Friday night was Jon Oliva, the main madman from Savatage, together with his band. And one thing I must say right in the beginning, he played 15 songs, and only two of them were from the actual JON OLIVA'S PAIN output "'Tage Mahal". The rest of the set were old Savatage songs, and the crowds worshipped the "Mountain King".
The band started with "New York City Don't Mean Nothing", Jon was in a really good shape, and so was the whole band! By the way, this wasn't the first link to Savatage for the guys, they were the first line-up of the former Savatage singer and now Circle II Circle fronter Zak Stevens. But back to the show: after the really well appreciated "Jesus Saves" they played the first Pain song "All The Time", before "Gutter Ballet" made the fans go wild indeed! This was followed by "Hounds" and "Tonight He Grins Again" really already makes me shake from CD, even more so when I hear it live, unbelievable!! After "Strange Reality", Jon introduced his band, and quite a few people who are into Savatage might say that this line up could be Savatage in the future. "Ghost In The Ruins" was enriched with guitar solos (fuck, these guys really are fabulous!!), and after "The Dark" they played the second and last song from "'Tage Mahal", and that was 
"People Say – Gimme Some Hell". Some of you might know that this song's lyrics consists of mostly songtitles from old
Savatage songs. The next highlight was "Believe", that absolutely brilliant ballad, before the sixpiece played "City Beneath The Surface" and "Sirens", then they left the stage for the first time. The encores were the really well appreciated "Power Of The Night" and – of course – "Hall Of The Mountain King".
After all it was a really tight gig from Jon Oliva's Pain, the band really fits very well together and the musicians know all the older songs by heart. The drive to Aschaffenburg (including returning home, getting the ticket, going back again) was really worth it, a nice night to remember!!
And, honestly I don't know if it was due to my Pagan's Mind shirt, but the Norwegian friend-of-the-band/journalist Frode gave me the possibility to go to the backstage area and talk to the musicians a bit and get my booklets signed as well, of course. Thank you Frode, if you read this!!!
setlist Jon Oliva's Pain:
New York City Don’t Mean Nothing
Jesus Saves
All The Time
Gutter Ballet
Hounds
Tonight He Grins Again
Strange Reality
- band introduction -
Ghost In The Ruins
The Dark
People Say - Gimme Some Hell
Believe
City Beneath The Surface
Sirens
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Power Of The Night
Hall Of The Mountain King
submitted by Paddy 01.11.2005
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