Kev Rowland
Coming Home’ is the most recent album from Peter Tägtgren (Hypocrisy), their eighth, released in 2016. Tägtgren started Pain as a side project to bring together his interests of industrial and techno into metal, and in the studio provides all the music and vocals himself, with the rest of the guys being the live band. I have been playing this album quite a lot recently, as with this album he has also been bringing in some symphonic elements, and although there are times when he is influenced by Rammstein there are plenty of others when it could be Dimmu Borgir or even Nightwish. It is the sort of metal album I can imagine getting plenty of flak from reviewers as there are quite a few numbers that one could imagine being played on a rock radio station as they are quite commercial. That it made it into the Top 30 in four different European countries doesn’t surprise me at all.
The album starts with a country and western pastiche, with is worrying on a couple of fronts: namely it’s country and western and the production seems to be missing all of the bottom end. But then the guitars really kick in and “Designed To Piss You Off” lives up to its name. There is something about this album that makes it incredibly listenable to, right from the off, which is probably why I have been playing it so much in the car recently. It is perfect travelling music, bashing the steering wheel and singing along with the music blasting very loudly indeed. Funnily enough I don’t have many passengers. This is industrial metal for those who feel that Rammstein are just too Germanic, who enjoy the odd symphonic influence but don’t want it to always be there or be over the top, and enjoy strong bottom end nu-metal vibes with English lyrics. Now that they have finished touring this one, they are promising album number nine in the future. Something to look forward to.