Papa Roach (supp. Wage War)
Wednesday, 29 January 2025
Vienna (Wien) / Wiener Stadthalle – Halle D / Austria
Papa Roach — yet another in that string of 2000s bands that embedded themselves into the millennial generation with the one track absolutely everyone has heard: Last Resort, which echoed everywhere for years. For most self-proclaimed music fans today, Papa Roach might register as a ‘one hit wonder’, but at the concert in that eternal, indestructible concert fortress — the Vienna Stadthalle — we were clear witnesses that this couldn’t be further from the truth.
Papa Roach are often mistaken for punk-rock artists because of their glory days, but thanks to their dropped tuning (Drop D or Drop C#) and rapped verses, that’s simply not true. They firmly belong in Nu-Metal territory — right alongside their best buddies, Alien Ant Farm.
This time around, DJ Rokko Ramirez warmed up the crowd first (many of you will have caught him at the Arena Stožice stage, before the Pantera concert on 31 January 2025), serving up music from the era that defined the evening. Everything rolled through — from My Chemical Romance to Avril Lavigne and everything in between. The DJ kicked things off at the exact moment the doors opened and people poured in — 18:00 sharp. He kept the crowd pumped right up until the last minutes, when the support act Wage War came charging onto the stage.
Wage War are a Florida metalcore quintet. They’ve got five studio albums to their name, the most recent being “Stigma”, which dropped last year. That record got noticeably more attention in the setlist, which covered a solid half-hour set.
I haven’t witnessed a metalcore band radiate quite as much sleepiness on stage as Wage War did that evening. Vocalist Briton Bond was ‘mobile’ in the same way the hands of a broken watch are — which is to say, barely at all. The guitarist did show some signs of life, actively joining in on backing vocals. He managed to shift his stage position (left and right) by a good ten centimetres, and that was about it. The setlist itself was sharp enough, and given the main attraction of the evening, actually heavier than you’d expect — meaning Wage War put out a solid amount of energy. The setlist was firmly centred on tracks from their newest album “Stigma”, complemented by one track from “Pressure” and three from “Manic”. They closed with the title track of “Manic”. The crowd received them really well. Wage War have serious mileage under their belt — they’re highly experienced and incredibly tight as a live unit. And that’s what counts; that’s exactly what the crowd came for.
Wage War – setlist:
1. The Show’s About to Start
2. Godspeed
3. Low
4. Circle the Drain
5. Nail5
6. Blur
7. Tombstone
8. Happy Hunting
9. Magnetic
10. Manic
At exactly 21:00, it was time to hang with Papa Roach. The opening had a pinch of technical hiccups — the curtain didn’t drop in sync with the concert charge — but the crowd wasn’t put off in the slightest; they locked in with the essence of opening track Even If It Kills Me instantly. The amount of fire and smoke unleashed during the first three songs was comparable only to some WWI battle for Vaduz, while the stage lighting was flat-out exceptional — throughout the entire show. The first thing during the concert that caught everyone off guard was the first cover: California Love, belonging to rap legend 2Pac Shakur! Then came Swerve and Liar, followed by Forever, which seamlessly bled into the Linkin Park mega-hit In The End during the outro. The band didn’t forget to pay tribute to the far-too-soon-departed legend of the nu-metal universe: Chester Bennington. It’s no secret that Papa Roach vocalist Jacoby Shaddix and Chester Bennington were more than just ‘industry colleagues’ — they genuinely treated each other as close friends outside of the business. After Chester’s suicide, Jacoby also spoke publicly about feeling guilty, because despite Chester confiding in him about all his personal struggles and demons, he hadn’t known how to help him better and in time to prevent the worst. He felt that the stigma around mental health was too heavy for the rock world at the time, and so it wasn’t talked about much publicly — even though many Papa Roach lyrics from the very beginning of their career deal with exactly those themes. That’s why the following track, Falling Apart, was followed by a short video addressing mental health struggles. At that point, Papa Roach announced they would donate proceeds from the concert to the Austrian suicide prevention association in the name of the show. After the video came Leave a Light On (Talk Away the Dark), where the venue lights went out and Jacoby called on fans to light up their phone flashlights. They stayed on until the end of the song. Jacoby then addressed the crowd, urging them never to give up when dark thoughts take hold, and that there is absolutely no shame in seeking professional help when you’re in that kind of personal crisis.
In the spirit of seeking inner balance and calm, another quieter track followed — Roses on My Grave. After that, we were back on livelier ground with the more recent No Apologies, released in 2022 and considered one of the most recognizable Papa Roach tracks of recent years.
Then came a drum solo, followed by a track that’s carved into the hippocampus of every person in that room — Scars. Jacoby had to put more horsepower into his vocal delivery here, because the entire venue had owned this song for a long time. Stadthalle consequently came alive with a particularly deafening noise — it wasn’t just the chorus being sung back, but every single word of the track. Towards the end comes crowd-stirring with calls to raise their hands, which only added to the overall energy output. Then comes the oldie Help, and many get the feeling that the main set is already wrapping up. The crowd stays relentless in unleashing decibels, and Papa Roach squeeze even more return energy out of them than during Scars. Born for Greatness follows, and Papa Roach say their goodbyes. Everyone knows something is missing!
That unbearable minute of waiting arrives — the one that feels as long as a whole geological era. But then — a new lightshow salvo! The encore is here. And here come the classics, one after another. Between Angels and Insects rolled straight into Infest — both from the “Infest” album, which remains the most recognizable to this day. When Infest wraps up, Jacoby announces that the encore is going to be very old-school! He calls on the crowd one last time to get the moshpits going — which appeared faster than a highway inspector spotting a car without a vignette. The intro to Broken Home is marked by a sequence of familiar rock ‘n’ roll phrases, before the band very unexpectedly drops into Eminem’s Lose Yourself, which also bookended the Broken Home outro. Then comes a series of covers — or rather, snippets of them stitched together: a mashup of tracks from the most recognizable bands of the late nineties into the new millennium: Korn, Deftones, Limp Bizkit, and System of A Down. They played Blind, My Own Summer (Shove It), Break Stuff, Chop Suey. On the last one, Jacoby threw in the towel and handed the lead vocal entirely over to the crowd. Immediately after Chop Suey comes the line: “I got one for you!” And everyone in the venue knew exactly what was coming. It was time for Last Resort. The crowd raised the roof like a mother-in-law being told by her son-in-law that she can’t cook, and sang at the top of their lungs. The venue was consequently swept by a tornado of new moshpits, as Jacoby surprised everyone mid-song with “We Will Rock You”, which the crowd sang along to as if nothing had changed and it had always been part of the song. We’re in the Last Resort finale, and the perfection of lights, sound, and crowd all merge seamlessly into one body brimming with joy and surging energy.
But Last Resort is the moment when everyone knows Papa Roach have brought the show home. The band promises to return. It’s more than clear that Papa Roach have absolutely no thoughts of retirement, which — after 25 years on the road — is definitely reassuring. Here at the editorial team, we hope we’ll get to cover their 30th anniversary too, and until then — “Time and Time Again” — we hope they’ll keep tearing up stages the way they did in Vienna!
photographs: Denis Paradiž
text: Helena Medved and Denis Paradiž
Papa Roach – setlist:
1. Even If It Kills Me
2. Blood Brothers / Dead Cell
3. …To Be Loved
4. Kill the Noise
5. Getting Away With Murder
6. California Love (2Pac cover)
7. Swerve
8. Liar
9. Forever (with Linkin Park’s In The End snippet)
10. Falling Apart
11. Leave a Light On (Talk Away the Dark)
12. Roses on My Grave
13. No Apologies
14. Drum Solo
15. Scars
16. Help
17. Born for Greatness
—encore—
18. Between Angels and Insects
19. Infest
20. Broken Home (with Eminem’s Lose Yourself snippet)
21. Blind / My Own Summer (Shove It) / Break Stuff / Chop Suey
23. Last Resort
