Live: W.A.S.P. THE PHOENIX – FEBRUARY 28 - by Uriel Mendoza - It was raining riffs inside the Phoenix February 28. Mississauga-based Exile opened the show with the best performance of the night, save for headlining W.A.S.P. Singer Will Patterson's ability to jump from a screech to a growl recalled the heyday of the mighty Iron Maiden, especially with epic and mystical tales that included lines like the ominously repeated "I'm coming for you!" and titles like "Another shade of hell." One fault in the performance, which is unfair to pin on the band, was the size of the stage; the Phoenix isn't the ideal venue for a metal concert. A lot of times the band seemed frustrated trying to rock out in such a confined space. It made things a bit awkward. Sin Dealer was a conveniently pre-packaged collection of every metal cliché imaginable. You know when you're pretending to be a rock star in front of the mirror — a whole lot of fist pumping, finger pointing to the sky, dramatically turning your back to the crowd — picture that. Like Fatal Smile later on, their saving grace was the guitarist. Effortlessly cool Sabbath-type riffs. Liquid Violence was an amalgamation of early James Hetfield on vocals with a Motorhead grungy punk sound, though it was hard to pick up with the sound quality. They shared a problem with Fatal Smile in that their guitars were turned up to the point where you were drowning in white noise. The drummer was the only thing that kept things together. He looked like a really pissed off gorilla, arms flailing and crossing and bashing everything in sight. Fatal Smile: Artificial poor impersonation of '80's glam rock. They just tried too hard. W.A.S.P. executed a well-coordinated attack, letting each member have their moment centre stage (double-neck guitar solos!) and disappearing into the background at just the right time; their movement was fluid and overcame the limitations of the stage. The sound, too, was layered nicely to let each instrument stand on its own. They delivered an unrelenting performance, never even bothering to stop in between songs. It was a metal rock opera with multiple movements — the tempo would instantly shift from dramatic march "Invisible Boy") to a violent onslaught ("Chainsaw Charlie") to ballads ("Gypsy Meets the Boy") — and made great use of effects like lighting and impressive back-up vocals to heighten the atmosphere. Added to the performance was a screen behind the band showing the black and white movie originally filmed for the conceptual album. The only thing better than hearing Chainsaw Charlie is actually seeing him.