Billion Dollar Babies is a Swedish hard rock trio, and the first band to play on this year’s Pain tour through Europe.

“Alright Berlin! We’re the Billion Dollar Babies, and we are here to kick your ass tonight!”
- Frankie Rich (vocals)

Now, I say trio, and you look at the pictures and see five people standing there. Why? Well, it appears that only Frankie Rich (vocals), Pat Kramer, and Max Lander (both on guitar), are actually part of the band. Karl Löfgren (drums) and Nic Lester (bass) were only hired help for touring purposes, but to be perfectly honest with you, I didn’t know the band beforehand, and I didn’t notice that they weren’t as much into the band as the other three.
So, yes, this was new to me, and a bit surprising if I may say so. Not that I hadn’t heard the band before, but that they were on this tour. Sure, Pain has made a hard rock inspired song or two, but overall it wasn’t exactly the style we were going for here. On the other hand, we also had a power metal band in Dynazty, and a gothic metal band in The Vision Bleak, supporting Pain on this tour, so diversity was apparently the key.
What I’m getting at, in a very roundabout way, is that Pain has more often than not, given us positive surprises in their choices of support acts, so we were open to see what we were dealing with.

Billion Dollar Babies had brought their own stagedrops, announcing the band name, but that, and Pain’s large setup in the back, there wasn’t a whole lot of space left for the band. Still, they made the most of it, and managed to put on quite a lively show. Rich was definitely the most active of the group, but to be honest, it was mostly Löfgren that caught my eye, with his wild yet playful drumming style – it would be good for the band to enlist him into their ranks forthwith! Heck, why take them both, they seemed to fit right in there.
Something else that caught my eye, but that’s probably just because I was standing next to him, was Pat Kramer, and his smoke stunt. Well, smoke and smoke. I noticed when he came on that he was wearing ice hockey leg protection, because it made me think about the late Jeff Hanneman, but these were different – they had a couple of tubes protruding at the front. At first, I figured it was only for looks, but after a while, I saw small puffs of smoke coming out of the tubes! Apparently, Kramer was somehow hooked up to a smoke machine, but it didn’t do much, and he took the apparatus off after the first song.
Rich was also trying his best at livening up the crowd, but being the first band stage out of four, proved to be a daunting task. Even though he spoke enough between songs, presenting his band and their songs as best he could, he never really managed to win the audience over. Ok, to be honest, a few of the things he said were a bit too silly and clichéd as well, and that didn’t exactly help matters along.

I believe, however, that the biggest problem here, was as I mentioned above, the early slot of the band.
Only about a quarter of the audience had shown up for the beginning of the show, and even though a few more filed in during the concert, there still weren’t very many to see Billion Dollar Babies.
This was of course also reflected in the response the band got – a bit of reserved yet respectful applause between songs, and a small handful of responders to Rich’s comments. Nothing to write home about.
Still, the band braved on, and to their credit, they didn’t openly show that they were affected by the lacking commitment from the Berlin audience. They played their half hour, tried to entertain as best they could, and promised to hang out if anyone had become interested in what they had seen and heard. The only thing they really should have rehearsed a bit more, was the bow at the end, which Frankie Rich managed to forget altogether, and just left the stage.

“We’ll be at the merchandise booth the rest of the night. If you wanna fight us, that’s ok. If you wanna hang out and have a beer, that’s fine too.”
- Rich (vocals)

Despite Pain’s previously good track record of choosing support bands, I’m sad to say that Billion Dollar Babies didn’t much of an impression on me. I had actually liked to end with a fitting quote from the lyrics of the Alice Cooper song the band took their name from, but, alas, it, like the band, isn’t very memorable, and has no outstanding bits to take home with you after it’s done.

Setlist (incomplete):

President Payne
Everyone’s In Love With A Chemical God