For me it was Wolfmother at a major German festival. I didn’t really know them before and did not expect too much, but was totally blown away by their performance.
Every Time I Die. It was a very small venue, the stage was like 2 feet off the ground and I was front row. No barriers or bodyguards, you could just reach out and touch them. The ceiling had pretty low beams and people were hanging from them at times.
They let people on the stage and if they lingered too long, theyd shove them off. They put on a wild show, interacting with everyone and just going crazy. That venue didn’t last long, it was open for 2 years and shut down after a zoning violation and some other issues.
Honestly I’ve never had that much fun at another show. I’ve been blown away by several performances, but the energy has never topped that one.
I still remember my first every time i die show. I was pretty shocked that the singer was this thin dude with the voice of a behemoth.
I had the same reaction! I was expecting a big guy.
Their guitarist is now a pro wrestler, too. He’s pretty fun to watch.
Does a solar eclipse count as a live performance?
A life performance by the universe
Yeah, the recent one was pretty good.
My first concert at IIT Delhi by KK. It was the best I’ve attended.
Sonu Nigam is my favorite but in his concert, I was like 3-400 m away and he was practically not even visible!
KK Slider?
No. Indian singer KK - Krishnakumar. He is no more.
I saw Swedish rapper Timbuktu at a local festival some 10 years ago, but he brought a full orchestra with him. It was an absolutely incredible mix that I’ll never forget
There have been quite a few good ones since, but the first concert that my parents let me go by myself to was a Primus NYE show in Oakland, some time around '94. I was, maybe 15? It was the coolest thing ever. Why was it so amazing? I mean, it was Primus, there was weed everywhere, and I was 15.
Yeah, but Primus sucks.
Fuck yeah, it does!
One evening in 2002 I saw In Flames, Soilwork, and Pain on the same stage, one after the other. It was while In Flames were small enough to stick to the smaller and more intimate concert venues, so the crowd was small enough that you could greet anybody there if you wanted. Met a lot of cool people that night. And the night finished with the entire crowd jumping in unison to In Flames - Only For the Weak.
I saw that tour too. I was so disappointed I never listened to melodeath ever again :D. To each their own I guess.
Saw Panic! At The Disco in 2012 after they released their third album. They’re one of the few groups that borderline sound better live.
They also did a cover of I Believe In A Thing Called Love which I wish they’d release as an actual single. Kinda sucks that Bohemian Rhapsody got that treatment years later but this didn’t.
I saw them when they released the first album, and the whole stage performance was like a gigantic circus, very elaborate and quite a spectacle. Everything they played was tight, was even impressed with the piano solo. I wish that era was captured on dvd and released, it was so good.
Jack’s mannequin opened up for them.
I’ve gone to several Gogol Bordello concerts, they’re always amazing. Most memorable one was when Eugene Hütz got their guitar strap stuck in their hair and kept rampaging around the stage with the guitar just hanging there, not holding it in their hands or anything. He kept making the stagehands go away instead of letting them help untangle the guitar. The mosh pits can be wild. Pre-covid he’d take swigs of wine and spit take it all over the pit, post covid they just splash wine everywhere instead which is still fun but not quite the same.
Another one that will stick with me is I got to go to a punk house and listen to local trans artists. I watched from the roof and spray painted a trans flag up there it was great
Rammstein in Foxboro a year or so ago.
I was expecting a good show but holy shit. Just the atmosphere, effects, stage presence, and showmanship. Best show I’ve ever been to.
Close second is Trans-siberian Orchestra, for similar reasons.
Crash Worship. They did sort of tribal industrial experimental music from the mid-80s through (I think) the mid-00s. I don’t know if they came out of the OG Burning Man crowd, but they very much had the Burning Man vibe from back when the Burning Man experience still included shooting guns. I saw them play a NYE show at a 1920s-era movie house turned music venue called the Aztlan, and it was bonkers.
The show started with a massive floor-to-ceiling fireball, and kind of escalated from there. There were a lot of drummers and fire performers moving through the crowd flanked by a phalanx of nubile people in various states of undress carrying alcohol whose mission seemed to be to get as many people as possible as drunk as possible as quickly as possible. At one point I was so soaked with kerosene and alcohol that I was genuinely worried about lighting my own cigarette. Fortunately I was shortly put at ease about it when I got hit with a stray firework and didn’t burst into flame.
It was a pretty intense experience. It’s not surprising that Crash Worship has been banned from just about every venue they’ve ever played (and I think maybe some entire cities as well). There’s no way the owners of the Aztlan knew what they were signing up for when they made this booking. I’m glad I got to be there to see it though.
I go to loads of concerts, but my favorite eas Lady Gaga’s Chromatica Ball in Wrigley Field a couple years ago. A friend drove 3 hours to my place Sunday night, then we drove 5 hours to Chicago Monday morning for the show. 45,000 people crammed into that tiny jewl box baseball stadium was incredible. Looking out at the grand stand felt like a wave of people about to crash down on the field. Lady Gaga is an amazing artist and performer and knows how to rally a crowd. She played all her hits as well as most of the songs from Chromatica, which is a great EDM pop album. Lady Gaga always spends about 30 minutes if every concert at a piano and it feels so intimate, like she cares for you specifically.
Wolfmother is a band i really like as well. It’s always a great when you go into a show with no expectations and get blown away.
I was at Warped Tour back in 2007, I think. It was in August in Texas, and was held in a parking lot. In other words, it was fucking hot! NOFX was the last band to play and as soon as they start their set clouds rolls in and a huge thunderstorm storm starts. Some guy runs on stage and tells everyone they need to evacuate to a nearby pavilion. Everyone refuses to move.
NOFX finally comes back out and says they were told they can only play 3 songs. So, they bust out their 18 minute long song, which up to that point they refused to ever play live.
As far as best performance, hands down Paul McCartney. He was in his 70s and played an amazing and high energy show for 3 hours straight.
You got to see The Decline live??? Fuck me im jealous.
I’ve actually seen it live twice now. They played it at the Punk in Drublic Fest in Fort Worth a couple of weeks ago. If they are coming through your area, I highly recommend it. From that I’ve heard they’re playing it at every show.
Oh fuck.
Thank you.
I saw Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds on the Skeleton Tree tour on the first night of tour. This was shortly after Nick’s son had died in a tragic accident where he had fallen off a cliff. It was quite obvious he was deeply grieving but needed to be on stage to begin healing.
It felt like during the first song that the whole audience was keeping him alive and singing with our collective breathing, like the whole room was breathing as one person and holding him aloft with our breath? It’s a bit hard to describe, but like we were holding his hand across a tightrope. Then after a song or two he found a groove and began being the Nick Cave we all know, and began moving like a jaguar across the stage the way he does and doing his Nick Cave things (if you know you know). He didn’t talk much but it was pretty clear it was giving him some of his life back. I’ve seen him three times since, and he’s back to his funny self despite the loss of another son in that time, but I’ve never lost the feeling when I see him that the audience keeps him afloat. It’s pretty special. Also listening to and reading about him talk about grief has helped a lot of people.
So hard to decide.
Most impactful was probably seeing Above and Beyond at one of the Wonderland festivals. They were the last band to play and did their group therapy stuff. And sure, part of it was probably the drugs, but On a Good Day really connected with me.
Most fun might be Bad Religion. The concert was great and all, but I was in California and my friend in Chicago told me they had an extra ticket so I flew out to go to the concert with him. Probably spent $350 on flights for a $35 concert ticket.
Then there was Panic at the Disco last year. It’s my girlfriend’s favorite band and I very much enjoy them. Now Im living in Chicago, so I flew out to California and drove with her to Las Vegas for the concert. It was one of our earlier dates once we decided to be more serious.
Best performance might have been the Adicts. It was a small venue, but gorram did they have such an incredible time.
A&B sounds amazing! My answer would be similar, but with Phish… Hard to say what was just the drugs, but definitely some great moments at those shows.
I’ve seen them a few times, but nothing has ever matched that first time.
I was going through depression and having a really rough time during that period of my life, went to the festival with friends that I got separated from. Which didn’t bother me, they were putting out some negative vibes. The ecstacy had me feeling super empathetic and connected with everyone. And then they close out their set with On A Good Day. And dude, it felt like me on a good day. It resonated with me to the center of my soul.
It started a period where I was going to raves solo pretty regularly, became a kandi kid, and would always meet random people when I went. I had one show that I met a guy who snuck in, was kind of sketch, but we had a good time. After the show, I had gotten home when he called saying he was stranded with no way to get back. And ya know what, I drove back and picked his ass up. It was like an hour drive and 5 am, but man, I was all about that PLUR life. Even wore kandi that said ohana on it all the time. Never saw him again after that night, but I learned to love the short friendships I made at those shows. They were all the more beautiful knowing they were temporary.
oh man, that sounds amazing. :) thanks for sharing.
I’ve seen lots of contemporary dance performances which have blown me away, one was called ‘The Silk Road’ and showed how dance, as well as material goods was passed on via the silk road.
It had traditional Indian dance and Spanish dance (the one where the men do the foot stomping, I’ve not been up for long and my brain is still in sleep mode). It was amazing. The dancing was beautiful and demonstrated how culture and ideas are transmitted, in this instance- the similarities of dance movements
Also saw a free performance of some students of Chethams School of Music (Manchester) perform the harp. I think there was 4, maybe 5 female students, and it was beautiful. I’ve never heard the harp performed just on its own and they used percussive rhythms made by drumming and tapping the instrument…
I have the flyers from both above performances, so I’ll edit my comment later on after I’ve found them
Also adding Estas Tonne…my boyfriend is a big fan and we traveled down to London for a week which included one of his gigs…it was held in a church and was just him and his guitars (and 2 incense sticks)
