Best concerts you've been to.

As I stated recently in another thread music has played an enormous part in my life.
I have an eclectic taste in music and listen to all different sorts and genres....some that may defy definition.

I have literally seen hundreds of bands/acts live ranging from some of the biggest performers in the world to some of the most obscure artists imaginable.

The other night I was looking on YouTube for a classic performance on Rock Goes to College of one of my favourite bands from back in my youth and I came across a video of them performing during their 30th reunion tour in 2009.
I was at the opening concert of this tour in Newcastle and I have to say it ranks in my all time best concerts I've ever been to.

So it got me thinking; what are the top 5 concerts I've been to and what are the best concerts other people have been to....and why?

This particular concert was by The Specials.
They were a part of my youth; didn't matter if people were Punks/Skins/Mod/Soulie The Specials struck a chord with my generation.
They were working class kids singing about the world we were living in.
Most of the old punks turned out to be hypocrites or were arty wankers who didn't have a clue what life was like for urban working class kids during Thatcher's hey day.
The Specials gave a big # off to everyone.....and had great fun doing it.
Their music is as relevant today as it was back in 1980.

Anyway, they broke up and we waited years - by all accounts Terry Hall didn't get on with some of the members and no-one got on with Jerry Dammers.
I'd met a few of them over the years and they were really good people but they all just laughed when I mentioned a reunion.

But in 2009 they announced a reunion tour - minus Jerry Dammers - and the opening night was in Newcastle.
Newcastle was absolutely bouncing that day, pubs were rammed with people who could hardly contain themselves - this band was/is so special to so many.
The atmosphere in Newcastle Academy was electric and the whole place erupted when they opened with 'Do the Dog'.
And it just got better.....they really were outstanding.

Its impossible to over-emphasise just how important a band The Specials were and to see them that night was simply unforgettable.

I can't find a video of that particular night but here's one of a concert on the same tour.
They are very good and the audience seem quite enthusiastic etc.....but not a patch on that night in Newcastle.



The set list in the description.

Here's a link to the Rock Goes to College concert, its well worth a watch.....especially The Skinhead Symphony.
www.youtube.com...

So, you're best concerts?

My faves ranked:

Aerosmith
Linkin Park
Stone Temple Pilots x4
Alexis On Fire x 3

I was at U2 in Tempe where they played for sold out crowd and memorialized the concert in Rattle and Hum. Tickets were $5 and I landed 8 row seat. I still think I’m in the film. Best sounding concert was Pink Floyd momentary lapse of reason tour. The sound was incredible. I still go to concerts and just saw Bon Jovi in Dallas and Pearl Jam in AZ. No comparison: Bon Jovi played mostly new stuff and realized I really don’t know them at all. Eddie Vedder’s voice is best voice live I have heard: granted never saw Zep or Queen. The most surprising concert experience was a friend literally dragged me to the Eagles recently, Glen Fred’s last tour. I thought they were way too old at the time but forgot how much I knew Eagles and Joe Walsh was amazing for his age.

Well, I have vague memories of one back in the 70’s,
Black Oak Arkansas, I think in Panama City, Florida.

a reply to: Freeborn

Grand Funk Railroad
Blood Rock
Jethro Tull
Iron Butterfly
Kansas
The People
America
Kenny Rogers And the First Addition

I'm pretty sure I saw ZZ Top in a High School Gymnasium when nobody knew who they were but I was kinda out of it so would have to check with my wingman for authentication. LOL

a reply to: Freeborn

This doesn't quite fit your thread but its important from the current state in 2022. I like the song. It was back in 1991 in Moscow when the old Soviet Union was about to collapse. Over 1 million people when Metallica played Enter Sandman. It was historic. Then Putin came along. Tough to understand the people then and the war crimes on the people of Ukraine by Russian troops today.

Metallica - Enter Sandman Live Moscow 1991 HD

a reply to: Ash614

I've seen U2 twice, once in Gateshead supporting The Police back in '82.
I only went because the lass I was seeing at the time was really into The Police but I thought the support acts of U2, The Beat, Gang of Four and I think The Lords of the New Church were far better.

I saw them again about 10 years later on the Zoo TV tour in Manchester.
They were very good but they'd become more of a spectacle than anything else....would loved to have seen them on the original Joshua Tree tour.

I took my daughter to see Bon Jovi twice, not really my cup of tea but the first time they were excellent.
Van Halen supported them and they were awful.
The second time the weather was terrible and the sound was very poor.

a reply to: Freeborn

As you are a fan of " The Specials " this may interest you.

Award-winning writer Steven Knight is to create a new BBC drama series set in the era of ska and 2 Tone music. Two Tone will tell the story of an extended family and four young people drawn into the scene which grew out of Coventry and Birmingham in the late 70s and early 80s.
Unifying black, white and Asian youths at that time, Knight said the series' soundtrack would be "sensational". It will start filming later this year at Knight's new Birmingham studios.
The sixth and final series of his hugely successful BBC drama Peaky Blinders, also based in the city, concluded earlier this month.

www.bbc.co.uk...

As for the best concert i attened, then i have some special interest. In a suburb of Birmingham called Erdington, in the late 60's early 70's there was a club called " Mothers " It was situated above a furmiture shop on the High Street.

Every week a top band or artist would play there. The list of acts i saw are numerous, and they included Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath, The Who ( they played the complete " Tommy Set " ) Elton John, David Bowie, Jethro Tull. Cream, Pink Floyd. Joe Cocker. Free, Deep PurpleT Rex the list was endless. Us Brumies where very lucky in those days for live music. And the addmission price was Ten Shillings.

“Mothers” was voted the best live music venue in the world in 1969, but why was a ball room above a shop in Erdington of all places given such a title? Well, the unassuming venue proudly showcased acts such as Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, The Who, T-Rex, Fleetwood Mac and Elton John (to name a few) in the three short years it was around.

Pink Floyd even recorded tracks for their album ‘Ummagumma’ in the venue itself. Canned Heat played there and referenced the club in their sleeve notes of the 1969 compilation album ‘Canned Heat Cook Book’ (seriously, go check for yourself). Not bad for a Birmingham ball room!

www.badluck.co...

a reply to: Waterglass

Not a big Metallica fan - a cousin of mine keeps on trying to get me to go see them - but that was awesome.
Can you imagine the buzz they must have got playing in front of so many people.

Such a shame.....

a reply to: Freeborn
My favorite moment was odesza at minus zero in Vermont. It was at Mount snow, they amped up the snow makers and used so many lasers. Snow lasers! It looked like a billion pieces of glitter flooding the sky. I cried out of happiness. It was really cool, look up odesza minus zero, it was ridiculous. And I've been to 100s of shows and big fests. I know it's different from yall seeing rock. Edm has insane production

I've been to staind and Korn and drake and all genres. Odesza at minus zero with snow lasers without a doubt takes the cake.

The 2nd concert of my life, hands down.

Five days before, I say my first concert...a Christian metal band called Whitecross and I was 14. Dad "begrudgingly " took me....found out years later he loves metal. That is all I remember.

So, concert two.

This show was amazing! It was at the Landmark Theatre...an amazing place guilded out in a Hindu theme. My whole family went and Dad's mom, my Grandma.

It was Johnny Cash and Family.

I remember the energy in the crowd, the upright bass. The fiddle, and The Man in Black. I felt the love and pain in each note, the passion and honesty in his voice. The lights, the sound, the way even the strange kid in a cowboy hat in front of me were family if only for a few hours.

That was when I realized I love music. It is my soul and I am lucky enough to work at that very same theatre now. I honestly can talk music for hours on end.

My 2nd favorite concert was two years ago. I took a day and drove out of town and got a hotel by myself, and actually got to see The Adicts.

A few years after the Cash concert, I heard Operation Ivy fell in love with the ska/punk/rude boy music scene...which quickly led me to one of the premiere bands in the world. Sad thing was, never got to see them until this one show. They absolutely killed it. Then you add in the fact that they formed in the 70's and almost 50 years later Monkey and the boys played like they were in their 20's.

Thanks for the memories tonight and a great few days of music posts.

a reply to: alldaylong

The Specials were so important to so many kids of a certain age the length and breadth of the UK.
We had # all...and what we did have Thatcher took it off us.
My options leaving school were the Dole, the Army or jail.....

Me and a mate 'acquired' every size and colour Harrington possible and used to sell them along with Levi Sta-Prest and Fred Perry t-shirts to kids from all over.
It was the only way any of us could afford the clothes....or anything really.

I like Birmingham....but musically its still very much a 'rock' city.
I worked in Hednesford for a while and used to go into Birmingham for a drink regularly.

Look forward to seeing the programme you mentioned....but I have to say most attempts at portraying that era haven't really been that realistic.

a reply to: theatreboy

Doesn't get much better than Johnny Cash and Operation Ivy.

I have some mates who supported Rancid and Old Firm Casuals on different occasions.
A couple of them are in regular contact with Lars, they reckon he's a cracking guy.

I've seen them both and they were really good.....but not quite in my top 5.

A handful of good ones out of the maybe 300-400 shows I've seen would be...

Vanhalen's reunion tour
Journey, Hart, and Cheap Trick
Billy F#&*ing Idol
Tool (haven't seen them do a bad show yet and I've worked their show like 4 times)
Girl Talk
Zeds Dead
Pretty Lights (seen them many times too and they never disappoint)
Griz at Red rock with a live band for the Ride the Waves tour

Its honestly hard to remember at this point as I work in the industry and so I've seen a metric f*#& ton of concerts...both working and as a paying member of the audience.

Man, I used to love going to concerts Ive really missed going...we used to have an amphitheater nearby and got to see a bunch of different bands, throw in those bands I've seen in my youth there are lots of them.

1. Rush
2. Van Halen
3. ZZ Top
4. AC/DC
5. Judas Priest

Honorary mention too, we used to always go see the Eagles but we caught them at Piedmont Park and there were about 100,000 fans watching and it was still fantastic

Steve Miller Band even with the Joker and the Space Cowboy getting on up there, still brought it most of the night not only vocally and definitely on the guitar. Wild Mountain Honey was excellent.

Bob Seger was pushing 70 something and he could still bring it vocally, such a fun concert great crowd.

and one of my all-time favorites got to see, ladies and gentlemen from Funk Rock Georgia "Mother's Finest" 35 years after their glory years and they were still good, it was at a little town country fall festival.

The Neville Brothers, some club in New Orleans back in the 70’s.

a reply to: Freeborn

i can't say the best. but the concert i remember best is roger waters the wall live in berlin 1990. the acoustics were bad but a monster of a concert, half million people, a huge wall (of which i could only see the upper third) and in addition a collection of various world stars (including huge sound failure while mother). a lasting memory.

I would have to say that the best for me was a three day all acoustic festival called Bread and Roses at the Greek in Berkeley in the late 70s.

Performing were some greats.

Hoyt Axton
Ramblin Jack Elliot
Maria Muldaur
Mimi Farina
The Boys of the Lough
Tom Paxton
Richie Havens
Joan Baez
Arlo Guthrie
Country Joe MacDonald
The Persuasions
Malvina Reynolds
Pete Seeger
Dave Von Ronk
The Roaches
Taj Mahal

And others.

The Specials was probably my 5th favourite concert I've been to.

Number 4 was when I went to see a little known band called The Mo-Dettes back in about 1980 I think, I was about 14 or 15 at the time.
They were playing at the local Arts Centre.

The Mo-Dettes were what I guess would be called an all girl New Wave band but I guess they'd be called Indie nowadays.
Not many people had heard them but me and my mate had bought their single from a small independent record shop whose owner used to let us skive school in there and listen to all sorts of music.

My mate lived on the other side of town and I got the bus to his house where we had a couple of cans or a bottle of cider etc.
I dyed my hair blue before we went to the Arts Centre.

We were over the moon when we got served at the bar and had a couple of pints.
There was the usual fight before hand, some older lads from town took offence at the presence of some 'out of towners'.
Then the Mo-Dettes came out and blew the place away - the place was bouncing.
I guess it was my first experience of anything as intense as that.
From that moment I was hooked on live music.

After the concert I got the last bus from town home....the bus driver started laughing at me when I got on the bus as did everyone on it - mostly half-pissed blokes.
going home after the pubs had shut.

I thought my mother was going to give me a bollocking for being late in but she too started laughing and told me to go look in a mirror.
My face was completely blue - I looked like a munchkin - ....I'd used food dye to dye my hair and with the heat and sweat it had dripped and spread all over my face.

It was a great night but I did make a complete tit of myself.

No footage of the night but here's a rare video of The Mo-Dettes.

Mayhem performing De Mysteriis Dom Satanas in its entirety.

Warrant/Slaughter/Quiet Riot

Motley Crue 1999

Slayer and Slipknot at Tattoo the Earth

And Green Day 1994, because it was my first.