Best live show you ever saw

[JonFromMaplewood]

Sorry if this has already been a thread.  Three-way tie for the best live show(s) I ever saw:

1) Fugazi, 1989, at 242 Main Teen Center in Burlington, VT.  Right around when the Margin Walker EP came out.  People were packed in like sweaty sardines. I had never seen people "mosh" before. It was a life-changing event.

2) Butthole Surfers at Saratoga Winners outside of Saratoga Springs around 1990. Bad Livers opened for them. I had never seen such insanity in my life.  Full of Deadheads who had gone a liiiittle too far with the blotter acid, and needed some stronger music. But when the Surfers started playing, the Deadheads started moving back. It was too, too much for them.  Charlie's Angels shown backwards and upside down over footage of penis surgery; Gibby never facing the audience; Paul Leary blowing my mind with his guitar antics; two drummers, standing up, banging away on their sets like some fucked up tribal ceremony; and amidst all of that, an occasional beautiful melody finding its way through the chaos.  Now THAT'S entertainment.

3) Mountain Goats, around 1999 at Brownie's (not there anymore).  John Darnielle alone on stage with his acoustic guitar most of the time. I have never seen one guy hold people's attention for so long.  You couldn't take your eyes off of him. He seemed like there was nothing on earth he would rather be doing.  So joyous.  I have been a die-hard fan ever since.  Recent shows have been less energetic, and draw much larger crowds. BUT you get to see The Gorch drum for him, which is amazing.

[samir]

Flaming Lips
July 2002
London Astoria

Two weeks before 'Yoshimi' came out. Three weeks before I moved to the United States.
It was a range of emotions. All of them good.

[Martin]

The Roots, just before they got somewhat arrogant, circa Do You Want More??!!!?
Maxwell, just when his first album had dropped and he looked like the second coming of Marvin, 1997
Cassandra Wilson, just before she got boring (again)

Many of my heroes are DJs, so a lot of my best live shows have been club sets, by the likes of Jeff Mills, Psychonauts, Gilles Peterson, Dego, DJ Shadow, and Kerri Chandler.

[buffcoat]

Radiohead, this year.  They put on an awesome show.

The Pink Floyd show in 1987 was my first major concert.  It was gargantuan - the last gasp of real 70s style arena-rock - a huge crowd in Raleigh.  I am pleased that I was there.

[Man Machine]

Unwound at Lounge Ax in Chicago, 1995. Incredibly loud and heavy, but melodic. It was like being immersed in sound.

[namethebats]

Radiohead at the Gorge in Washington, 2001. It was the only time they played the original version of "Reckoner" - not that great a song, but when you're being pummeled with it in the fourth row, it's life-changing. And the rest of the setlist was outstanding.

Honorable mentions: The Dismemberment Plan at Modified in Phoenix, 2003; Guided by Voices at Nita's Hideaway in Tempe, 2001; LCD Soundsystem/Arcade Fire at the Roy Wilkins Auditorium in St. Paul, 2007.

[Sarah]

Phil Ochs at St. Lawrence University in 1966.  It remains one of my fondest memories.

Second half of a Bruce Springsteen concert in the early eighties.  I wasn't a huge fan, but someone else paid for the ticket.  Was unmoved during the first half, but during the second I even stood up for the bulk of it.  Really pretty wonderful.

Billy Bragg at Bowdoin College in 1991.  Tiny room.  Great.

Runners-up:

Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau at Carnegie Hall in the fall of 1975.  Tears were streaming down my face by the end of it.  Such a voice that man had.

Dave Van Ronk at the Left Bank Cafe in Blue Hill, ME, in 1992.  An honor to have heard him live.

[Patrick]

Mos Def circa 03 Bowdoin College, Maine...  he played with his band Black Jack Johnson, i meet Dr. Know at the show, he had to be one of the dirtiest people i had ever meet, and by dirty i mean like covered in dirt.  A+ performance.  

The Melvins Circa 01 at the North Six, Brooklyn.  totally arrogant, hardly even looked at the audience, played flawlessly.  at the end of their set they turned on this box that said "thanks".  solid A performance.

The Roots circa 07 Colby College, Maine.  this was durring the tour when they where doing alot of cover songs by the likes of Nas, Wu-Tang, Led Zeppelin,  and did the 10 min Machine Gun/Masters of War song. the Roots played for over 2 hours.  A+

others of note, the Flaming Lips (they put on a hell of a show), Sonic Youth (playing a half empty theater with a sound system that had to be the worst ever. all it was was echos and feedback.  halfway through the show i think they abandon the set list and made as much noise as they could), and Megadeth...  i know i know, but i got free tickets and figured why not.  i was almost 100 feet away in the stands and every time one of the Pyros blew i could feel the heat, AWESOME!!  also Acid Mothers Temple in 2006, that was great!!!

[Sarah]

Mos Def circa 03 Bowdoin College, Maine...  

Ha!

[Patrick]

Mos Def circa 03 Bowdoin College, Maine...  

Ha!

yeah the best part, Mos Def came out on stage and said "My Ni**az!!!"  and the 99.9% white audience went crazy....  Surreal!! 

[Sarah]

Was the concert in the tiny room with the stuffed polar bear in the hall outside?

[Patrick]

no it was in the Gym, and it was in the middle of February and very cold in the gym... 

[Sarah]

I figured Mos Def probably rated a bigger space.  Too bad:  he might have gotten almost as much mileage out of the polar bear as Billy Bragg did.

Note:  This is my 2999th post.  Good god.

[tenspeed]

David Byrne, Bowery Ballroom, 2001       vs.      Lollapalooza, Waterloo Village, 1991


It's a toss up.  David Byrne was flawless and innovative.  He made the 5,001st time I heard Psycho Killer sound like the first.

Lollapalooza, the exact opposite:  A dust bowl of phernomes, feedback and day-time strobe lights.  I was 13, I had weird hair, and never in my life had I seen so many pale, sickly, looking children wearing the letters 'N,' 'I', and backwards 'N' printed on black t-shirts.   It was like recess at a apocalyptic, dystopian, mutant, rock n' roll high school, and the Butthole Surfers were responsible for watching your children.    I could only imagine what my mother thought, she brought me and my only friend there.  Poor Simon, he was so scared he wouldn't leave the blanket.    Ahh, youth....

[Pat K]

Half Japanese in DC, last summer. The classic lineup reunited, they played all of the good stuff, the crowd went wild, etc. Jad Fair was playing an acoustic guitar that was strung with yarn instead of guitar strings. Off-the-charts awesome.