Cap has made a few of these type threads and this one may not be original but it’s been on my mind so here we go.
Not albums, but individual songs. They can be amazing for various reasons, great recording, the venue, individual band member performance etc.
I have not included any songs for which I was in attendance, that feels like a separate category and for many it is hard to find quality recordings. I also stayed away from just listing live versions of my favourite songs. That felt like a cop out. Most of these are songs from artists I like but aren’t my favourite songs. But something specific about that performance pulled me in.
Basically I chose songs that give me goosebumps no matter how many times I listen.
1. I’m not a huge Nirvana fan but this is amazing. The pain in Kurt’s voice, the look on his face towards the end. Not an original of theirs but never did a song feel more from the heart.
2. I read this was recorded shortly after Prince was snubbed from Rolling Stones top 500 guitarists of all time. Talk about a mic drop. Or guitar drop. Literally. I don’t even like Prince but this is epic.
3. From live at Pompeii. This is peak Pink Floyd. It’s beautiful, mesmerizing, eerie. Playing at such a historic venue with no crowd was so cool. Before the grandeur and alienation of later tours like the Wall this feels so intimate and yet desolate.
4. This one is a bit different in that it’s a product of its time. Korn hasn’t exactly aged well. Woodstock is also seen in a rather negative light nowadays. But this performance is hard to ignore. At the height of their popularity, going toe to toe with the biggest rock/metal bands in the world, Korn was one of, if not the first, heavy act to play at Woodstock 99 and it shows in the crowds enthusiasm. That scene of the pit, if you can even call it that it’s so big, going wild as he screams “are you ready?” Is legendary. For me this also represents a different time in music. Much and MTV actually played music and heavier acts actually got airplay, something you would never see today. Top 40 pop fans knew who Korn was just as much as Korn fans knew who the Backstreet Boys were. Nowadays anything not pop or hip hop barely gets any attention and when it does, like Tool a few months ago, it’s treated as this rare occurrence.
So, what are your favorites?
Last edited by Cecil Terwilliger; 11-17-2019 at 01:31 PM.
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No footage but when I was at Sasquatch a few years ago Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros joined Mumford and Sons and did Fleetwood Mac's The Chain live. I don't really like Mumford, and I've seen Fleetwood play it live too, but this was one of the best musical experiences of my life. The setting sun behind the stage, the gorge, thousands of people singing along outdoors in the middle of nowhere. Just magic.
There is a vid online of them doing it somewhere else (with some others on stage as well), but it doesn't do it justice.
Steely Dan live at the Gorge Amphtiheatre in Washington State, summer of 2000.
Songs? All of them. First time I had ever experienced digital "Q-Sound" as FOH and it remains unforgettable. In consideration of the fact that there were three background vocalists, a four piece horn section, a supplimental keyboard player, supplimental guitarist (the incomprable Jon Herrington), two percussionists, a second bassist, and also Becker and Fagan? And they were all putting things into the mix? And it sounded pretty much like listening to the record (except for Herrington's interpretations on some of the classic "hired gun" guitar solos)?
The overall experience in a perfectly "dead" outdoor environment, looking across the Columbia River valley at the Hoodoos while the sun sunk in the West?
All while my favorite band of all time was doing what they do best?
Imagine it...
They didn't play "Josie" and that was the only thing I had a problem with...
Well, that and the Cops in Spokane...but that's another matter entirely!
LMFAO.
RIP Mr. Becker; you did good things in your time on the extant world.
Last edited by Bindair Dundat; 11-17-2019 at 04:19 PM.
Reason: add RIP
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For "songs" only?
"Hallowed be thy Name"; Iron Maiden, Kinsmen's Fieldhouse, Edmonton, July 1982.
Bruce on fire. Never the same after that.
That entire show was so balls out (22 Acacia Avenue, The Prisoner, Number of the Beast, Gangland, Invaders...etc.) and is a timestamp that will never EVER exist again.
And then the Scorpions came on the stage after that and made everyone forget about Maiden.
And that's just crazy IMO. Blackout was a good record but Number of the Beast has buried it in terms of global sales.
That said? Rudi and company brought their "A" game and Klaus was also hitting on all cylinders. Mattias Jabs had finally learned how to shred (took him 3 hard years to do so) and pretty much killed Murray and Smith in the "who's got the biggest guitar dick" category.
The energy on that stage is something that will probably never be seen again.
It was a whole different time and place.
People still went to Sam the Record Man and bought vinyl...
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Best Live Songs Ever
