Live albums that beat the studio albums // define the band

From the King Crimson thread:

as for the 80s stuff...you may want to pick up Absent Lovers, its like the 80s albums on steroids. idk if there are any overdubs on it or if the band really was just that good. it's insane, maybe one of the best live albums ever.

...

This has been my line forever, it's wild how good it sounds compared to the studio versions (and how good the playing is). Like one of the very few examples where the live album is the definitive document (maybe I'll start a thread!).

― change display name (Jordan), Thursday, March 5, 2020 9:57 AM (0 seconds ago) bookmarkflaglink

At Budokan by Cheap Trick, dunno if it beats the studio but def the defining album for the band

budokan is the first i think of as well

other than that, gotta be dave at red rocks. you just don't get the full dave experience without hearing the crowd cheer during the silences of ants marching. electric!!!

now, U2 at Red Rocks ...

Dr Feelgood – Stupidity

Maybe B. Marley & the Wailers's Live !

The Last Waltz is also pretty definitive but yeah At Budokan...

first I think of is At Fillmore East

Other examples that come to mind:

Maceo Parker - Life on Planet Groove (I love some of his other albums, but this album seemed like his most popular, at least among high school musicians, and the band is on fire)

Rebirth Brass Band - Live at the Maple Leaf was their best at the time it came out, although I like some of the studio albums that came after better.

So far this thread is really just my high school/college years.

xp

Frampton Comes Alive

Springsteen and the Dead's best stuff is spread out over live recording, but I'm not sure there are any definite single live albums

Talking Heads probably

James Brown - Love Power Peace is my other big high school album. Obv the studio versions are classics, but the sound is amazing and actually captures the energy of the whole thing.

Thin Lizzy

Keith Jarrett's Köln Concert ?

Tim Buckley – Dream Letter
John Martyn – Live at Leeds

Some of those Miles Davis records for certain bands, like Agharta.

I might be alone on this one but Dylan's Live 66 would qualify imo.

https://img.discogs.com/b0-u4OsRMoWn1YRmesbUsZRBl38=/fit-in/600x600/filters:strip_icc():format(jpeg):mode_rgb():quality(90)/discogs-images/R-825699-1162687861.jpeg.jpg

maze ft frankie beverly - live in new orleans, their best record and one of the best records ever made

Springsteen and the Dead's best stuff is spread out over live recording, but I'm not sure there are any definite single live albums

I'd say Live/Dead, but even that would be controversial among Heads. Before the Dick's Picks really cranked the archival thing into gear I think it would have served to define the band.

And maybe Johnny Cash's At Folsom Prison.

Yessss, I was knew I was missing a huge one and that's it (Maze)

xxxxxxpost no way is The Last Waltz the defining Band record

The Make-Up ‎– Destination: Love; Live! At Cold Rice

...is a cheat one

https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/71p-hu9f4YL._SL1423_.jpg

Aretha - Live at Fillmore West? (definitely the King Curtis album, at least)

Otis Redding - Live in Europe??

Deep Purple- Made in Japan
Iron Maiden- Live After Death
Townes Van Zandt- Live At the Old Quarter
UFO- Strangers in the Night
Jerry Lee Lewis- Live at the Star Club, Hamburg
Ozzy- Tribute
John Cale- Fragments of a Rainy Season

arguable-- It's Too Late to Stop Now
Santana- Lotus
Scorpions- Tokyo Tapes
Elvis- TV Special

Ok this thread is making me feel old, maybe a better question is 'what is the most recent classic live album'?

Anything after Jay-Z Unplugged?

Spiritualized's Royal Albert Hall live album is pretty definitive, I would say.

Leonard Cohen's Live in London is astonishingly good

Big Time - Tom Waits, amazing versions of mostly Rain Dogs/Swordfishtrombones era tunes that are even greater than the studio recordings.

https://img.discogs.com/wYFcAS4PwMuIb4Nh7sTzPWOENgg=/fit-in/300x300/filters:strip_icc():format(jpeg):mode_rgb():quality(40)/discogs-images/R-3679098-1340048395-4110.jpeg.jpg

Kiss -- Alive!

it sucks but less so than the prior albums with the same material

king curtis - at fillmore west
jerry lee lewis - star-club hamburg
seger - live bullet??

i would also argue skynyrd's one more from the road

I can't think of many defining recent live albums--people seem to love Carrie & Lowell live but I haven't heard it

king curtis at fillmore west ++

RIP live albums

Although maybe Tiny Desk concerts are the new live albums, and some of those are probably definitive for certain bands (at least in terms of views/plays)

for Jerry Lee Lewis, I prefer The Greatest Live Show on Earth to Live at the Star Club

One of these days i'm going to seriously put to the test the theory that Cardiacs is a valid answer to every thread on ILM. The Special Garage Concerts arguably has the definitive versions of many songs from their first couple of cassette releases and some that were never released before.

Does it count if there are no studio versions? As with Fushitsusha - Double Live II and Les Rallizes Denudes - Live '77.

Underworld's Everything, Everything feels like one of these, at least for the stadium banger part of their arsenal

Judy at Carnegie Hall

bill evans - live at the village vanguard

^^good one

I prefer "Night Beat" but "Live at the Harlem Square Club" is prob Sam Cooke's other most beloved album.

It's actually surprising how few jazz albums I'm coming up with, given that it's a live medium. Lots of great albums but few career-defining ones.

Cannonball Adderley - Mercy Mercy Mercy

Ooh another perfect one

Soul Rebels Brass Band have two mid-career live albums (one live-in-studio) that are probably the best representation of the band:

https://open.spotify.com/album/6V6vRstf0Y2AqKX3mVGZwc?si=qPBmpr2nTnino5VJJMKV1g

https://open.spotify.com/album/6xYLfRmf3lIuvjiPhzvbc2?si=l_bij2qlRsawybqhZutbSQ

my favorite one by Wes Montgomery is his live lp Full House

The rest of the albums by Manzanera's 801 are fair to good, but 801 Live is the one to own.

Coltrane - Live at Birdland is just as good as their best studio albums from that period, hard to say it eclipses them though.

Hawkwind- Space Ritual
Waylon Jennings- Waylon Live
J.Geils Band- Live-Full House
Jerry Jeff Walker- Viva Terlingua!
Outlaws- Bring It Back Alive
Delaney & Bonnie- On Tour
Neil Diamond- Hot August Night

Last Waltz is not great

Everybody let’s just list a bunch of albums oh wait

Swiss Movement?

Invitation To Openness?

Talking Heads probably

― change display name (Jordan), Thursday, March 5, 2020 10:55 AM

As long as you're talking about The Name of This Band Is and not Stop Making Sense.

Zappa belongs here somehow, since he often didn't even bother creating a studio version of a song, just relied on a tight band and good recording. Roxy & Elsewhere, Sheik Yerbouti, Tinseltown Rebellion...mostly-live albums with mostly-new material that never had studio versions.

Magma probably belongs here too, both Live/Hhai & the Retrospectiw albums are more energetic and somehow sound better than the studio recordings (there's probably overdubs on the first and there are *definitely* a bunch on the second, but they're still more essential than any of their studio albums)

oh yeah and Ween's Live in Chicago, kind of their version of Absent Lovers - I listened to it every day and when I went back to Chocolate & Cheese I could not believe how slow it was

https://i.imgur.com/gWRKrdi.jpg

Not a full album, but I think of the Stage version of "TVC15" as the definitive version because it was many years after getting that album before I even heard Station to Station. The Stage version is so much faster, S2S version seems plodding.

Little Feat's "Waiting For Columbus" is pretty definitive, imo

Live After Death eclipses all other Maiden stuff for me. Maybe Decade of Aggression for Slayer?

Grand Funk - Live Album

YES GRAND FUNK FUCK YES

Live At Leeds, obvs

James Brown - Love Power Peace is my other big high school album. Obv the studio versions are classics, but the sound is amazing and actually captures the energy of the whole thing.

Sundazed vinyl issue of this from a few years back is a bust tho, tracklisting gets bloated and loses urgency, and the mix is weird

The Who's Live At Leeds, I mean

Re: Tiny Desk

I find the Khruangbin Boiler Room set, and most of their other live set videos, far more appealing than their presence on record. Something about seeing them make all that sound as a trio makes those easy grooves feel immediate.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YgWnrIC8X-k

I might like the Heron Oblivion live album better than the studio version of the same songs. Close call.

Some will think it's heresy, but The Blow Up gives Marquee Moon a run for its money.

Lindisfarne Live - Geordies talking to Geordies.

I never liked the sound quaity of The Blow Up but that San Francisco show they released on Rhino Handmade a whiles back was electrifying.

The live album was really a late '70s to mid '80s phenomenon. I feel like the last ones that had real impact were Iron Maiden's Live After Death and/or maybe Metallica's Binge & Purge. Even a great one like Neil Young's Weld didn't have the impact of Rust Never Sleeps

So the thread is now just about good live albums, is it?

Metallica would definitely be on a 'worst live albums' thread.

heh, of course we did that:

Worst Live Albums Ever?

I’m not sure I’ve listened to Comes Alive.. Is it better than Frampton’s Camel?

i can't even name another frampton album

I never liked the sound quaity of The Blow Up but that San Francisco show they released on Rhino Handmade a whiles back was electrifying.

When I feel like listening to Tortoise's TNT, I usually go to the Midwinter 2019 performance rather than the studio album —
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EwJf5fw57Yo&t=607s

The Birthday party LIve 81-82
which i thought might be the first of several archive releases when the band the rights back to their material. Haven't seen anything new since though .

Electric Prunes Live in Stockholm 1967
I think there had been rumours around that the band was a studio ensemble for years partially because all their material was being written by outside sources and then the name was taken over by David Axelrod.
BUt this sounds like a Detroit Rock band a couple of years early. Very energetic hard hitting heavy psychedelic stuff. Wish there was more of thsi and wish there was also equivalents by other son the garage scene. Would love a Chocolate Watchband live set from the time.

HP Lovecraft May 11 1968
In the studio tehy tend to be pretty heavily arranged and possibly a little staid, maybe a little looser and more spacious on the 2nd lp. But this is a bit of a revelation free jamming looseness and very energetic
I heard there was osme weird backstory about the tapes being delivered to the person who went on to release them. Sounded like an echo of the Deep Throat scene from All The Presidents Men from the way I heard it.

Gun Club Ahmed's Wild dream
Jeffrey lee Pierce self produced the almost contemporary studio lp Pastoral Hide and Seek and I thought it left it sounding a little anonymous so this wasa much better representation of the then current sound. BUt thsi was a short lived band with a different drummer. I think the guy Simon Fish had been with teh Cult beforehand.
There's also one new song and several much older ones.

John martyn Battle of Medway
One man, a guitar and an echoplex . Interesting results.

JImi Hendrix Live at berkely
Visceral live set by JImi with MItch Mitchell and Billy Cox.

MC5 Teenage Lust
Proabaly better encapsulation of teh band's sound in 1970 than Back In The USA. Some of the same material in more expansive style plus a cover of James Brown's Its A Mann's Man'S Man's Man's World and a Black To Comm.

Conqueroo From The Vuulcan Gas Co
Unfortunately still the main legacy of the Texas based band though i think a jam with the 13th Floor Elevators is on the live 2cd where Stacy Sutherland is incapacitated by the acid he's taken.

Television Live at The Waldorf
Official version of a live set that had been in circulation in worse sound for years. Captures the band in 1978 and very hypnotic when they're in full flight.

Grateful Dead Two From The Vault
Captures the SF band in August 1968 which I think is one of their peak months ever.

Not quite in the spirit but I think Radiohead's "The King of Limbs Live From the Basement" is about 300% on the studio version.

yeah they should've just released that honestly

Neil Young & Crazy Horse - Live at the Filmore

that’s the definitive “Cowgirl in the Sand” performance for me

I prefer "Night Beat" but "Live at the Harlem Square Club" is prob Sam Cooke's other most beloved album.

― A True White Kid that can Jump (Granny Dainger), Thursday, March 5, 2020 12:36 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

Live at the Harlem Square Club was the first thing I thought of, but I would add Aretha's Amazing Grace, and it's cheating but also the last three songs of Purple Rain.

Motörhead's No Sleep 'Til Hammersmith.

maybe controp but I prefer Last Date to every other Eric Dolphy incl. Out To Lunch

Van Morrison's Live at the Pacific High Studio from '71 is definitive imo for the Moondance/Tupelo Honey/Band and Street Choir material.

turnthejaw, I agree. The Warfield Television show that Rhino put out feels bloodless to me (tho my brother disagrees). (But the boot that beats them all is the Portland/Earth Tavern 1978, recorded the night after the Warfield).