What about live music?

Live music can be both better and worse than home listening - for example, Fugazi have always been much better live than on record/cd/whatever.(Well, in my opinion anyway) They always throw themselves into the performance 100% and generate a great atmosphere. On the other hand, I thought that Portishead were incredibly dull live - they sounded no different to their CDs and lacked stage presence. They could easily have just stood there miming to a CD and nobody would have realised. (I should add that I actually like Portishead, before anyone concludes otherwise)

I'd say that the most transcendent gig experience I've ever had was the first time I ever saw The Pixies - I was 18 at the time and had just bought Come on Pilgrim, which was like nothing I'd heard before. (I was mainly into Goth stuff and metal back then...)The gig was just incredible - 45 minutes of fantastic shouty guitar music. And they were just there as the support to Throwing Muses!

I live in Philadelphia, USA. This is the home of the Curtis Institute. The student recitals are free during the winter months. The recital hall is small, and the acoustics are great. I have heard incredible music in that hall, and it is by far my favorite. It's pretty much restricted to classical, but that is not a problem in my opinion. I love it.

There are other times. Kitchens of Distinction doing "Drive That Fast," Radiohead performing "The National Anthem," Windy and Carl at Terrastock II, Martin Gore singing a solo acoustic "Here Is the House" at Dodger Stadium and the entire crowd singing along, the Chameleons performing "Second Skin," getting to sing along with En Esch of KMFDM during "Godlike"...

That said, to answer part of Mark's question -- while I've been to a slew of shows over the moons, it's not central to my experience of music and never has been. To others I know it's intrinsic and core, while others balance out home and club listening in equal importance. I wouldn't go that far -- just my somewhat stay-at-home nature, perhaps.

To an extent seeing bands is part of my social life, but I've never spoken to anyone at a concert that I didn't already know from somewhere else. I'd much rather see a band than hear a DJ playing records.

I do occasionally see concerts in a sit-down environment, but this limits the type of performance to a more...upscale sort of gig. Usually this means something like Loreena McKennitt, which isn't really my first choice. The luckiest one however, was Tom Waits. Despite nosebleed seats, it was one of the best shows I've been to, if not the best. And y'know, I doubt it would have worked in a pub.

I thought Godspeed were really excellent. It was a great time to just sit back and daydream, bombarded with the film loops and the building sound. Good stuff.

Probably best concert experience ever for me was the Flaming Lips in '96. That was the tour where they opened in the dark with the piano chords of "The Abandoned Hospital Ship" and then after Wayne sang the first verse and the first guitar chord kicked in (and it was LOUD! I couldn't tell if it was the speakers breaking up or my eardrums) something like 40,000 Chrismas lights all came on at once, draped all over the drums, guitars, microphones, etc. Totally and completely overwhelming. Great show after that, too.

I really hate the way most indie bands sound live - there's something so *ugly* about how they get their drums to sound and the rhythms are so....ugh. I saw the Aislers Set, who make pretty pop noises on record, twice recently and couldn't make it through a full set, the rhythm section just sounded so fucking plodding and horrible. I used to always dutifully sit through sets but now I regularly say sod it and go to the bar. I never write up a set I've not made it through though (except in a forum like this).

I used to like club PAs where some dolly boy or gal would mime to a backing track. For ten years I only saw gigs in clubs and I saw a bunch of great PA performances by everyone from Debby Harry to Kylie to Run DMC to the Pet Shop Boys. I go to proper gigs again now but I still think the 20 minutes PA format - belting out your new single and three greatest hits - is a pretty unbeatable live action event.

Where I grew up there was only one venue (a huge hall owned by the Town Council who put on a gig about once every 6 months). So anyone at all coming to town was a big deal for me. There was no point worrying about whether I liked them or not - zero discrimination was the best approach, so I went to see everyone who came. Hardly anyone used to bother coming but for some reason the council used to book bands doing quite big tours. Perhaps my favourite of this period was when I saw Marillion. There were fifty of us standing in this hall that could take about 1000 people. The band had a full lighting rig, dry ice – the whole pomp thing. And they did a massive two hour set unaware that NONE of us liked them. In the same setting with similar numbers of people in the audience I saw Lloyd Cole and The Commotions, Pete Hammil, the Two Tone Tour (Specials, Selector etc), Alexis Korner, The Blow Monkeys. It wasn’t until I left home and moved to London that I realised that gigs were popular entertainment and not some strange esoteric piss-taking pleasure.

Best gigs: Recently? Dirty Snow, Panasonic, Daniel Johnston and Magnetic Fields. Ever? James Brown, Divine (queen of the PAs), New Order.

What about the mid-point between live and album, namely... "live album"? I only say this cos today it struck me that someone, someday should put together a really vast and comprehensive Smiths live LP, that sweeps up things like the old live take of 'What She Said', 'Some Girls' and all the other stuff I've not heard.

Or should they? Oh, all right, maybe they shouldn't.

indian classical music concerts can be phenomenal experiences as well as they tend to sustain for four hours without a break. when everyone's jamming at the top of his game few things are more breathtaking. the things nagamani srinath did with her voice last summer, along with the intricate overlapping rhythms, were great.

and, yeah, _emergency and i_'s all right but the dismemberment plan's live show was scintillation.

But everything I've said so far is in reference to ROCK concerts; as for jazz performances, the exact opposite is true. Watching those guys actually playing their instruments, creating music right before your eyes adds a new dimension that recordings can't capture. And mercifully, there are no deafening walls of amplifiers to hide from.

The demise of The Star Hotel is not an anomaly. Across the world, dedicated music spaces are dropping dead like flies in sulphur mustard. Iconic New York venue 285 Kent closed last month and in London, the casualties caused by gentrification, TFL, and uninspiring slabs of concrete rank high. We’re losing dedicated music spaces and we’re losing them fast.

this is sad, if it's really true. you'd think that one of the few areas of the music industry that can't be easily replaced by free-media is the experience of live-music.

(having said that, i haven't gone to a concert in years).

It is always sad when good venues close. But in my 30 years of gig-going it seems like that is always what happens. Most cities have one or two iconic irreplaceable venues it is true, and when those go it is fairly tragic. But the kind of venues where new and interesting stuff happens tend to open and close/burn down/become mexican restaurants quite quickly. Something else usually pops up to replace it. Young folks are going to keep on making music and they will always find a place to play it. I feel for anyone who loses their favourite venue though. Been through that lots of times.

Major epicenters of music/culture for young people will always have a churn of good venues, both legit and DIY. I am not bothered by venues closing in New York, London, Montreal, Chicago, etc. I am much more concerned about small and mid-market venues that serve a mostly local and all-ages clientele. The all-ages punk club in my hometown was the only thing going of note for people under 21 for about 90 miles in either direction. Its demise after I grew up and left town really makes me wonder what the outcast/culturally-inclined young people are doing after school and on weekend in my town.

Hopefully they are playing in someplace that you are not aware of. There was an interview in our local alt-rag with one of the guys from Vancouver punk antiques the Pointed Sticks a year or two back. He said it was sad that when he went out everyone he saw in bands was old and therefore he concluded that young people are not playing live music anymore. Which is ridiculous because this town has dozens of bands aged 17-23 playing in numerous unlicensed venues that are not even included in the aforementioned alternative listing magazine. Presumably because they don't advertise in it. That's maybe another story though.

In Denmark concert reviews are very common, and they're also quite popular with readers: maybe you attended a show, and a good review lets you relive it or puts your experience into perspective (okay, not rocket science) and of course it's loads fun to discuss your verdict with others (...) and if you didn't attend it's nice to know what you missed out on. See this (Danish) review of Queen playing a local stadium as an example http://gaffa.dk/anmeldelse/92432 - long reviews, photos, discussion.

So anyway, why don't leading online music media (like p4k) feature proper concert reviews? They cover touring acts to some degree, as when they for instance update us on what cover songs John Misty is playing atm http://pitchfork.com/news/58514-father-john-misty-covers-leonard-cohens-im-your-man/ and they also review plenty of live records. Is it that the readership is global and concerts are local?

most local publications (that i see) don't do concert reviews either. i assume because it's not directly promoting anything, the tickets & beer have already been sold.

Yeah, although in a way it promotes a tour if you review the first show of many. But with the way the internet works economically it should be a great idea to review concerts - it generates both traffic and comments, sites like setlist.fm seem very popular - and on artist specific message boards there's a lot of concert discussion (on ilm artist threads too).

During the festival days, Roskilde Festival distributes a free daily newspaper on the camping area, and the concert reviews are always discussed widely - it's kind of part of the concert experience that you not only discuss the concert experience but also address the general concert reception. So much for concert reviews as promotion.

The gig review for the free weekly I used to write for were often the most popular articles. Also, I'm seeing D'Angelo tonight and I noticed the nytimes did a live review.

Yeah, that's a cool nytimes review too, or at least it was interesting to get an idea what happens at a good D'Angelo show these days - last few live reviews he got in Denmark were more mixed.