Best and Worst Concert Moments.

[BuckBackHome]

How about some thoughts as to your best and worst concert moments/memories.

Best Song in Concert: Three Days by Janes Addiction. Stephen Perkins had this killer drum solo. It was when he still had his super long dreads and there was a spotlight shooting up from the stage floor behind him during it. Great solo. Also, their last tour before Lottapoorlosers (aka, Lollapalooza).

Most Excited Performer: John Cougar. We were just a few rows away and he was just so happy to be there. He could not stop smiling the first few songs. Really seemed to be happy to be performing live.

Craziest Fan: Some psycho at a Sara McLachlan show. Stood in the front row center stage the whole show with him arms extended and just kept swaying side to side. She could not get near the stage to touch the hands of fans because of him. Her band was pointing at him and laughing.

Dumbest Band Member: One of the keyboardists for Nine Inch Nails. Guy was just a little too hyper. They were up on some platforms and their keyboards were on some sort of system where they could move them all around. He was a little too excited once, threw the keyboard out and then pulled it quickly back at himself. He proceeded to knock himself off the platform, but made it back up. He obviously hurt himself, but the show kept right along.

Dumbest Fan: A friend of mine did a little mudsliding down the hill at Blossom Music Center at Lottapoorlosers. Problem was, he was so drunk he did not notice that he separated his shoulder until the next day.

Strangest Diatribe by Perry Farrell on how he used to make money before his band was popular. Not what I needed to know.

Worst Fans: Any idiot that thinks you are supposed to mosh at a reggae concert.

Worst Concert: Depeche Mode. Worst show ever. I think they played their double live cd and that was it.

Best Concert: The Who. It was two years ago, but they still rock hard and are one of the best ever.

Most Consistent Band: U2. Always put on a great show and tour to support their albums.

Overall Worst Concert Moments: Tie
1. Drank too much before a Guns n Roses/Aerosmith show and never made it through GnR's opening act.
2. Chased a drunk friend around a show. Has happened twice. Kid Rock and Lollapalooza.

 

[jlb1705]

1. Drank too much before a Guns n Roses/Aerosmith show and never made it through GnR's opening act.

Sadly, you probably made it further into the show than Axl did.

One of my best friends went to Bonnaroo this past summer, and got too stoned to make it to see The Dead. Isn't that the equivalent of being too drunk to fish?

 

[DEBuckeye]

I'm a full-fledged Rush fanatic, so needless to say, every Rush show I've been to is above all others on the list. However:

Worst show- Prodigy, Detroit, 1999-ish. Horrible. Everything was pre-programmed, not even a bit of live improvisation, and the "band" showed very little emotion. I could have stayed home and listened to the CD for a lot less money. Runner-up, Pearl Jam.

Most interesting show- Grateful Dead, Cleveland, 1993-ish. I am not a Dead fan, but I got free tickets and figured I should see them at least once before they started to die. The concert was much better than I expected, but the most interesting part was just checking out all of the fans.

Best overall show (music, stageshow)- Nine Inch Nails, Iowa City, 1995 and Detroit, 1999-ish. I love NIN. Trent Reznor is a musical genius. His stuff gets pretty complex at times, and he always seems to combine the right amount of programming with live performance to A). get the song's sound right, and B). mix things up so you're not bored with straight CD copied performances. The videos and light effects are just right for the music- pretty cool, and not overly flashy.

Most incredible talent (aside from Rush)-
1. Prince, Grand Rapids, MI, 1999-2000-ish. Again, I'm not a huge fan, but got free tickets. Prince is incredibly talented. Great stage presence, great musical talent.
2. Dave Matthews Band, Philly, 2003. Lots of talent in this band, and they really show it off during extended jamming during songs. Very impressive.

Loudest- Rob Zombie, Philly 2003. Partly because the show was in a relatively small place, but they had that shit turned UP! Also, a pretty cool stage show.

Most over-the-top show(s)- I went to see a ton of heavy metal bands in the 80's. Judas Preist, Dio, Ozzy, Black Sabbath, etc. The big thing back then was huge stage sets, lots of pyrotechnics, lasers, lights, smoke.... Amazing what some of these bands would put together for a tour.

Coolest person I've met- Ice-T. (yep, Ice-T). On the first Lollapalooza tour, when he was touring with his band Body Count, a friend and I were wandering around and ran into him and his band. They were very cool, very approachable and down to earth.

Bands I don't normally admit to seeing- There are a few from my hair-metal days. Ratt/Poison/Bon Jovi, Winger, Krokus, Great White, I should probably stop typing now.....

Great moments that I remember-
-Rob Halford (Judas Priest) riding his Harley on stage.
-Neil Peart's (Rush) drum solos.
-Very early Metallica show (Ride the Lightning tour) in a small theatre.
-My first concert, Rush's Signals tour.
-Seeing bands/musicians who are considered great, or historically significant- Eddie Van Halen, Eric Johnson, Ozzy/Randy Rhodes, The Ramones, AC/DC, Black Sabbath, Grateful Dead, Kiss, Iggy Pop

 

[Bucktastic]

Pink Floyd in the Shoe.......easily the best.

 

[buckzip]

I've seen Rush 2 times. They were excellent.

Journey was excellent.
Ratt pretty good
Dokken good
Def Leppard ok
Ozzy ok
Kiss good
WHitesnale good


The best concerts I have been to were Queen.
Freddy Mercury was such a showman. The light show was awesome.

By far the worst was Bon Jovi(girlfriend wanted to go).
They were so dam boring. it was like watching a video for 3 hours.

 

[Buck Nasty]

DEBuckeye,

your experiences are frighteningly similiar to mine.

Huge Rush fan, first show ever Moving Pictures - Probably been to about 15 Rush shows. Kind of lost interest in them after Power windows. But back in the day we would see them at Cleveland and Pitt. for every tour.

Prince, I am a big fan of his and agree his talent is remarkable. I was lucky enough to catch him a long time ago, and again just this past year for his final tour.

A couple shows that I had low expectations for that turned out phenomenal

Alice in Chains - Lollapalooza, it was about a hundred degrees all day long, and based upon the rumored drug use by the band I figured by the time they came on stage it would be disappointing. Layne Staley came out in a 3 piece suit in that heat and they were unbelievably tight and rocked through the whole set.

Nirvana- Hare arena. same thing. I expected them to be drunk/stoned and sloppy and not play a long show. They were tight as hell and rocked for a good 2+ hours.
also saw Nirvana at Staches about 3 months before they hit. Nobody knew who they were. We remarked at how loud they were and how drunk they got. 3 months later they were the biggest thing going.

Tool - Just an amazing sound like a new era of Rush. Very hard, technical, and tight.

The Pixies - one of my all time fav's Frank Black is an amazing talent always put on a great show. They are on tour right now and the show is definitely worth seeing.

Went to see RATT a couple years ago at the AlRosa Villa, just for kicks. It was amazing. It was like we went into a time warp to 1988 all over again. Spandex, Bleached out slut groupies. turned into one of the funnest shows ever and that was just because of the crowd.

Jimmy Buffet - I don't even remember which one it was, and I am by no means a big fan of his, but I was able to stand in a circle on the lawn with about 1000 other peope and cheer on two people fucking under a blanket right during the middle of a show. good times.

also did the gamut of 80's and 90's arena shows. AC/DC, Van Halen, ZZ Top, YES, etc.

Best show for the Money: Stevie Ray Vaughn at the Ohio State Fair. 5 Bucks to get in awesome show.

Black Crows put on a phenomenal show at the Palace about 10 years ago too.

Anyone who went to OSU in the late 80's -90's who may have gone to see the Royal Crescent (RC) Mob. Possibly the funnest shows I ever went too.

Worst show: Billy Idol/ The Cult at the Hyatt Ballroom or whatever it used to be called. Horrible sound, and between the two bands they still only played for about an hour and a half.

 

[BuckBackHome]

Coolest person I've met- Ice-T. (yep, Ice-T). On the first Lollapalooza tour, when he was touring with his band Body Count, a friend and I were wandering around and ran into him and his band. They were very cool, very approachable and down to earth.

Agreed. They were wandering the crowd at the Lollapalooza tour I saw at Blossom. They sat down by us and were just hanging with the crowd and enjoying the show. I think they understood what that tour was all about.

 

[scooter1369]

Best stage show: Iron Maiden and Twisted Sister in Lakeland, FL. Powerslave tour. Runner up: Dio and Savatage at the Ocean center in Daytona Beach.

Favorite Concert: Metallica and Queensryche in the Ocean Center in 1989. And Justice For All tour and Operation Mindcrime. What a show.

Best venue: Merriweather Post Pavilion in Maryland. Aerosmith and G-n-R. Outdoor facility like the Polaris (Germain) Ampitheatre.

Best festival: Monster's of Rock Van Halen, Scorpions, Dokken, Metallica, Kingdom Come. Saw it twice. Once in Tampa Bay at the Sombrero and once in D.C. at RFK Stadium a week later.

Concert most ashamed of attending: Poison. Ass everwhere!!! That was the only reason I went. To find a groupie type for the night.


Saw dozens of free shows at the BandShell in Daytona. Growing up there was really really tough.

 

[Savante]

Best: Tie - Wu-Tang Clan, March 2002 at the Newport and Radiohead, summer 2003 at Blossom. Just plain awesome shows. After that, Cake/De La Soul/Modest Mouse/The Flaming Lips at Promowest.

Worst: Nas at the Newport. Love the man, but his show was too short, he took too long to go on, and he only played a 10 minute medley of his first (and best) two albums. WTF WTF WTF?

Most recent: Last week, I saw De La Soul at Al Rosa and Bob Dylan at the Schott. Before that? The Pixies at Vet's.

First: Metallica, Days of the New and Jerry Cantrell, Polaris. Awesomeness.

Craziest: Tie - Phish, February 2003 at US Bank Arena and The Dead at Blossom, this past summer. The people there were awesome, and the shows just rocked.

Best Festival: Ozzfest at Polaris, the year of the Black Sabbath reunion. System of a Down was one of the OPENERS, Rob Zombie was good, The Deftones were good, Sabbath was good.. but the reason I was there, Primus, ROCKED. Awesome, except I got hit with mud. :(

Worst Festival: Lollapalooza 2003 at Polaris. Incubus was okay, Audioslave was okay, but Queens of the Stone Age (who I was most excited to see) sucked, and Jurassic 5 only got 30 minutes. Pharoahe Monch cancelled, and in his place was Steve O from Jackass. Yay. By the time Jane's Addiction came on, I was exhausted, and they only played for like 45 minutes!

Most memorable: Method Man and Redman, December 2001 at Promowest. Method Man hit me in the face during a stage dive and I got to go backstage because my nose was gushing blood. I smoked with some of the boys.

 

[buckeyebri]

Best Show: AC/DC Flat out put on the best Rock and Roll show that I have ever seen, from Angus running around and climbing the scaffolding on stage to Brian Johnson swinging from the bell rope on Hells Bells. The crowd was diverse, old and young, and plenty of hot women in leather and high heels.

Best Concert: Tie betwen Tom Petty and U2.

Lamest Moment: Ted Nugent doing an accoustical version of Fred Bare.....Ted doesn't know accoustical.

2nd Lamest Moment: Billy Idol walking around with a walking stick on stage, after he recked his motorcycle, with a huge blow up of a naked woman.

Lamest Concert: Bob "inaudible" Dylan

Closet to the stage: Right at it trying to get Pat Benatar to notice me....

Most times seen in concert: Tie between Tom Petty and John Cougar at three each.

Worst Concert Experience: Getting to the Bryan Adams and Tina Turner show, but never making it in (not for a lack of tickets)....

Most Memorable Moment: Watching Jimmy Page play his guitar with a violin bow during a Firm concert