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Thread: What bands have too few live albums?

  1. #1
    Member Digital_Man's Avatar
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    What bands have too few live albums?

    And which ones have too many?

    It's interesting how some bands such as King Crimson and Rush have so many live albums while others like Genesis have relatively few. Even YES could actually stand to have a few more imo(of older archival material anyway). Pink Floyd is another good example of a famous band with very few live albums. In their day Gentle Giant only had one and so did VDGG before their reunion. Camel I don't think has that many either and neither do many newer bands. So how come some big named bands(in prog circles or otherwise)have so many live recordings while some don't.

    I wish Genesis in particular had more live albums especially from the 70's.

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    The Who. Basically most of what's out there is from 1969/70 (Leeds, Isle Of Wight etc.) with similar set-lists, or the later post-Keith Moon periods.

    Not too much from Led Zeppelin either. There's nothing after 1973 on CD.

    With Yes, I think Yessongs, Yesshows, The Word Is Live and the BBC Sessions is a reasonable summary.

    Pink Floyd started to redress the balance in the CD era. There's the 'Is There Anybody Out There' release, and most of their Wembley 1974 show is on the deluxe DSOTM/WYWH releases. But their BBC sessions should be out there, and it's a sad truth that there also appears to be *no* professional film of the band between 1973-7.

    It remains scandalous that The Rolling Stones' 'Brussels Affair' from 1973 is not on a mass-market CD. That performance continues to blow me away, I would even go as far to say as it's my favourite live recording by any rock act.
    Last edited by JJ88; 06-07-2015 at 02:27 PM.

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    Too many:

    Iron Maiden
    Neil Young

    Both up around the 7- 9 mark.

    Too few:
    no one.

    One live album per artist is enough in my book

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    Oh No! Bass Solo! klothos's Avatar
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    ELO -- in their 70s heydey period they only had one early in their career, and it was released in the UK and not the USA


    ELO Part II had too many

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    If it's the Long Beach one, it's the other way round- I think that was only put out in the US at the time. Don't have it anyway.

    It does tend to be that earlier live albums are more interesting, usually in smaller venues with musicians taking more chances. For example, the live disc of Ummagumma is a million times more interesting than The Delicate Sound Of Thunder IMHO.

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    Oh No! Bass Solo! klothos's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by JJ88 View Post
    If it's the Long Beach one, it's the other way round- I think that was only put out in the US at the time. Don't have it anyway..
    It came out on Harvest which is an import in the USA. It could be found at specialty record shops back in the day. If it was USA, it would have came out on United Artists and Jet later on. I didnt like it.........Still, you would think that after the grandiose Out Of The Blue spaceship tour, a live album would have been released.

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    Member bill g's Avatar
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    I don't buy a lot of live albums, I rarely if ever listen to them, but we really need live albums of special performances such as Steve Hackett's Genesis Revisited where he had all the wonderful guests such as John Wetton, Jakko, and everyone, and the Brian Wilson with Jeff Beck-which I still need to check out, but apart from that I will include one:

    Big Big Train

    Having said that, I think a Thinking Plague live album would be great too.

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    [Having said that, I think a Thinking Plague live album would be great too.]

    There already is one. It's called "Upon both your houses" and represents their Nearfest performance.

  9. #9
    Quote Originally Posted by klothos View Post
    It came out on Harvest which is an import in the USA. It could be found at specialty record shops back in the day. If it was USA, it would have came out on United Artists and Jet later on. I didnt like it.........Still, you would think that after the grandiose Out Of The Blue spaceship tour, a live album would have been released.
    I believe Bev Bevan said in his book that the whole point of The Night The Lights Went Out In Long Beach was to put something out in countries that they had toured in yet, to give the fans there an idea of what their live show was like. I've forgotten which countries he named, but I know the US wasn't one of them, and if the idea was to release something in countries the band hadn't played in at the time, one would think it also would not have been issued in the UK, but I'm not sure about that.

    As for why they didn't put out a live album from their later tours, maybe it's because Jeff Lynne knew the band sounded way better in the studio than they did onstage. Kelly Groucutt once suggested that they played along to tapes because he and Jeff couldn't pull off the vocal harmonies onstage on their own. If that's true, it's quite likely the strings were also on tape (either that or Jeff Lynne wasn't lying when he said that Richard Tandy had to cover for the cellist while they were bouncing around the stage). The stuff I've heard is not bad but not particularly great either. I can totally believe Jeff Lynne (and/or possibly Don Arden) wanted to maintain an illusion that he may have thought would have been spoiled by a less than great live album.

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    The Strawbs have several live acoustic albums out and one from the electric line-up at Nearfest but maybe one or two from the Rick Wakeman or Blue Weaver line ups (not counting the Live at Chiswick recording). Would love to hear live stuff from the late 60s/early 70s band.
    Lou

    Looking forward to my day in court.

  11. #11
    What about Uriah Heep? That one from their peak era (Demons And Wizards/Magician's Birthday) doesn't have their earlier epic Salisbury on it ....

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    Hey, "Genesis live" doesn't have Suppers Ready on it. I guess some bands figure it takes up too much space to have a really long song on there.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Digital_Man View Post
    Hey, "Genesis live" doesn't have Suppers Ready on it. I guess some bands figure it takes up too much space to have a really long song on there.
    I don't think Genesis was quite big enough to have a two album live album during that period. Why they didn't release an expanded on on Genesis Live is a mystery to me...


    My choice is Jethro Tull for the Thick As A Brick/A Passion Play era. Would also love to see a Yes live album for the Fragile tour. ELP for the Trilogy tour. Elton John when Goodbye Yellow Brick Road came out.

    Bob

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    Oh No! Bass Solo! klothos's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by GuitarGeek View Post
    As for why they didn't put out a live album from their later tours, maybe it's because Jeff Lynne knew the band sounded way better in the studio than they did onstage. Kelly Groucutt once suggested that they played along to tapes because he and Jeff couldn't pull off the vocal harmonies onstage on their own. If that's true, it's quite likely the strings were also on tape (either that or Jeff Lynne wasn't lying when he said that Richard Tandy had to cover for the cellist while they were bouncing around the stage). The stuff I've heard is not bad but not particularly great either. I can totally believe Jeff Lynne (and/or possibly Don Arden) wanted to maintain an illusion that he may have thought would have been spoiled by a less than great live album.
    It wouldnt surprise me at all if they were doing early variations of sequencing with tapes although Im not sure how Bevan would be supplied a click and how he monitored it considering he never played wearing headphones...but, still, I can see that

    Also, since the YouTube explosion, I have watched plenty of their live shows caught on tape and - yeah, I agree while they dont suck live, they arent that spectacular either. However, one of the interesting things I noticed about their live videos is Tandy's use of the mellotron, which got a lot of play on old vids I watched in comparison to its virtual non-existence on studio albums

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    According to Tony Banks, the main reason behind "Supper's Ready" being excluded from Live was that the band didn't want to release the same side-long epic having just done so on the prior album. And yes, they wanted it to be a single LP to keep it budget-priced.

    Of course, years later we got Live At The Rainbow 1973 which did have SR...

    BigSixFan: Yeah, I'm with you on the TAAB/APP-era live Tull album. Would be fantastic.
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    I think one or two is enough for any band. A live late-era Tull album (post-Stormwatch) would have been nice but Bursting Out is so perfect it can stand alone. I don't understand why a better live Beatles album than "Hollywood Bowl" couldn't be released. There have to be some good recordings. I can't think of any others.

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    [Of course, years later we got Live At The Rainbow 1973 which did have SR...]

    Yes, but is this an official live album or a boot? If it's not a boot then it isn't listed on progarchives under live albums. Also, if there is some place where I can find it legally I'd like to know about it.

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    It would be nice to have a couple of earlier Tull tours, at least TaaB or PP.

    The Who are really lacking something from the early 70s. I'd love to have heard them do Quadrophenia (even though that tour was plagued by technical problems).

    The Stones in '71 or '73, when Taylor finally hit his live groove and there was that dangerous atmosphere hanging over them. It's a crime that Brussels is not on a CD.
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    Ok, I see that Live at the Rainbow is part of the live 73-2007 box set. It would be nice if it was released separately though.

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    The sections of the 1973 Rainbow gig on the Archive box had Gabriel's arbitrary overdubs on a few sections in 'Supper's Ready'. Don't know if the 1973-2007 box suffered that too....wouldn't buy that one, so much that could have been included was not.

    The 1972 'Supper's Ready' should have been added to the 'Live' album on CD in the 90s IMHO.

    Uriah Heep...I'm not particularly aware of much quality, early live material that could be released. There's a few BBC tracks which have seen release as extra tracks. And anyway I find the 1973 one definitive, in terms of set, line-up and performance. Some bands already have that one perfect live release, and they are one of them. See also 'Made In Japan', 'Live And Dangerous', 'Strangers In The Night', 'Live At Budokan' etc.
    Last edited by JJ88; 06-08-2015 at 03:00 AM.

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    Quote Originally Posted by llanwydd View Post
    I don't understand why a better live Beatles album than "Hollywood Bowl" couldn't be released. There have to be some good recordings. I can't think of any others.
    Well, they were mostly done without an audience but there's the BBC sets. There's also various live tracks scattered across the Anthology sets, the first one in particular. There's a lot from a live radio broadcast in Sweden on the first one, which is a popular performance among fans. Those Anthology sets need an overhaul IMHO- taking out some of the spoken word tracks and tracks duplicated on other releases, so that more live material can be added.

    The Hollywood Bowl album is good for what it is. I find it a decent recording for when it was recorded. Maybe the three concerts that were edited down for that, can be released in full.

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    That's Mr. to you, Sir!! Trane's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by PeterG View Post
    One live album per artist is enough in my book
    it really depends on the band's hustory line-up change or musical direction)...

    For example I always hated the fact that Triumph's only two live albums are from the m-to late 80's (which renders them useless to me)... I'd have loved one from the Just A Game era.

    Quote Originally Posted by JJ88 View Post
    It does tend to be that earlier live albums are more interesting, usually in smaller venues with musicians taking more chances. For example, the live disc of Ummagumma is a million times more interesting than The Delicate Sound Of Thunder IMHO.
    I'd even say that the same applies to most band's studio albums.

    Quote Originally Posted by arabicadabra View Post
    What about Uriah Heep? That one from their peak era (Demons And Wizards/Magician's Birthday) doesn't have their earlier epic Salisbury on it ....
    Dud they play it often, though? And that piece required some rather big adaptations to be played on stage, becauseof the brass & string sections

    EDIT: I just saw the thread << OK, but seems rather patchy rendition

    Quote Originally Posted by llanwydd View Post
    I think one or two is enough for any band. A live late-era Tull album (post-Stormwatch) would have been nice but Bursting Out is so perfect it can stand alone.
    The Isle Of Wight DVD concert came in to fill a gap (the C-side of LTIP was simply not satisfying in that respect), but it still feels too few...

    But for post SFWW/HH era, I couldn't care less, and Little Light Music is dreadful (IMHO)
    my music collection increased tenfolds when I switched from drug-addicts to complete nutcases.

  23. #23
    I think a lot of the recent remasters/box sets have rectified a lot of the 'missing pieces' from a live respective, especially Genesis, Camel, ELP etc!

    Defineatly need more Moon era The Who though!!!!

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    A few things have slipped out from The Who in 1971-3. There's the concert on the 2cd 'Who's Next' and tracks on compilations like 'Who's Missing', and the 30 Years... box. But they seem to me to be the most poorly represented major 'classic rock' act in terms of live releases.

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    Very few bands have too few live albums.

    Many have too many.

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