What's the best gig you've been to?

The only band I saw at gigs were:



And they provided very suitable entertainment the few times I went to see them on this tour and the previous one. I'm not sure if I'm at this specific gig, but even if I was, I wasn't yet old enough to brave the mosh pit anyway, so I'd be at the back somewhere lamely waving my hands around.

These guys were well ahead of their time, doing sincere dark while most other bands were still doing 80s cheese or glam and the like.

The next kind of gigs that got my attention were more of this variety:



To which I attended quite a few and a few in London, most of which had different names. Again, I ahve no idea if I was at this specific event, but even if I was then I probably wouldn't even recognise myself anyway.

Around this time I also saw the late, great Victoria Wood at the Albert Hall. She was a stand-up comedian who's act was half music and half jokes, so I would still class it as a gig:

Having performed at the Hall 47 times, Victoria Wood holds the Royal Albert Hall record for the longest run of shows by a female headline artist, and held the longest run of shows by a comedian here, with a then unprecedented run of 15 sell-out shows starting on 21 September 1993

Though I can find any youtube vids of her early 90s shows, but here's one from just a bit later in 1997:

Well, this one will be hard to understand for anyone who is not from Sweden, and also hard to understand for about 50% of the swedes, since they think he cannot sing

It was a very sunny swedish summer night ( the sun stays up until midnight ) and there is this Swedish guy called Håkan Hellström, he kind of have magic powers on stage, in 2016 we were a bit more than 70,000 people in the local arena, and I can say that almost everyone was singing along to some of the songs, it is hard to describe the feeling.

I think we fans are kind of crazy, the population of my city center is around 500,000, this year he sold out 4 conecert in the local arena with around 70,000 in each in total almost 280 000 tickets, and it was still very hard to get tickets, even if it is more than half of the cities population Of course the concerts got moved to next summer because of the Corona virus

Ah, Fields of the Nephelim. Haven't seen them, but I have several albums by them.

A pibbur who now is reminded to listen to said albums again.

A bit of useless off-topic trivia - the eccentric director Richard Stanley, who just made The Color Out of Space, got his start directing music videos for the Nephs. And his great grandfather was Henry Morton Stanley, the famous explorer who uttered the words, "Dr. Livingstone, I presume."

Originally Posted by joxer
No love for Kraftwerk?

Yes! They have toured Australia twice, 1978 & 2005 and saw both, also saw Tangerine Dream in 1982

In the late nineties I had the magical experience of wandering into a college gym in Vancouver at like 6:00 a.m. after staying up all night at an SF con. I don't remember what school -- I had driven up from Seattle.

The bleachers were pulled back and shafts of sunlight were coming in through the transom windows, and in a square of light was sitting a woman with a mass of red-gold hair playing a harp -- looking about as pre-Raphaelite as you can get on an empty basketball court.

I had no idea who she was but it was Loreena McKennit, not well-known at that time, just practicing for a concert later in the morning, performing
the Stolen Child. I sat my sleep-deprived self down and let her fey magicks wash over me for a few hours as other people trickled in and eventually the actual concert began.

So, maybe more a product of the circumstances than anything else, but a peak moment.

Jeff Mangum playing through The Aeroplane Over the Sea from start to finish at the Paramount in Oakland was also pure joy.

Thanks for sharing these memories everyone, though I feel very old. I saw OMD in the early 80s, Liverpool UK.
Finding it hard to pin down a best gig, possibly Skunk Anansie supporting Killing Joke, had never heard of SA but was totally stunned by them. They were on when we arrived. We were heading to the bar and just stopped in our tracks.

Last gig I went to was Antony and the Johnsons in a Symphony Hall, I think maybe 2010. It was an excellent gig but highlighted to us the increasing problems in accessibility (my husband has MS and is a wheelchair user).

I have seen twice, but was wary of, Fields of the Nephilim, no way I was going near any flour after spending 2 hours crimping, back combing and spraying my hair. I recall being secretly pleased that a Bauhaus gig was in a sit down venue as my feet were killing me from the impossibly high heeled boots I was wearing.

Wish I could answer but it's has been many years since I was at a concert. The problem is I hate large gatherings and being around so much people. Yeah its a phobia of mine.

I guess I could say my last Trans Siberian concert it was X-Mas gift five years ago.



They know how to put on a good show.

I never liked Kraftwerk, even as a kid. Far too cold, far too emotionless for my taste.
And because OMD is kind of the opposite in that to me, I like them very much.

Last year I consciously experienced being an total alien : Visiting a concert of the anniversary tour of ZZ Top. I think it will be my one and only concert of them, because I was fitting into it like a white dot fits into a black painting.
I like most of their music, though.