Concerts thread: Best/Worst/Next/Last one you attended?

I’m looking at Pet Shop Boys and New Order at the Hollywood Bowl on Oct. 2.

 

Good to see this thread be relevant again!

It looks like my first live music in two years will be the Menzingers in late August, but really hoping to catch something before that.

 

Just heard a guy praising a local concert series because Lita Ford is playing there.

Hey, it's free.

 

Just bought tickets for Sleater-Kinney and Wilco show in August. I have no idea how I'll feel about being part of a crowd at that point - certainly wouldn't like it now despite being vaccinated.

 

I'm going to go out on a limb and say 99 percent of people at a Sleater-Kinner and Wilco show will be vaccinated.

It’s the hazmat suit of concerts. A Ted Nugent show is a Wuhan bat booth.

 

Bumping for review of my first concert since the summer of 2019. Saw GNR last night at Fenway Park (originally scheduled for last summer, but, well...). GREAT show. Fenway is NOT a great venue in terms of sightlines and sound but it was still thoroughly enjoyable. While we were watching mainly the screens -- so I had no sense of the on-stage chemistry between Axl, Duff and Slash, they sounded tight and energetic with a definite GNR edge, and all three of them looked fit and energized. They played for well over 2 hours and with an outstanding setlist (though I was sorry they didn't play "Coma", which they played in 2017 at Gillette). Crowd definitely skewed old -- I'm 51 and was a senior in HS when Appetite was released, so right in their wheelhouse -- almost everyone seemed within 10 years of me in either direction. And crowd DEFINITELY skewed pasty and overweight. The years haven't been kind to the Gen X/late Boomer hard rock scene. If they're coming your way, you should definitely go -- they're really the last great band from the pre-grunge years and they definitely give you your money's worth. The crowd was also largely sitting down in our section (another sign of an aging fan base), but we moved over and up for a couple of songs and people were on their feet getting into it.

As far as Wolfgang Van Halen's Mammoth (the opening act -- regrettably Smashing Pumpkins, who would have been the opener last summer, didn't end up doing the tour) -- we missed all but the last 2 songs of their set. But from what I heard -- while I wanted and expected to say they suck -- they didn't. They were quite good from the little we saw.

Finally -- it was great to be out in a big crowd on a beautiful summer night hearing live rock n' roll. With the Delta surge, I was a little nervous (not worried about getting sick from a breakthrough but I'd hate to pass it along to a kid or an immuno-compromised person; the unvaxxed by choice can go fuck themselves) and did mask up in the concourse, but not in the open air during the show.

 

I love to attend shows at a little venue south of Madison, Wis., called the Stoughton Opera House. It probably seats 200-300 and books a lot of second-tier acts like Nick Lowe and Iris Dement. I've seen old-timers like Tom Paxton, Judy Collins and Roger McGuinn perform there along with up-and-comers like Sarah Jarosz and Leyla McCalla. International groups like Huun-Huur-Tu and Ladysmith Black Mambazo.

The 2020-2021 season at the Opera House has a couple of interesting shows coming up: Rhiannon Giddens and a Colorado band called DeVotchKa. Lowe w/Los Straitjackets and Taj Mahal are also on the bill, but they're already sold out because they're holdovers from the last virus-limited season.

 

Rhiannon Giddens is crazy talented. Would love to see her.

 

Leyla McCalla is Giddens old bandmate w/the Carolina Chocolate Drops ... McCalla has a Haitian creole heritage that comes through brilliantly in her music.

Chocolate Drops leader Dom Flemons was at Stoughton a few years as part of the Pokey LaFarge review. Are you familiar with Pokey? He's another talent from Downstate Illinois.

 

Isbell tweeted thanks to an Austin ER doc for saving Amanda's life last night. She put something on IG about it as well. No other details are out there.

 

I saw Wilco & Sleater-Kinney tonight at an outdoor venue in Atlanta. First live show in at least 18 months. So amazingly good. I needed that.

You had to show proof of vaccine or recent negative test to get it, which was encouraging.