Best Rock & Roll Concert you have ever seen?
 

So many......but I’ve got to go with.......Monsters of Rock...... Arrowhead Stadium

Spent the day and night down front center stage.

Van Halen
Metallica
REO
Heart
Scorpions
John Cougar
Kingdom Come

Fleetwood Mac at Sprint Center.

My top 2 are more 1a and 1b. Eagles Farewell I and History of. Rolling Stones Steel Wheels.

Five really stand out:

Eagles - Hell Freezes Over, 1994 (Alpine Valley) and 1995 (United Center). Lucky enough to see this show twice. Melissa Etheridge opened for them at Alpine. She was awesome.

Lynyrd Skynyrd, 1992 - Monsters of Rock (Alpine Valley). Show also featured Firehouse (good), Damn Yankees (great) and Poison (awful). I'm not a big Skynyrd fan, but **** they were flawless.

Cinderella, 2005? - (Tweeter Center, Tinley Park, IL). They were amazing; it was like traveling back in time, except all the 80s fangirls' 2000s bodies were exploding out of their 80s concert outfits. IIRC Warrant opened for them. They put on a good show as well.

Cheap Trick - Lap of Luxury, 1989 (Riverside Theater, Milwaukee). That place had amazing acoustics. House of Lords opened for them, and is the best opening act I'd never heard of before.

AC/DC, 1998? (Tweeter Center). Far and away the best and most energetic stage show.

It was never a concert in a big arena with a well-known band. The most fun, and energetic times were smaller bands in venues that held a few hundred people.

Cowboy Mouth... probably ten times.
Drivin' and Cryin' at the Music Farm in Charleston, SC
High On Fire at the El Corazon in Seattle
Neil Diamond at the Fillmore in SFO
Sleater Kinney at The Swiss in Tacoma, WA

Just kickass fun times. Random hot chicks on my shoulders, slamming shots with other hot chicks, body surfing, drinking with band members.

Hmm....This is a hard one because I have seen so damned many. However, I am going to go out on the proverbial limb and say.......


Transiberian Orchestra


I know, I know - it is a cross between classical orchestration, Christmas songs and slamming Rock.

The stage show was out of this world. Hell, I put it right up there with Floyd.

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My wife is a Neal Diamond fan. We went to see him in the mid-90's. His light show was the best one I've even seen. Totally not expecting that.

1994...memorial hall in KC:

Nine inch nails

Openers: Marilyn Manson and Jim rose circus


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Rush - Snakes & Arrows tour
Alice Cooper & Iron Maiden - Maiden England 2010 tour
Qupipo, Shihatsu Machi Underground, Lili Koana, & others - Just some battle of the bands performance in Tokyo but wild as hell thanks to the first two groups.

KISS Alive II tour. Dynasty, Reunion tour
Rush -Moving Pictures, Snakes & Arrows tour
Van Halen - II
Iron Maiden - Killers, Number of the Beast, Piece of Mind, Powerslave
Accept - Staying a Life
Judas Priest - Point of Entry, Turbo, Screaming for Vengeance, Painkiller, Defenders of the Faith
Krokus - Headhunter
Quiet Riot - Mental Health
Ratt - Invasion of your privacy
Queensryche - Operation Mind Crime
Jackyl - Jackyl
Ozzy - Diary of a Madman, Ultimate Sin, No More Tears
Journey - Infinity, Evolution
Def Leppard - Hysteria, Pyromania
AC/DC -Let There Be Rock, Back in Black, For Those About to Rock

Off of the top of my head.

After Grand Funk turned pop with Were an American Band in '73 being played all over the radio. They had been my band when I discovered their debut in '69 "On Time" and played the first 5 albums to death. Suddenly I wanted to like something heavier, and I walked into a mall in Miami while on leave from the Army and saw the cover to Uriah Heep Demons & Wizards. I had heard the song Easy Livin' on the radio that week. I bought the album for that song and for the Roger Dean cover.

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Suddenly I found myself buying all their albums up to that point, Uriah Heep double album Live '73 I think I wore out the grooves to that album, it was perfect.

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When their next studio album came out, Sweet Freedom, I was at the store waiting to buy it.

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When Wonderworld came out in '74 and I was somewhat disappointed, but it still had that sound. Years later after seeing the movie Spinal Tap, I realized it had to be based on Uriah Heep and that album.

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1975 I'm out of the Army now and living back in my hometown St. Petersburg and even though several big bands had come and played in Tampa such as Yes and Led Zeppelin and others, I didn't go to any shows. I was married and trying to start my career with the FAA as an air traffic controller. However, on August 8, 1975 Uriah Heep came to St. Petersburg, not Tampa across the bay, but to the Bayfront Center in St. Pete, with Manfred Mann's Earth Band opening. I said to my wife we've got to go.

To this day it's one of the best shows I've ever seen. David Byron the lead singer, who put on a great performance, see the video below, was fired from the band in '76 and the bassist Gary Thain was electrocuted on stage about that time and died. The band was never the same without those two, they tried John Wetton, John Lawton, John Sloman, Pete Goalby and the current Bernie Shaw, and none had the magic that David Byron possessed. I got to see them in their prime, and it was GREAT!!! Unfortunately David died in 1985 alone from cirrhosis of the liver. If you happen to catch Uriah Heep nowadays at club or somwhere, only the guitarist Mick Box is the original member from the beginning, he's the guy with white hair.

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Damn!! I love me some Uriah Heep and have since they first came out - those High harmonies were unbelievable... :thumb:


When I heard that Byron had (basically) drank himself to death.....it was bad.

I know what you mean about small clubs, and instead of a cover band playing hit songs, a new band playing their original material. I lived in Savannah, Georgia in the 80's and owned a record store. We had a club on River Street called Night Flite and all the new wave bands played there. After REM made it big, we were getting a lot of Georgia bands coming to town from Athens and Atlanta.

My three favorites were, the Swimming Pool Q's, Love Tractor and Guandalcanal Diary. GD had won the MTV Basement tapes in '84 and got a recording contract from Electra Records. The other two bands also had recording contracts. Love Tractor was an REM clone but played many songs as instrumentals with no vocals.

Once about '85 Love Tractor for an encore was playing a jam and then asked if anyone in the audience could play bass. Some girl said she could, so she came up on stage and they showed her the cords and now she was playing bass. Then they asked about keyboards, and then the guitars and then finally the drums. The drums were last to go because they kept the beat. Night Flite was small, maybe 100 people was the most it could hold. Anyway, the song ended with the band sitting in the audience and people from the audience on stage playing the instruments, most unusual performance I've ever seen. Love Tractor is still around, here they are from 2016. I did see REM in 1985 and they were fantastic.

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The Swimming Pool Q's put on the best shows. I remember one night, I yelled out Rock N' Roll Hoochie Koo and they broke right into the song, here they are from '85.

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I'm good with these guys for like one or two songs. Gets rather boring to me after that. Not shitting on the talent whatsoever.

The concert I went to was very good. It is not all heavy metal. They actually played a wide variety of songs styles.

It is a sort of an"acquired" taste...I remember fondly the first time I saw them at Memorial in KCKS. Music starts and builds, and builds, and builds....back then they didn't have much of a "show". Over the years I have seen the "show" go from basically non-existent to what it is today. Damn....12-13 years now?

Then I saw the "older folks" (not me obviously ;) ) getting up and walking out..I truly think they came to see a Christmas orchestra by the KC Symphony.....pretty funny..

In all honesty - it has become a Christmas tradition for my family for several years. Hell, we usually buy tickets when they have the fan pre-sale and get the first row or two.

We look at it as the beginning of the Holiday season..

I can respect that. It's Mannheim Steamroller for me.

And I suppose it's not a good idea to base an opinion off a few Youtube videos.

311 transistor tour. '96, i think. not exactly rock but plenty of sex and drugs. 2 out of 3 ain't bad.

musically... the best rock concert I attended was Ozzy No More Tours

Pearl Jam is always a great show. They sound crisp live and always play 3+ hours. I was scheduled to see them for a 4th time this April before it was cancelled.

Coheed and Cambria was amazing live back in 2011. Saw them at the Knitting Factory in Spokane, 1500 seat venue. Screaming guitars that were unbelievably crisp live. Throw in Claudio's high pitched vocals, which sound exactly like they do on the record, and it's one of the best concerts I've ever seen.

AFI- Saw them in Missoula, Montana in a venue with max capacity of 1,400. It was ****ing awesome as every seat felt so close. We were in the upper balcony so we could watch the pit moving throughout. It was a fairly short set but another band that kept their sound live.

Eric Church and Garth Brooks- Two huge stadium concerts that were fantastic. Both are great showman and both concerts lived up to that hype. Set-lists can be very important for country music and both chose cohesive songs. Church worked in local "kid", Michael Phelps, during one song that absolutely rocked the house. I don't like most pop country put out today but Church can really write songs. He's in my top 10 favorite artists of all time and is writing better songs as he ages.

Rush R40

A great career retrospective. Too bad it was the last tour. At least I was able to take my kids out to see them live.

KISS in STL on their first reunion tour, iirc STL was their 7th gig, so they were still fresh and excited but had a few shows to iron out the kinks first... absolutely incredible, like a time warp to 1977

We were in the risers on Ace's side, almost eye level with him... they killed it

Honestly the best show I’ve seen recently enough that I can really remember was Ice Nine Kills. My favorite band was the last opener and one of the other opening acts blew me away. There was only about 150 people there but the room was so small you couldn’t even move. The pit was crazy and both of my daughters were with me.

Guns n Roses (a few years ago in Glendale, AZ where the Cardinals play). Flat out awesome show. Say what you want about Axel Rose but the guy puts everything he's got into his singing and showmanship haha. They rocked out , the crowd was really into it and played for quite awhile.

Thats actually great to hear.I don't think he would've gotten so much flack if he didnt help start fight/riots/cancellations over the years.I know he did have some issues though.

2007 - Stray Cats in Kansas City

I basically eye ****ed Brian Setzer for 2 hours from 10 feet away from him while singing along with him. Security made us go back to our seats about 20 minutes into the show and Brian said:

"I don't know who just told everyone to go sit down but these people have been waiting 15 years for this. If you were up here... get back up here" (or something VERY close to this) I am basically crawling over people to get back to where I was and the security guy stopped me and asked me where I thought I was headed. I pointed to the front of the stage and kept on moving.

****ing glorious.

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This. My long time Rush buddy got us 3rd row on the floor, center stage. We could feel it every time the Professor hit his bass drums. Such power he had.

It was bittersweet because you knew it was the end.

The Rolling Stone in Wichita KS. October 2006.

These bands were not there. It was a great show, but I think you are misrembering. Dokken was also there to bore the crowd to death.

Huge food fight after Metalica between levels. Got so crazy a majority of the crowd was throwing shit. My sister got overheated after the Scorps ad we had to get her to the medic tent. Scorpions stole the show imo.

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monste...Rock_Tour_1988

crap, I went to two of those. And another one in Arrowhead. The best was the Van Halen/Metallica/Scorpions one. I’d never heard of the Scorpions. Heard one song of Metallica. Was totally blown away. Or maybe it was the good drugs. I remember the food fight. It was a blast watching it.

One of the Summer Jams had the other bands you mentioned. I went to other one with Foreigner, Triumph and others. It was at Kaufman though.

I missed the one with John Cougar.

I did the same thing with the two Aerosmith concerts I saw. They all kind of blend together after all these years. :thumb:

Yeah, there were two Monsters of Rock’s at Arrowhead. Then another one that wasn’t under the Monsters of Rock banner, may have been REO, Heart, John Cougar? There was another one too. They were having those twice a year in the 80’s because the money was so good.

I miss those days. Twenty bucks and you get to party all day and night to some great bands!

Billy Idol
Dave Matthews Band
RHCP
Some chick that was playing at the Gaslight in Lawrence, middle 2008. Sounded similar to Neko Case :D

I’ve been lucky enough to see a lot of great shows but I think the one that was the overall best was the Miller Lite Party at the Cotton Bowl in 1989. The Fabulous Thunderbirds opened, followed by Stevie Ray Vaughan, followed by The Who.

It’s funny now because I went into it thinking about The Who, “man, I hope these old farts can still bring it.” I was worried I was going to be disappointed. Not only were all three acts great, The Who totally kicked ass. I left there convinced that was the best show I’d ever seen. I also told myself that I would never again assume a rock band was too old to bring it.

Never heard of the Scorpions? They were one of the first bands I got into as a kid, even before they blew up stateside with Love At First Sting. I remember buying Blackout on cassette and thinking at the time it was the heaviest thing I’d ever heard. Then I was introduced to Sabbath.

Saw Scorpions and Iron Maiden in 82 in Memphis. They didn't do The Zoo and I was bummed.

MCR and Blink in 2011 at Sandstone. Amazing night, great show both bands were on point and I was with some pretty cool people.

KISS 1977
Judas Priest
Rush
AC/DC
Motley Crue/Ozzy
Iron Maiden - Killers, Number of the Beast, Piece of Mind, Powerslave
Accept
Krokus
Quiet Riot
Journey
Heart
Cheap Trick
REO Speedwagon
RATT
White Zombie
ZZ Top
Skid Row
Queensryche
Robert Plant
REM
Metallica
Ted Nugent
Slaughter
Jackyl
Twisted Sister
Def Leppard
Zebra

Off the top of my head