Back in 2014 I got to see Rise Against play at the House of Blues in Boston, which was amazing, and just recently I went to see grandson and K. Flay perform together.
I think these are my two favorite concerts I’ve been to, and the key factor seems to be the energy between the crowd and the band. It’s a thing that’s kinda hard to express in words, but for me that’s definitely what makes a concert go from good to great. It doesn’t need to be a high-energy thing necessarily, either: one of the best moments from grandson’s set was actually a really somber, lower energy song that he came down onto the floor to perform, and you could just tell that everyone was really invested in that moment.
What about you all? What takes a concert to the next level for you?
Stage presence is a big one for me. When I saw My Chemical Romance last year it was this big spectacle and just marvelous. Even though Gerard himself is not the best singer, it was just a fun time period. When I saw Slayer with Testament, Behemoth, Lamb of God, and Anthrax. It was the mood they created. The intensity was something you could literally feel from just the noise. They were really giving it their all as it was Slayer’s farewell tour. But the crowd also kind of matters too.
And when concerts have disappointed me, it’s usually been because the stage presence is okay at best but the audience has been terrible. There were some local hip-hop/rap festivals I would go to. And the bigger the festival got, the more belligerent the behavior got. You would have people pushing and shoving to get to the front. And since these festivals were always in the middle of summer. It was be unbearably humid. Then they switched to a venue that was all concrete and that just killed my knees entirely to be there for 5+ hours.
And when concerts have disappointed me, it’s usually been because the stage presence is okay at best but the audience has been terrible.
This all the way.
Saw Oasis many years ago, massive stadium show not too long before they imploded. Hands down the worst gig I’ve been to. The band were fine, but Liam being Liam was goading the crowd. A crowd who, mostly, had been drinking for most of the long day, so were rowdy as shit.
The end result was a gig that felt dangerous and not much fun at all.
Exactly, I’ve been to metal shows like I said and have felt fine. And those generally have a lot of physicality. But not brutality. When it treads into the realm of brutality or abuse it is just hard to justify.
Terrible audiences really ruin vibes. I’ve seen it happen mostly at festivals. During a headlining act at ACL some people started making a mosh circle, but just used it as an excuse to bash their way to the front. As someone who likes mosh pits quite a bit i was honestly pissed at their actually dangerous behavior.
It was grueling. I don’t think I can stomach going to another festival again because of the prior experiences. It was reminiscent of the behavior when people got trampled to death at Travis Scott’s show awhile back. Thankfully no one in my situation died. But the pushing/shoving that people were doing was very dangerous.
One thing I really appreciated at the grandson show I was just at was that he explicitly told everyone at the start of his set that one of his show’s “rules” is: if a mosh pit forms, and somebody falls down, you stop and pick them back up. None formed at this particular show, but still a really cool thing to ensure everyone’s on the same page about that up front.
It warms my heart too when artists will stop shows because they can tell someone in the audience is in trouble.
I’ve been going to punk shows and playing in bands for years.
One of my favorite things about a show is when a band is absolutely crushing it and there’s just an electric feeling in the air. It’s hard to describe, but the music gets the entire room of people synchronized in vibe and people just want to move and have fun.
It’s a rare thing, but when it happens, it’s unreal. As a musician, I’ve been chasing this high my entire life.
Yeah! I wonder if we might be talking about the same kind of energy. Whatever it is, it’s definitely something reciprocal between the crowd and the band that you just can’t get listening to a recording of the music, even if it’s a group of people listening together.
I’ve never been in a band so I guess I don’t know if you can get that energy when you’re playing on your own without an audience, but I’d guess probably not.
It’s for sure possible without an huge audience. Sometimes being able to capture even an audience of 5-10 strangers can be powerful.
I played a show in Seattle at a bar last September and during one of our songs, I saw someone in the audience look to their friend and mouth “what the fuck” - as in we had sounded really good and they were shocked by that.
Afterwards we had a really great conversation and that person told us we were one of the best bands she had seen at that bar.
I think the energy thing is something that is palpable when the music is just undeniably good and fills the room, crowds just throw fuel onto the fire.
Loop earplugs, mostly. They’re a game changer.
Energy, presence and the performers just being totally locked in. My favourite gigs, off the top of my head, have been Cash Savage & the Last Drinks, Explosions in the Sky, and Too Many Zooz. Each act went on stage knowing exactly what kind of mood they wanted to create and the crowd was totally there for it too. It all coalesced into something intoxicating.
Aaaagh, having even medicare earplugs is honestly a lifesaver for concerts. I love love love the energy of the crowds and seeing a band but i already have mild tinnitus. Don’t need no more of it.
i’ve only been to maybe 4 concerts, but i personally LOVE LOVE LOVE mosh pits lol. i’m into typically pretty high energy screamy rock music, so pits like that are pretty much always ongoing for whoever is interested, and i just really like the energy i guess and fun everyone is having with each other. the feeling of being surrounded by “my people” too who love the band as much as i do is just magical honestly. it helps that every show i’ve been to so far has had really kind people in the crowds ready to help you if you’ve lost something or anything is wrong :)
it helps that every show i’ve been to so far has had really kind people in the crowds ready to help you if you’ve lost something or anything is wrong :)
At that Rise Against concert I went to I actually lost my watch off my wrist in the pit! (The lugs were bent, so it had a tenancy to fall off if jostled.) Everyone stopped immediately and helped me find it, and I got it back without it being stepped on or anything! The we went back to enjoying the show
Haha, the mosh pit helped someone find their contacts twice at a HEALTH show. Very good crowd.
that’s so sweet thank you for sharing your experience! i luckily haven’t had any issues so far with losing anything, but hopeful that whenever i eventually do drop my phone or something it’ll be with people like that around me :)
Best one I’ve been to was Lightning Bolt. Out of the numerous death metal, grindcore, and thrash shows I’ve seen, Lightning Bolt just had the room in a trance. Couldn’t stop moving if I wanted to. The energy was insane.
Jeez I’m envious of that, I would love to have seen them live, but I’m on the wrong continent
The first time I saw Chippendale perform (it was actually with Mindflayer (drums & electronics) not Lightning Bolt (drums & bass)) it changed my life. That was… summer, 1999? I had spent the 90s listening to rock from the 70s and whining that there was no good new music… WRONG! Ha ha.
The only other drummers I enjoy as much are Gabe Serbian (The Locust) and Max Roach.
I might be a bit of an outlier, but I am not at all a fan of crowds, so I strongly prefer concerts with assigned seating. I’m in a relatively small city that rarely ever gets big names, but even when we do, most of our concert venues are primarily standing-only, with very few seats available and even those are first-come-first-serve. So I try to always get there early enough to ensure a seat. I just want to see my favorite artists perform live, not get jostled around and smothered by strangers.
I mostly like crazy underground punk rock chaos, however… One of the best concerts I’ve ever seen was assigned seating, so I can appreciate both styles. (Diamanda Galas, mid-90s.)
For me, that depends on how old the band is. Older bands are just going to have more rabid fans that will push and shove you out of the way so they can see dear leader. Otherwise, I live for GA tickets.
I love Nine Inch Nails, I love them live, but I don’t think I can tolerate another show with their fans.
Concerts where every single PERSON in the room knows all the words to every song. That’s what really does it for me. Usually this is a band like The Front Bottoms or Pinegrove, it feels like their songs were made to be shouted back at them by an audience. That kind of energy is something that larger venues/shows have never been able to capture or compare to, imo.
Not at all mainstream, but the most enjoyable show I’ve been to was The Protomen. They have a Megaman-themed rock opera and a good portion of the story takes the form of a few characters interacting in front of a crowd of onlookers. At their shows, they do an absolutely fantastic job of making the audience feel like they are the crowd in the songs. They’re not just performing songs, they’re singing to you, and about you. The audience gets to be active participants in their songs, and the energy and adrenaline is incredible.
They typically play smaller venues, which helps, because you’re generally no more than 20-30 feet from the band. Being part of a crowd pumping fists into the air and chanting “We have con-trol, we keep you safe, we are your hope” has never felt so great. For a smaller band without the budget for huge screens and special effects and everything else you might see at a more mainstream show, they really manage to put on an amazing performance.
‘The Will of One’ from one of their live shows a few years ago.
Yo I love the Protomen! I own a physical CD copy of Act II: The Father of Death, and I’ve got an Act II t-shirt that I still wear pretty frequently. I think I know most of the words to that album, lol.
I actually got to seem them in person, too, back in 2017 in Massachusetts! They were playing with several other game-themed bands: Powerglove, MC Frontalot, and Bit Brigade (thanks to concertarchives.org for reminding me who else was there). Really cool show, I had a lot of fun! When I went to see them they didn’t perform the whole rock opera, they just played a handful of their more well-known songs, probably because there were so many different bands playing that night. I’d love to go to another one of their shows where it’s just them playing, it would be amazing to see them perform the whole thing in order. I can imagine that being directly addressed as the audience in a song like The Hounds would be next-level.
That is absolutely wild - I was at that same show in Massachusetts!
I jumped right down the fanboy rabbit hole after the first show we went to… bought both albums and a shirt, and they even signed them. Felt like I owed it to them to buy the merchandise, to be honest - admission was something like $12, but I had way more than $12 worth of good time.
I’ve been to four of their shows; they’ve always performed a subset of the songs from the albums, but I absolutely agree - especially after Act III is released, I’d travel quite a ways to see them perform all 3 albums in story order.
Haha that’s amazing! Small world!
I’ll be honest I’ve been out of the loop on news about them for a while, and just kinda assumed they’d stopped working on Act III for one reason or another; a little googling tells me I’m wrong and that they’re actually performing songs from Act III at their shows now! I will definitely be keeping an ear to the ground for when that album drops!
Went to grab a few links to some of the Act III songs they’ve got studio versions of, and found that they’re 7 years old at this point… felt like they were a lot more recent than that. Covid kind of just removed 3ish years from my perception of time. As such, I assume you’re fully aware of them, but in case you aren’t, Hold Back The Night and This City Made Us are absolute bangers.
I’m subscribed to their newsletter (which is mostly just tour announcements), but it occasionally contains Act III info. They’re certainly not being speedy about it, but hopefully we’ll get to hear it someday. :)
I do know them, although I didn’t realize that they’re going to be a part of Act III until I started googling just now! I only knew them from the EP that came out… yeah, almost 8 years ago. Time is nuts.
I never saw a concert in my life. But in 1 month, I’ll be at a festival to see Billy Talent, Imagine Dragons, Talk, Grandson, Les Shirley and Weezer! Can’t wait!
That’s a hell of a lineup! I saw Weezer in concert with Panic! At The Disco, and they put on a really good show. And like I mentioned, the energy at a grandson show is just incredible. I hope you have an amazing time there!
Is it Festival D’ete? I wish I still lived close enough to Quebec to go see that easily, so many great bands!
Yes, it’s Festival D’ete! It will be my first vacancy since I was 8, and I’m going with my gf!
surprise. it’s that ‘holy cow i wasn’t sure i’d be into this but it’s amazing’. for all the reasons everyone else has cited - stage presence, audience, engagement both ways.
alas most artists can only surprise me this way once, but the die is cast for that artist from that first time.
Excellent sound quality
Fair lol! It’s definitely important
Alicia Keys @ Boston Pavilion was great. She seemed to enjoy herself while having banter to the crowd. She seemed so genuine. Felt like such a personal experience with her music.
An open minded crowd that creates an “us” without the band even beeing on stage yet and a band that knows how to and is willing to tap into that feeling and just kind of joins the crowd. As opposed to a crowd that separates into small groups where everyone eyes the others to find out who’s the best or most hardcore fans or a band that’s tired because it’s the end of a long tour and would rather chill at home than play that gig.
For me it definitely is the energy between the band and the crowd and how the band engages with the crowd. I don’t like it when the band just plays their songs without interacting. It also is the crowd for me itself. I’ve seen Flogging Molly a few times and everybody just seems so happy to be there, enjoying the show and looking out for each other. It’s just a whole other vibe.
If I can feel the band enjoying themselves, it really makes it for me. Being a musician myself, I thrive on seeing the interaction between the band members, mistakes, improvs, and variations that make it into the show.
If you’re just up there playing the album, it’s tough for me to get into.
