Clearly you haven't heard 'Okonosos' by My Morning Jacket.

Was never a fan of live albums myself, but now that I can view live performances on YouTube, I'm belatedly discovering some great musical moments. Case in point is the attached clip from Jules Holland's show where there's the amusingly uncomfortable fit of Robert Plant being closely followed by The Fall. An uncomfortably smug piece of happy clappy stuff by Planty which then segues into the rumbling Fall grind of 'Blindness'. Planty must have wondered what on earth was happening - "Are they warming up?" - indeed isn't that Planty looking rather bemused at 3:24? Reminds me of some of the clumsy mix tapes I used to make when I was 12.
Oddly this YouTube clip has become my favourite version of a modern day Fall classic-ah. Not least for the toe-curling awful bit right at the end by Jools.

Am I the only one suffused with gloom when the juxstapostion of the words "live" and "album" comes into play?
It's always a bad sign.

It's all live DVD these days isn't it?

Fraser man, You should know that the only thing live on L & D is Brian Downey's drums and the audience; everything else was re-recorded in the studio. See Tony Visconti's notes here... http://www.tonyvisconti.com/artists/thinlizzy.shtml

What's the live album that Danny Baker plays a bit of applause from, that has Rod Stewart being announced in the fadeout if you listen carefully?
I think it was a Bowie live album that an engineer had cut & pasted the applause into, but could be wrong. And hasn't Chuck Berry released some glaringly blatant dubbed-audience 'live' albums?

The last great live album I bought was Crowded House's "Farewell To The World" although you could hardly call it recent as it was recorded over 10 years ago! In more recent times, Oasis's "Familar To Millions" wasn't really that bad at all.
Best ever live albums for me are Bruce Springsteen's "Live 1975-1985" and Dire Strait's "Alchemy". Don't snigger, give the latter a go, I feel A Dire Straits comeback will soon be on the cards.

... you mentioned, I think what a lot of them have in common is that the versions of songs on those albums are superior to the studio versions. If the first version of Smoke on the Water you hear is the live version, then the studio version is going to sound incredibly plodding and restrained.

I think the best example of this (speaking as a fellow teenage headbanger), and again it's from the 1970s like many of those you mentioned, is UFO's Strangers in the Night. A lot of those songs only took off on the live album, having made little impact on the original studio albums.

I have some pretty good live Costello bootlegs although not sure I should mention that here. But his semi-official Live at El Mocambo is pretty good.

Then you get bands that are far better live than in the studio such as The String Cheese Incident - all of their gigs are recorded and sold as triple cd's on the band website. I tell you they are pretty bloody awesome - they started off as bluegrass but do fantastic extended live versions of Weather report,Bob Marley,Paul Simon,Pink Floyd - you name it. Musicianship of the highest standard.

Portishead - Live at Roseland NYC (1998)

Stunning....

I've been enjoying 'Live Seeds' recently by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds.

Anyway, it's all about Bootlegs these days innit?

Mott The Hoople's Live is something I return to often and I don't listen to most of the live albums I've got, who does?

Live And Dangerous/ In The Studio (delete where appropriate) is a good listen. Saw them live a few times in the seventies and what a band they were live, pity about the studio albums.

First time, they blew Queen off the stage.

Last time I saw them was in 1981 at the Milton Keynes Bowl (it's not a bowl, it's just a large field!) and sadly they were a parody of what they'd been previously.

about Mott...the Anniversary Edition of the album is even better I reckon. Another tasty little live-r is 'Modern Lovers Live'- if only for the twelve or thirteen ( I've lost count ) versions of 'Ice Cream Man' and the sublime 'Morning Of Our Lives'.

Isn't that one of the best?

have released two live albums...

I've never been too bothered about the official live album as a concept. They are often a bit overdone with editing tweaks and dubs, missing songs, and most of the banter seems to be edited out. The live bootleg is just the treat, the online hunt for the ones you were at, the set variation, the ellusive soundboard recording. The live albums that never were albums, just gigs that there happens to be a high quality mp3 of.

only one problem with that album, why isn't there an "!" at the end of "Live"?

A US Radio Station played a supposedly live state to state broadcast of what was a supposedly Mott The Hoople Live Show that was the latest studio album with applause dubbed.

I heard that even bits of the audience applause on "Live and dangerous" were lifted from elsewhere!

The Ramones - It's Alive

Deep Purple - Made in Japan

Genesis - Seconds Out & 'Live'

AC/DC - If you want blood

All from the 1970s, so I guess you are right, they don't make 'em any more....

Neil Young's 1991 live album with Crazy Horse, Weld - and then there's Arc, its unnecessary companion - is largely outstanding. The best versions you'll ever hear of Tonight's The Night or Cortez The Killer. Like the Springsteen live box, it does a very good job of making you feel you're actually at a concert. And it sounds bloody enormous. The worst mistake I ever made was watching it on VH1 once - it looked so small and performed by mortals.

For my money, the finest live album of all time is "It's Too Late To Stop Now".

Anyone unsure of the desirability of live albums needs to have this one blasted at them to dispell all doubts.

Outstanding work, Mr Van.

Joni Mitchell's Miles of Aisles is good. Sides 1 and 4 with the funky but arid sound of Tom Scott and the LA Express and sides 2 and 3 Joni solo. Great stuff especially when after the line 'they shakes their heads and say I've changed' in Both Sides Now she shouts 'And I have' and it's a shout of triumph. Much like the way that Van Morrison shouts 'It's too late to stop now' and the Caledonia Soul Orchestra respond at the very end of the album of the same name. Interestingly enough (to me at least and I've had a long day) when he sings the same line on 'Into the Mystic' it is far more hesitant.

Neil Young & Crazy Horse - Live At the Fillmore East
Released last year but recorded in 1970 :) It is available for the princely sum of 3.16 of your English pounds on iTunes right now.

Days Of Speed by Paul Weller is a pretty good recent live album as is Live Wood especially the live version of "This Is No Time".

Karma To Burn by The Waterboys is also pretty splendid.

The best ones IMHO are Live & Dangerous, PNYC & It's Too Late Too Stop Now.

Cant believe we've got to 32 responses without a reference to Live at the Fillmore East. This, coupled with (and I hesitate to mention this) Live Dead, were absolutely required listening in their time.

Could it be that more recent bands cant cut it live?

Not sure whats to be gained by a live recording of someone lipsynching after all.

On the live recording front, and cutting across from the Clapton debate elsewhere, the live version of Crossroads, especially Eric's second solo, is something I never tire of.

Can't believe we've come this far without somebody recommending "Rockin; The Fillmore" by Humble Pie. Peter Frampton and of course, the inimitable Steve Marriot. It's a double with only seven tracks, two of which burst the 15-minute mark, naemly a rambling version of Muddy Water's "Rolling Stone" and a 20-minute renditioon of Dr John's "Walk On Gilded Splinters". It was the album of choice in the common room during my sixth-form days in Colchester, at The Gilberd School. As for definitive live songs, Tom Waits' "Jersey Girl" by Springsteen really takes the biscuit.

PS Another staple in my sixth form days was "Live In Europe" by the brilliant Rory Gallagher.

Either listen to, or download this Decemberists gig and wonder why it hasn't been an official realease - awesome does not even come close to describing it.

http://www.archive.org/details/decemberists2007-02-03.dpa4061.flac16

All these entries, and nobody has yet come up with the correct answer. That answer is, of course, Stupidity by the mighty Doctor Feelgood. An album which catches a hungry band at the peak of its powers.

A big stack o live concerts recorded for radio are available to stream here

http://www.wolfgangsvault.com/

and there's plenty of sites that host downloadable versions of bootlegs in shn or ogg format. A lot better than shlepping round town halls buying overpriced, badly recorded bootleg tapes (i could never afford the CDs) as I did throughout my teenage years.

Gotta agree with my man vulpes vulpes Van's 'Too Late ...' is , as mentioned before on a previous thread, just sublime; as is Richie Haven's 'Live at the Cellar Door'- a genuine artist and possibly one of the greatest interpreters of others works. 'Weld' much better than 'Live Rust' but all these are ancient in real terms.
I think i would agree that 'Kicking Television' is possibly the best of very few recent releases.
However i think i heard that a new idea is sweeping the past away and stealing the fire of the bootleggers, correct me if i'm wrong but didn't Crowded House start a scheme where punters could purchase a copy of the gig they were attending by pre paying and then a cd was sent on after the gig?
This must be the way to go

This was a good recent live album - slightly spoiled by the hometown (Chicago)crowd's need to whoop and holler during every quiet bit.

David Live is good - so is Too Late To Stop Now.

To this day, I remember David Hepworth's review in Q about the guy that chose to whoop in the middle of The Needle And The Damage Done: "Such is the strength of this set, his shame will pursue him for years to come" or something along those lines.

...to raise my head above the parapet with the name Van Der Graaf Generator, their live album 'Real Time' (recorded at the reunion gig at the RFH in 2005 but released this year) is very fine. And you can almost see me in the audience shot on the front cover which clearly adds value.

Of course, you could say the VDGG are as archetypal a 70s band as any mentioned above...

I have always thought that those critics who get on their hobby horses about how "lame, superfluous and exploitative" live albums are, are just showing themselves to be enormous tossers. Lots of live albums are lamentable rubbish, of course, but then again, lots of albums are, full stop. But great live albums do exist. The acid test is simply that you mourn the fact that you weren't there. Yes, I know that most live albums are post facto constructions, but big deal. Art is not truth.

Many of the great ones have already been noted above.

- ACDC - "If you want blood",
- Allman Bros "Live at Fillmore East" (the revised Tom Dowd version, incidentally, is an absolute masterpiece of editing, and exceeds the quality of the original in every way)
- Neil Young "Live Rust" and "Weld"

but here are some hidden treasures that tend to get overlooked.

- Golden Earring - "Naked 1 & 2," "Something Heavy Going Down"
- Warren Zevon "Stand In The Fire"
- Van Morrison "One Night in San Francisco"
- Rolling Stones "No Security"
- Magazine "Play"

And don't even get me going on jazz or DVD performances.

The best Burritos album is "Last Of The Red Hot Burritos", which is live.

The special edition of Greendale has a DVD of one of the acoustic shows, which is quite frankly brilliant, if not only for Mr. Young's incessant ramblings about the fictitious Green family.

The Abbatoir Blues Tour DVD comes with two CD's of Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds that are well worth a listen.

Oh, and Live Rust is incredible.

Actually I've had many years of pleasure from "Waiting for Columbus" by Little Feat - in fact the first music my newly born son heard was the live version of "Willin'", one of the most life affirming songs. Mind you, there is tons of good live Feat around now, and maybe it wasn't the best show with Lowell as bootlegs from the era suggest, but that original live one on vinyl still does it for me.

Jesse Malin's semi official "Messed Up Here Tonight" is a good 'un.....complete with The Boss completely hitting the wrong chord at the start of "Wendy"!

Dylan's Rolling Thunder Bootleg is absolutely brilliant; the skits, the between song banter, the whole package...

Still perplexed that the Manics have never stuck out a live album. I'd pay good money for an official copy of the Christmas '94 gig at the Astoria....

PS - First time poster, long time listener....