Is anyone here still into live concerts these days?

@allenf1963 I live north of Charlotte, near Statesville. We are indeed blessed with several good sounding venues for live music in this area within 2- or 3-hours driving distance. Not bad. MSG in NYC was always special. Would love to see Radio City. Have fun and keep supporting these local venues. I’m glad they survived the Covid-19 years. Many just barely did.

Ah, Ziggy's will always be a special venue. I really miss it in its old location. Saw a ton of shows there and recorded some. They had a killer sound system. Saw Medeski, Martin, and Wood there for the first time. Wow. 

The last concert I went to was back in 2019.  My son took me to the 50 years of Jethro Tull  concert.  I believe we were at Mohegan Sun Casino in Conn.  I got my son into Tull back in the 90’s, I had been to well over 30 Tull concerts before this last one. The concert hadn’t changed a bit, same concept.  Big difference is Ian Anderson’s voice, he can’t hit the notes any more and all the songs were slowed way down to accommodate his aged voice.  No more concerts for me, too much hassle, too loud and the crowds are inconsiderate.   I would rather take a stroll down Beale St. in Memphis in the evening and listen to the locals play.  

@moonwatcher -- When I saw the venues you named, I realized we must live near each other. I’m in Winston-Salem. I am at The RamKat, Cat’s Cradle, Motorco, Filmore, Neighborhood Theater, Hanger 1819, The Underground, Orange Peel, and Monstercade VERY OFTEN. I also fly to NYC to catch shows at Radio City, Irving Plaza, St. Vitus, Brooklyn Steel, and others.

Before I retired, I handled Jay’s insurance at Ziggy’s for 20 years. My office was on Deacon Boulevard, right in front of Ziggy’s. I saw hundreds of shows there before he had to close. I had free reign to sit in on sound checks. I’d walk in around 2:00 p.m. wearing a suit and tie, grab a PBR beer, and sit dead center answering questions from the bands on how it sounded. Great memories!

@allenf1963 ,

What was Warren Zevon like??

I’m 62, and I’ve been attending shows since I was 10 years old (had a sibling 11 years older than me). Throughout the 1970’s and 1990’s, most shows were in venues under 10,000 seats, with an occasional large stadium show. Starting in the 2000’s, I started throwing in a few Multi-Day Festival shows where crowds of 80,000 fans a day were common. I quickly learned those events were not for me -- from the ticket prices to hotel costs to concessions cost, they just became ridiculously expensive.

Also in that early 2000’s time frame, I began attending shows at independent clubs -- venues that held a maximum of 500 to 1,000 fans, and quickly fell in love with these shows. The sound was much better, the prices were very low, you had the ability to see a vast variety of niche genre bands, and get to see them up close and personal. I began befriending the club managers and sticking around after shows in the loading area or in the clubs (with permission from the management), and I got to meet and party with numerous now famous musicians who enjoyed having a dinner or drinks bought for them. My primary music is Progressive Rock and Prog Metal, and I have been fortunate to hang out with the members of Haken, Porcupine Tree, Sons of Apollo, Dream Theater, Fates Warning, The Pineapple Thief, Leprous, Riverside, along with Mott The Hoople, Opeth, King Buffalo, Warren Zevon, Killing Joke, Dixie Dregs, Zakk Wylde, Black Label Society, Pantera, GodspeedYou! Black Emperor...just to name a few.

Give me the under 1,000 seat venues all day long. I’ll keep rocking out live as long as I can!

I rarely go to large venue (20,000 seat and larger) shows. The disconnect between seeing the band playing is just too much. Don’t get me wrong, I went to plenty of them in the decades past, from Pink Floyd, many Grateful Dead shows, Phish, Widespread Panic, Paul McCartney, The Police, Sting, Neil Young, Steely Dan, and more recently, Goose.

But always for more bang for my bucks, I loved going to smaller "bar" or "warehouse" shows, venues holding between 150 and 5000 people. They were always cheaper and now, a LOT cheaper, and you felt like you were actually seeing the band and had some interaction with them.

My favorite venues are the Ramkat in Winston-Salem, the Orange Peel in Asheville, The Visulite in Charlotte, The Lincoln Theatre in Raleigh, and Pisgah Brewing Co, in Black Mountain. All these venues are open to audience recording too, which is a hobby of mine.

Prices for seeing bands at these venues ranges from $30 to $50 and are well worth it. I mainly go to see rock jam bands (think Spafford, Eggy, moe, lespecial, Aqueous), Americana, or jazz, and a few singer-songwriters. These places have the sound quality dialed in very well, and most don’t blow your ears out either.

I won’t say I’ll never go to a "large, expensive" show again, but it would have to be someone I really, really liked.

I haven’t been lately, but I went for about 20 years to a 4-day Americana festival called Merlefest, that has about 10 stages going, and everything from straight ahead bluegrass to rock. For the price, you get to see many, many artists.

To show the disconnect at large shows, some YouTubers recorded some of the songs as presented in commercials or videos from Taylor Swift’s recent live tour. They found that on most of the songs, she wasn’t even singing live. They were canned "prerecorded" vocals. No thanks. I mean I guess her fans don’t care and they just want to see her dance around the stage, but I can listen to a record for nearly free via Tidal and pop my own popcorn and get beers a lot cheaper.

You betcha ….but, very selectively for class acts only.

in March 2024, I paid the StubHub asking price for killer floor tix - front and centre ninth row from the stage- to see THE EAGLES live.

In August, it was BLUE RODEO in an outside venue,

In November, it was for great tickets to see DIANA KRALL live.

I now have CHRIS BOTTI live in concert tickets coming up in a couple of months.

TAKEAWAY:

” Price is what you pay….. Value is what you get …”

- Warren Buffett,

I don't tend to go see popular music so ticket prices aren't so much an issue for me. I typically see Phish 3-5 times a year they keep their ticket prices sane and mostly smaller club shows jazz mostly.

  "F that!  I do not use that phrase lightly."

That proves how adamant you are about it! Tad out of character for you...

Smaller venues for me. 

I do Broadway, local music venues, and outdoor music festivals. I will never pay to a Ticketmaster event.

Last year I attended almost every Jazz concert at the Buena Vista Theater in San Antonio, TX. It's a truly great venue for Jazz.

Whenever there is an opportunity to attend, I am there. Live concerts often include unique improvisations, interactions, or surprises that you won’t find in studio recordings. I dig the energy, acoustics and atmosphere, especially when the setting is on a smaller scale. 

I quit going to shows in 2020 when COVID hit and I've never really gone back; I used to be good for 20 - 30 gigs per year, but I'm also 73 years old now! So I'm mostly content to watch live shows on my sound and video system. Unless I personally know any of the performers, in which case I'll come out to support them. When they started having this variable seat pricing business with Ticketmaster, I found that so frustrating I quit going to large shows even before 2020. 

Good point.

Know anyone who likes ice baths?

@thecarpathian did I say whose kidney?

Try and go to 3-4 a year Red Rocks of course and smaller venues but very picky since prices are so high these days

Every chance I get. Love small venues, Jazz and Blues clubs. I travel quite a bit and always look to see who will be in town for a weeknight show. 

I could care less about prices.

It's always the guy in front of me who has to record the event on his phone that makes a live event a no go.

So much for "living the moment."

That means you can only go twice.

any time the Beatles is playing, I am selling a kidney to go see them

Absolutely but only when the price is right.

We just went to NJPAC for the annual Sarah Vaughan Vocal Competition, in the small Victoria Theater there, 5 contestants, it was wonderful, I posted some photos and links on DPReview.com. Last live event was this in 2019, just prior to covid, it made me realize how much we have been missing. 

https://www.dpreview.com/forums/thread/4786835

Yes I do attend live concerts, Bless living next to Ravinia festival here in Illinois.Price is very reasonable. The venue is very beautiful.

Last year for the first time in years my wife and I went to see Styx and Foreigner at the Bangor Maine Amphitheater. I was actually surprised how good the sound quality was compared to many of the arena style shows we attended in the past. The negatives were pretty much what has also been said except for the majority of the crowd standing for the entire show. Why buy front row seats if you are going to stand? At 75 my feet and back aren’t up to it.

We do go out at least a half a dozen times a year to smaller venues where you have good sight lines, maybe a meal and not have to be concerned about the weather.

I rarely attend a show where the capacity is over 5,000.  Prices for most large shows are ridiculous and I'm not satisfied sitting somewhere far away or off to the side, don't enjoy the parking hassles, and the sound usually sucks. 

I'd much rather go to Jazz Alley in Seattle, sit right in front of the stage, have a nice meal, park for free, and be on the freeway in 5-10 minutes after the show. 

I go to a lot of shows throughout the year, there's a lot of great talent playing smaller venues where you can get reasonably priced tickets and be in the first 10-15 rows and enjoy great sound.

Smaller venues where you can sit close to the band and really watch very talented players play has pretty much wrecked me for large venues where ticket prices are vastly higher for a less satisfying and involving experience.  But that’s me. 

I don’t go to many, but our kids have gifted us a couple of concert tickets in recent times.

We went to hear ZZ Top and Jon Fogarty at CMAC a couple of summers ago. Billy Gibbons can still play, but the band sucked....Frank Beard looked dead at his drum set. Jon Fogarty, on the other hand, hasn’t lost a thing....he was fantastic! He and Billy Gibbons did one tune together that was really good. Fogarty’s son played too.

Last fall I went with my son to hear "My Morning Jacket" in Syracuse, NY, and was pleasantly surprised with an incredible show put on by an immensely talented performer who I wasn’t very familiar with. Great show. Crazy prices.

I prefer smaller shows at local venues on the occasions that you catch someone with talent.

@tippydi -Perhaps it is, depending on one’s age and finances. I know many 20-somethings, and parents with teen/pre-teen children who love seeing the big stars, and sharing the experience. I enjoy their stories.

At one point I went to many large-venue shows. Last stadium show I went to was Bruce Springsteen, in 2016. Between tickets, parking and concessions I forked over $700+. It was worth it.

And waaaaay back in the last quarter of the 20th century, I enjoyed the music, the scene and the, ahem-concessions (cough, cough). Now, not so much. It’s likely because I’m over 65, and the thought of being surrounded by 70,000 people gives me the willies.

Clubs and small venue shows are a different story. I’ve enjoyed a number of performances at local music venues and jazz clubs in NYC.

Do you go to bigger venue shows?

David