Essential Live Performances / Concerts

[Mave]

Watching a great concert -whether it's on your headphones and a PC monitor, or on a huge LED TV and surround system- is fantastic.
Since I'm a bit of a quality and download maniac myself I'm gonna list the best live performances/concerts you can buy/download.

I also have a lot of SD performances (mainly MTV unplugged concerts) but I'm only going to list blu-ray level quality here.

If you like any of the bands listed below, I suggest you go buy/download the show asap.

In no particular order:

Queen: Rock Montreal & Live Aid

Blows me away every time I watch it, Freddy's performance is out of this world.

AC/DC live at Donnington

Best AC/DC performance out there, without a doubt.

The Doors live at the Bowl 1986

Jim Morisson, you magnificent bastard, a fantastic performance.

The Eagles live at Capitol Center, 1977

No widescreen unfortunately, still a great concert. Opens with "Hotel California".

 

[Stybar]

bumping a really old post because fuck it

Not necessarily HQ vids, but still:
The Iron Maiden concert at Rock in Rio in 2001 is legendary. The entire concert is available on CD, and video footage is on youtube, somehow. My dad has the CD, and as a kid I was fascinated by the cover art of it. I suppose it's one of my first introductions to metal.

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Something a bit different, and less mainstream: Skalmold with the Sinfóníuhljómsveit Íslands. Icelandic band, with the Icelandic symphonic orchestra, playing in Iceland for an Icelandic crowd. It's epic. This song is my favorite of that set: you can see the drummer having a fucking blast of a time.

Not you guys' usual type of music, I know But they're one of my favorite bands, and the entire concert is great.

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Gotta mention this one as well. Blind Guardian, a staple of Power Metal. They wanted to record a live album/dvd, but didn't have any decent footage. So, naturally, they hosted their own 2-day festival, with the express intention to record live footage of themselves. It resulted in Imaginations Through The Looking Glass, and features some of the best crowd participation I've ever seen.
In particular in The Bard's Song (although that's cheating - it's always sung out loud by the crowd), and in the legendary recording of Valhalla. To this day, whenever Blind Guardian performs Valhalla live, the crowd goes fucking nuts, and tries to replicate that moment.

(small pic, because it's from 2003, and decent resolution pics are hard to find)

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This doesn't really fit, maybe, because it's more specifically about one song, not a particular concert.
Nightwish is one of the most famous symphonic metal bands out there, mostly due to the flamewars of fans debating which is their favorite lead singer, and the dramas relating to the replacing of said lead singers.
Anyway, this song was recorded live at Wacken in 2013. Due to some drama in the background, the lead singer at the time (Anette) was replaced by Floor (who is the current lead singer). This concert was her first live performance with the band. The very original singer Tarja (who many still consider the best), afterwards said that this version of the song is her own favorite, and said that Floor delivered it better than she ever could.
Yes, I just dropped 3 names in a few sentences. The entire band member timeline is wild.

In particular from 8:28 to 9:30 is very popular with "reaction channels". That earthshattering last note, man. Goosebumps.

 

[Mave]

bumping a really old post because fuck it

Not necessarily HQ vids, but still:
The Iron Maiden concert at Rock in Rio in 2001 is legendary. The entire concert is available on CD, and video footage is on youtube, somehow. My dad has the CD, and as a kid I was fascinated by the cover art of it. I suppose it's one of my first introductions to metal.

View attachment 221

---

Something a bit different, and less mainstream: Skalmold with the Sinfóníuhljómsveit Íslands. Icelandic band, with the Icelandic symphonic orchestra, playing in Iceland for an Icelandic crowd. It's epic. This song is my favorite of that set: you can see the drummer having a fucking blast of a time.

Not you guys' usual type of music, I know But they're one of my favorite bands, and the entire concert is great.
View attachment 222

---

Gotta mention this one as well. Blind Guardian, a staple of Power Metal. They wanted to record a live album/dvd, but didn't have any decent footage. So, naturally, they hosted their own 2-day festival, with the express intention to record live footage of themselves. It resulted in Imaginations Through The Looking Glass, and features some of the best crowd participation I've ever seen.
In particular in The Bard's Song (although that's cheating - it's always sung out loud by the crowd), and in the legendary recording of Valhalla. To this day, whenever Blind Guardian performs Valhalla live, the crowd goes fucking nuts, and tries to replicate that moment.

View attachment 223
(small pic, because it's from 2003, and decent resolution pics are hard to find)

---

This doesn't really fit, maybe, because it's more specifically about one song, not a particular concert.
Nightwish is one of the most famous symphonic metal bands out there, mostly due to the flamewars of fans debating which is their favorite lead singer, and the dramas relating to the replacing of said lead singers.
Anyway, this song was recorded live at Wacken in 2013. Due to some drama in the background, the lead singer at the time (Anette) was replaced by Floor (who is the current lead singer). This concert was her first live performance with the band. The very original singer Tarja (who many still consider the best), afterwards said that this version of the song is her own favorite, and said that Floor delivered it better than she ever could.
Yes, I just dropped 3 names in a few sentences. The entire band member timeline is wild.

In particular from 8:28 to 9:30 is very popular with "reaction channels". That earthshattering last note, man. Goosebumps.

Who cares about bumps when they're useful?
Very informative post, will check them out!

Sty please check out this one, I don't have a lot of metal concerts, but I love this one. I've got it in REMUX blu-ray quality. (17GB) Most crystal clear metal I've ever seen

Metallica Through the Never (2013)

Metallica Through the Never (2013) ⭐ 7.1 | Music

1h 33m | R

www.imdb.com

 

[Stybar]

That lightshow at the intro of One is magnificent, yeah.
Great share!