I’ve heard of 75% of that list. I realize that you were being tongue in cheek but most of that list isn’t obscure.
No. The point, which you seem to not get is that a lot, if not most of these bands were “nobodies” when I saw them open for other acts. All of them went on to headline in the next few years. And whether you’ve heard of them or not, more than half of them are still working in one form or another. Derek Trucks just released a new CD a couple of months ago. Aaron Squirrel is a local Norman guy you should be trying to book for your next frat party.
If you have no interest in where your music comes from, then you don’t.
it ain’t nothin’ to meee
it ain’t nothin’ to meee*
But by ignoring the opening acts of today you’re putting yourself behind the curve for what will come next.
*Johnny Winter, somebody else you’ll not have heard of.
Yes, I live under a rock. :rolleyes:
And of course I’ve heard of all of those bands, they’re the famous ones from the list.
But for the record, I’m 27 and have never heard of Mahavishnu Orchestra, Climax Blues Band, West Bruce and Lang, Sun Ra, Jack Dejohnette, Lake, Golden Earring
Blackfoot, Saxon, Fastway, Shooting Star, Yngwie Malmsteen, The Motels, Robin Trower and a few others from the list.
Wiki-ing a few names doesn’t lead me to any obvious reasons why I should have heard of any of them. The 2nd tier bands of yesterday are going to be just as obscure to the average 20something as the 2nd tier bands of today are to the average middle-aged person.
Of the three bands I listed in my first post in this thread (Matt Nathanson, Guster and Flickerstick), how many people over 45-50 could say they’ve heard of all three?
And arguably, just because an opening act is relatively unknown, doesn’t mean they don’t make great music. We saw Amiina open for Sigur Rós, and they were just lovely. But Sigur Rós is already verging into art music territory from popular music, and Amiina perhaps even more so. The next time we saw Amiina, they were playing in a museum venue. We saw Tom Brosseau open for them, and he’s pretty obscure, but he has an amazing voice for the sort of folk-country that keeps the myth of the American frontier alive and well. Do I expect everyone to recognize the names of these performers? Not really. Were they worth seeing in concert? Very much so.
Regardless of the fact that acts aren’t “nobodies” just because one person doesn’t recognize them, I really don’t see why being less well known is automatically a reason to dismiss opening performers.
Well put, Idlewild. I come from the punk scene, and except for a few “real” concerts (i.e. mainstream) most of the bands I’ve seen are people you will probably have never heard of. The Pogues, Flogging Molly, and Toots and the Maytals are the only bands I can come up with that more than 2 Dopers have probably heard of, and that’s pushing it. Oh wait, Against Me! is on MTV now, aren’t they? Well I remember when James was in a mediocre local punk band, and have seen Against Me! when they were playing dives, so I guess that counts.
So in my music scene, opening acts were always appreciated. Punk shows around here usually had the format of 1) Local band first, sometimes of dubious musical quality but often great musicians in their own right 2) fairly obscure band doing their first national tour on their way to making it big (as big as “big” is in punk, anyway) and 3) headliners.
When you come from a music scene that is outside of the mainstream, you’re free to make your own decisions about music instead of having it forcefed to you (not to disparage other posters’ musical tastes, as you Cafe folks probably know way more about music than I do). Those nobodies may not be popular, but they can certainly rock your face off and have done it for me many times.
Following up my own post with a correct URL. Thank you again, so much Mr. Jobs, for the ONLY computer in the universe with no cut & paste.
Some of my favorite bands are bands I saw first as opening bands.
Rush opening up for Kiss in 1976 (I think?)
Queensryche opening up for Kiss the day before I left for boot camp in 1985
Disturbed on one of those mega-band tours
Chevelle on the same tour
Three opening for Dream Theater last year
Five Finger Death Punch on the second stage at the Mayhem Festival
Some other bands I like (just not favorites) I’ve also seen as opening bands:
Anthrax opening for Iron Maiden
Primus opening for Rush (already mentioned)
Drowning Pool at some mega band festival
Candlebox opening for Metallica
Static X opening for some band I can’t even remember!
Overall, I’ve found some good bands watching the opening acts. I’ve also seen some REALLY crappy bands (Rush fans from the old days will remember Rory Gallagher and Mr. Big) and some stuff I’ve said “meh” to as well.
My favorite concerts of all time have been bands that have done “An Evening With” type shows, 3 hours of their own stuff. Rush has done this for several years, and Dream Theater used to do that. Nothing like seeing close to 4 hours of your favorite band like when DT played the Beacon Theater in 2002. I’ve also loved seeing Billy Joel & Elton John play together, they do some awesome shows.
Opening acts I have enjoyed:
The Moody Blues ( for Cream)
Led Zeppelin (for The Who)
Yes (for Jethro Tull)
J. Geils Band ( for Emerson, Lake and Palmer)
Junior Brown (for John Prine)
Shawn Colvin (for John Hiatt)
Richard Thompson (for John Hiatt)
Mary Chapin Carpenter (for John Hiatt)
John Hiatt (for Jackson Browne)
Great Big Sea (for Squeeze)
I’m sure there are some cool ones I’m not remembering right now.
I’m in favor of opening acts.
Quite seriously, No, I’ve never heard of them. And no, I haven’t been living under a rock, just in a country that isn’t the US, and I’m not part of the “Music Scene” (Just because I’m 27 doesn’t mean I live for Music, you know).
Why should I have heard of these bands? I could probably name several authors of the top of my head that are obscure to you but are extremely well-known in literary/historical circles, for example- I don’t ask if you’ve been living under a rock because you’ve never heard of (for example) Jan Morris, Simon Winchester, or Antony Beevor (No Googling or Wiking, now!), after all.
And? 
A few of the great opening bands I’ve seen, though they’re “nobodies” to most people:
Imogen Heap opening for Rufus Wainwright, many many years before she caught on. I got to meet her after the show and she was very sweet.
Noe Venable opening for some name, I can’t even remember who now, because Noe blew me away and rocked my world.
Lisa Germano opening for Mouth Music. I’d never heard of her and was just floored.
Yep, sometimes opening bands go on to become huge, and it’s fun to say you saw them when they were an opening band. My best example from back when I was into regular rock was when I went to see a now-obscure guitarist named Ronnie Montrose in concert, when he was touring to support an amazing album called Open Fire. I had become a fan when he appeared on a late night TV show called Midnight Special when he played the mesmerizing “Town Without Pity.” (Midnight Special is also where I first heard of and heard the music of a then-unknown band called Genesis, with this bizarre lead singer named Peter Gabriel who wore strange costumes and outlandish makeup, but whose music was like nothing I’d never heard before and it, literally, changed my life.)
Montrose was headlining.
There were two opening bands that I’d never heard of and before the music started I was all pissy because I wanted to hear Montrose right away. Well, both bands were really really good, and I bought albums by both of them the next day. I didn’t become permanent fans, but I sure did like those albums. My tastes used to be very different.
The first opening band was the then-unknown Van Halen, touring to support their just-released first album.
The second opening band was the then-barely known Journey, touring to support their 4th album (and the one that finally broke them into the big time after toiling in obscurity) Infinity.
Montrose, the headliner, is today almost completely forgotten. Such a shame.
Just wanted to say I like your username!
Quite a few of the bands mentioned aren’t American.
Just the ones I can name offhand…
The Guess Who are Canadian.
Golden Earring are Dutch.
Foghat are British.
I can’t say I’ve heard of everyone in DfrntBreign’s list, and I certainly can’t say how popular the various bands I do recognize are outside Canada and their home countries (if not Canada), but that you don’t know them speaks a lot more of your ignorance of the wider musical world, not their being ‘nobodies’.
Especially if you can’t even name Don’t Fear The Reaper, which isn’t exactly an obscure cut.
And yet, you still haven’t answered my or Martini’s question. Why should we have heard of these bands?
To give just one example, Wikipedia lists West, Bruce and Laing as a “blues rock trio.” I could probably count on one hand all of the “blues” artists I’ve heard of, and all of them appeared in The Blues Brothers.
There’s also the fact that they only released three albums and disbanded nearly a decade before I was born. I ask again, why should I have heard of them?
They are internationally known bands. That he doesn’t know them speaks entirely of his ignorance, not their obscurity.
Being (not particularly) young, being non-American…none of that is an excuse for not knowing the bands in question - a good number of them are not American, so the fact that they’re known in the US at all makes talking as though they’re obscure local bands silly.
I’m not American, either, nor am I particularly old. Yet, I: a) know more of the bands than he does, and b) cop to my own ignorance when I look at the list and see I’ve heard of less than 3/4 of them, rather than claiming being a young(ish) Canadian means I can’t possibly be expected to have heard of them unless I’m some sort of obsessive with a room full of vinyl.
FTR, I wasn’t raising my age as an excuse for not knowing- it was me saying I am supposedly in the target demographic for the Music Is My Life thing.
Completely unscientific, but I asked some of my friends at university today if any of the band names meant anything to them and, for the most part, they had no idea who they were. (Obviously they’d heard of some of them, same as myself).
Ignorant is not knowing who Hannah Montana or Radiohead or Queen or Nirvana or someone else equally High Profile is- artists/groups who are on the radio, on TV, who have CDs for sale from reputable, chain record stores and not demos/EPs sold out of the back of the drummer’s panel van in the carpark.
Saying “Sorry, I’ve never heard of these bands which, and let’s be fair here, have zero profile to the Average Person In The Street (who is totally different to the average poster on the SDMB)” is not ignorant. It’s simply having never heard of a band which I have no reason to have ever heard of.
And, as yet, I’ve yet to hear a compelling reason from the “They are so famous and not obscure!” brigade as to why I, or any other Average Non-Musical Enthusiast Person should have heard of them.
Sometimes, the opening act has been hand-picked by the headliner as someone worthy of more recognition. Another Roadside Attraction was an outstanding example of a band selecting other acts that influenced them, whose sound they liked, that they thought were cool, etc. The Police used to do the Police Picnic in Toronto with the same kind of motivation.
Opening acts I’ve heard that were noteworthy -
Change of Heart and The Odds opening for The Tragically Hip
The Meat Puppets opening for Nirvana
FM opening for Rush
Max Webster opening for Rush
Crash Test Dummies opening for Elvis Costello
Cano opening for FM
Funny that twickster goes to see Derek Trucks and has to sit through an opening act.
We went to see Santana last summer and Derek Trucks WAS the opening act. Never heard of him but liked him. He came out later and played with Carlos Santana… and wow. So good.
Yeah, I’d like to hear them together sometime. green with envy
I’ve been pleasantly surprised by opening acts over the years (though I’m hard pressed to come up with specifics). However, my husband came unglued when Macy Gray opened for David Bowie. The genres were a million miles apart, and her performance wasn’t what we were geared up for. It bothered me less than it bothered him, but it still sucked.
I would have killed to see that show.
I finally came up with an example of great opening act. We saw Joe Cocker and Johnny Winter opened for him. Shooooweee! That was an awesome concert.