# Top 50 Live Albums of All-Time **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [August 6, 2002, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/top-50-live-albums-of-all-time/122665 "2002-08-06T21:00:39Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Munch](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/munch/32/5281_2.png) [@Munch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Munch)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2002, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/top-50-live-albums-of-all-time/122665/1 "2002-08-06T21:00:39Z")
Are we taping this? ---
**Author:** ![mouthbreather](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a698b9/32.png) [@mouthbreather](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mouthbreather)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2002, 9:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/top-50-live-albums-of-all-time/122665/2 "2002-08-06T21:40:50Z")
\ is this thing on? ---
**Author:** ![Semp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/fbc32d/32.png) [@Semp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Semp)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2002, 11:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/top-50-live-albums-of-all-time/122665/3 "2002-08-06T23:12:13Z")
I didn’t know **Live** even put out that many albums to begin with. Let’s see, there was Throwing Copper and that Secret Samadhi one… ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2002, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/top-50-live-albums-of-all-time/122665/4 "2002-08-07T01:18:29Z")
I’ll start: **Allman Brothers Band Live at Fillmore East** Runner up: J. Geils Band: **Full House** ---
**Author:** ![WSLer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/a6a055/32.png) [@WSLer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WSLer)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2002, 1:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/top-50-live-albums-of-all-time/122665/5 "2002-08-07T01:20:34Z")
Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band- **Live 1975-1985** ---
**Author:** ![Ukulele\_Ike](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/df788c/32.png) [@Ukulele\_Ike](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ukulele_Ike)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2002, 2:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/top-50-live-albums-of-all-time/122665/6 "2002-08-07T02:18:19Z")
The Band: **Rock of Ages**. Runner up: Little Feat: **Waiting for Columbus**. ---
**Author:** ![neofishboy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/neofishboy/32/444_2.png) [@neofishboy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/neofishboy)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2002, 3:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/top-50-live-albums-of-all-time/122665/7 "2002-08-07T03:49:08Z")
The Who - **Live at Leeds** Jane’s Addiction - **Jane’s Addiction** Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - **Live Seeds** ---
**Author:** ![Mockingbird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c68b51/32.png) [@Mockingbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mockingbird)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2002, 4:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/top-50-live-albums-of-all-time/122665/8 "2002-08-07T04:39:59Z")
Eurythmics Live: 1982-1989 ---
**Author:** ![Coriolanus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/coriolanus/32/18769_2.png) [@Coriolanus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Coriolanus)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2002, 5:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/top-50-live-albums-of-all-time/122665/9 "2002-08-07T05:07:02Z")
Grateful Dead: **Europe '72** Ted Nugent: **Double Live Gonzo** Neil Young: **Rust Never Sleeps** Yes: **Yessongs** Emerson, Lake and Palmer: **Ladies and Gentlemen** If we should limit ‘live albums’ to performances recorded at a single venue, or even a single show… one of my treasured vinyls is: John Coltrane: **Live at Birdland** ---
**Author:** ![hawthorne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/c89c15/32.png) [@hawthorne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hawthorne)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2002, 6:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/top-50-live-albums-of-all-time/122665/10 "2002-08-07T06:12:54Z")
Talking Heads **Stop Making Sense** “B.B” King **Live at the Regal** Paul Kelly **Live, May 1992** ---
**Author:** ![hawthorne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/c89c15/32.png) [@hawthorne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hawthorne)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2002, 6:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/top-50-live-albums-of-all-time/122665/11 "2002-08-07T06:21:06Z")
Oh, and Motorhead **No Sleep 'til Hammersmith** ---
**Author:** ![taggert](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/96bed5/32.png) [@taggert](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/taggert)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2002, 7:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/top-50-live-albums-of-all-time/122665/12 "2002-08-07T07:27:45Z")
Eric Clapton, Just One Night Allman Brothers, Live at the Fillmore East Grateful Dead, Live Dead ---
**Author:** ![Aro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b3f665/32.png) [@Aro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aro)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2002, 11:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/top-50-live-albums-of-all-time/122665/13 "2002-08-07T11:30:10Z")
**Pulse** by Pink Floyd. All live, all fantastic. **MTV Unplugged** , by Nirvana / Eric Clapton / Neil Young. ---
**Author:** ![nefertari](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/7bcc69/32.png) [@nefertari](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nefertari)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2002, 12:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/top-50-live-albums-of-all-time/122665/14 "2002-08-07T12:10:12Z")
MTV Unplugged Alice in Chains - even more poignant considering recent events. UnLEDed - It might be a travesty for ‘original’ fans but I _love_it! It’s new and different, and it’s the closest thing I’ll ever get to the real thing! Damn me being born into the wrong decade. nefertari. ---
**Author:** ![Fingolfin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/eada6e/32.png) [@Fingolfin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fingolfin)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2002, 12:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/top-50-live-albums-of-all-time/122665/15 "2002-08-07T12:13:49Z")
WTH?! What happened to my OP? Oh well, here it is again… The House of Blues ([hob.com](http://hob.com)) has released their Top 50 Live Albums of All-Time list. A superb list with some interesting selections. Judy Garland?! Kiss Alive?! My only grip is that The Last Waltz should be in the Top 5. Man, if I had half of these CDs in my collection I would be one happy camper. 😉 Go [Here](http://www.hob.com/onlinemusic/specials/topfifty/fullListing.asp) for the Top 50 Live Album page. Click the ‘Top 50 Radio’ button to hear a countdown of the albums (2 tracks from each album). Thoughts? Opinions? * * * \*\*01 Jimi Hendrix Band Of Gypsys (1970) _Born out of a contractual obligation with his record label, this crowning achievement in live music found Jimi Hendrix playing with a new set of musicians, helping create new boundaries, setting the standard for guitar playing even decades later._ 02 Various Artists Woodstock: Three Days of Peace & Music (25th Anniversary) (1995) _So The Doors didn’t make it to the show, and The Grateful Dead were almost electrocuted. At least it wasn’t Fred Durst on a piece of plywood doing it all for the nookie._ 03 Johnny Cash At Folsom Prison (1968) _As the first of two concert recordings that the original man in black put on for the inmates of prisons, this performance resonates with an amazing intimacy that Johnny Cash achieves by playing to the men as his peers rather than simply criminals._ 04 Bob Dylan Bootleg Series Vol. 4: Live 1966 Royal Albert Hall (1998) _Thirty-two years after the event, this former bootleg concert, legendary for Dylan’s raucous electric performance and the negative reaction it elicited from the politically charged crowd, finally appeared in a two CD set in 1998._ 05 Miles Davis The Complete Live At The Plugged Nickel 1965 (1965) _Two nights of unbridled jazz interpretations gave birth to this epic Miles Davis collection, originally released in abbreviated separate three volumes. The complete performances from both nights finally saw the light of day as an 8-disc box set released in 1995._ 06 B.B. King Live at the Regal (1965) _Listen to the crowd cry out blissfully as the King of Blues, B.B. King, reels his audience in with intimate banter and some of the most passionate blues delivery in the history of the form._ 07 Allman Brothers Band Live at Filmore East (1971) _Pushing the definition of a live show into the realm of profound experience, The Allman Brothers Band’s Live At Fillmore East is an album rock, jazz, funk and jam bands all tip their hat to._ 08 Bob Marley & The Wailers Babylon By Bus (1978) _“Jah! Rastafari! Ever living, ever fearful, ever sure, Salassi I the first…Yeah…Yeah…Rastafari, ever living…Rastaman vibration!” So says Robert Nesta Marley as the lights go down and the show begins._ 09 Nirvana Unplugged in New York (1994) _Candles, rocking chairs, a cracking voice and a song written by Leadbelly: these were the ingredients to the best live performance of the 1990s._ 10 The Who Live at Leeds (1970) _Most bands would kill for the creative evolution The Who’s seminal live recording Live at Leeds has undergone. Mirroring their own artistic growth, the second and third re-issues of one of the loudest concerts ever peel back the perceived skin of a band whose talents were limitless._ 11 The Band The Last Waltz (1978) 12 John Coltrane Live at Birdland (1963) 13 James Brown Live at the Apollo Vol. 1 (1963) 14 The Ramones It’s Alive (1979) 15 Aretha Franklin Live at Filmore West (1971) 16 Muddy Waters At Newport (1960) 17 Talking Heads Stop Making Sense (1984) 18 Otis Redding In Person at the Whisky A-Go-Go (1968) 19 U2 Under a Blood Red Sky (1983) 20 Peter Frampton Frampton Comes Alive (1976) 21 Little Feat Waiting For Columbus (1978) 22 Ray Charles Live (1973) 23 The Rolling Stones Get Your Ya-Ya’s Out (1970) 24 Stevie Ray Vaughan Live Alive (1986) 25 Grateful Dead Live Dead (1969) 26 The Doors Absolutely Live (1970) 27 John Lee Hooker Live at Newport (2002) 28 Etta James Rocks the House Live (1964) 29 Lynyrd Skynryd One More From the Road (1976) 30 Neil Young & Crazy Horse Live Rust (1979) 31 Joe Cocker Mad Dogs and Englishmen (1970) 32 Cream Live Cream, Vol. 1 (1970) 33 KISS Alive! (1975) 34 Cheap Trick Live at Budokan (1979) 35 Various Artists The Monterey International Pop Festival (1967) 36 Albert King Livewire/Blues Power (1968) 37 Sam Cooke Live At The Harlem Square Club (1985) 38 Frank Sinatra Sinatra at the Sands (1966) 39 Eric Clapton Unplugged (1992) 40 Elvis Presley Aloha From Hawaii (1973) 41 Ella Fitzgerald The Complete Ella In Berlin (1960) 42 Judy Garland Judy at Carnegie Hall (1961) 43 Billie Holiday Jazz at the Philharmonic (1946) 44 MC5 Kick Out the Jams (1969) 45 Curtis Mayfield Curtis Live! (1971) 46 Neil Diamond Hot August Night (1972) 47 John Coltrane Complete 1961 Village Vanguard Recordings (1961) 48 Bill Withers Live at Carnegie Hall (1973) 49 Elvis Costello Live at the El Mocambo (1978) 50 Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen Live From Deep in the Heart of Texas (1974)\*\* ---
**Author:** ![Mullinator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c2a13f/32.png) [@Mullinator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mullinator)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2002, 12:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/top-50-live-albums-of-all-time/122665/16 "2002-08-07T12:18:05Z")
Obligatory mention of **Frampton Comes Alive** ---
**Author:** ![TubaDiva](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tubadiva/32/507_2.png) [@TubaDiva](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TubaDiva)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2002, 1:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/top-50-live-albums-of-all-time/122665/17 "2002-08-07T13:24:12Z")
Gil Evans Orchestra: **Live at Sweet Basil, v. 1 and 2.** Jenny your humble TubaDiva who was there. ---
**Author:** ![Ukulele\_Ike](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/df788c/32.png) [@Ukulele\_Ike](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ukulele_Ike)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2002, 1:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/top-50-live-albums-of-all-time/122665/18 "2002-08-07T13:25:06Z")
Damn…forgot the Dylan **1966 Royal Albert Hall Concert**! Put that one up for me in the place of **Rock of Ages**. The Band’s on it, anyway, except for Levon. I didn’t realize we could pick jazz albums…I’ll say: **Stan Getz and J.J. Johnson at the Opera House** , Chicago 1957. Backed by Oscar Peterson, Herb Ellis, Ray Brown, and Connie Kay. Looks like it should just be a standard blowing session, but for some reason EVERYTHING came together that night…and this album has emerged as possibly the PERFECT live jazz album. Runner up: **Jazz at the Philharmonic 1946**. Featuring Charlie Parker, and rotating combos with Dizzy Gillespie, Howard McGhee, Buck Clayton, and Al Killian on trumpets, Lester Young, Coleman Hawkins, Willie Smith, and Charlie Ventura on saxophones, Mel Powell on piano, and Lee Young and Buddy Rich on drums. This was the first JATP show that Bird played…the ballad on the set is “I Can’t Get Started,” and Bird follows Lester Young’s solo. After two stunning choruses, the other horn players refuse to follow him, resulting in the first bass solo ever heard at JATP. Honorable mention: Sonny Rollins; **The Solo Album**. Recorded in concert in the Sculpture Garden of the Museum of Modern Art, New York, July 19, 1985. An entire program for tenor sax, no accompaniment. Nobody but Sonny would have the _cojones_ to pull THIS one off, and for close to an hour, too. ---
**Author:** ![Purd\_Werfect](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/e47c2d/32.png) [@Purd\_Werfect](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Purd_Werfect)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2002, 1:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/top-50-live-albums-of-all-time/122665/19 "2002-08-07T13:56:42Z")
Thin Lizzy - Live and Dangerous Tubes - What Do You Want From Live Kiss Comes Alive Rush - All the World’s a Stage I probably wouldn’t have any use for any of them anymore, except for perhaps the Tubes release, but they were all great live sets. Oh, and Sloan - 4 nights at the Palais Royale Portishead - Live at Roseland, NYC Both great efforts. ---
**Author:** ![Eonwe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eonwe/32/240_2.png) [@Eonwe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eonwe)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2002, 2:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/top-50-live-albums-of-all-time/122665/20 "2002-08-07T14:30:18Z")
I’ll second **The Band: Rock of Ages** and **Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band- Live 1975-1985** , and add **Simon and Garfunkel: The Concert in Central Park** [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/top-50-live-albums-of-all-time/122665.md?page=2)