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Worst Live Performance?

#81
SMILEYSIXX said:
A7X... The headliners of the show were them and Flogging Molly. I didn't have high hopes for Flogging Molly and intended to leave early if they were last, but they were first and absolutely amazed me. Then A7X came out... they were just so unbelievably boring...

Oh, and Breaking Benjamin. They headlined a concert in my hometown and... it was just... not good, at all.
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I've seen flogging molly a fair few times, and on at least 3 of those occasions, the bass player has passed me a tinnie of Guinness. Bass player equivilant of the spidey sense? :bassist:

They have always kicked ass when I've seen them.


Worst band, without a doubt has to be Rancid. I used to be a huge Rancid fan, certainly one of the reasons I wanted to start playing bass 9-10 years back. Saw them in 2003, and they were just terrible.

I've heard high school bands sounding much tighter than that. All the support bands just blew them out the water.

Worst audience had to be a few months back. I went to see Sick of it All playing, and while I admit, it isn't going to be for everyone, they are one hell of a live band. They were flat out amazing, right into it as they always are. The kids (well, teenagers) who were clearly there to see AFI just sort of stood there jaw dropped. There was about 30-40 people who had clearly gone there to see SOIA and were enjoying it, but we kept getting dodgy looks from the AFI fans :rolleyes:

Youth of today, I just don't know!

I also expected AFI to be terrible, I saw them in 2001 and loved the show and was a big fan at that point, but when the albums after the Art of Drowning came out, it just didn't appeal to me anymore. Luckily they played a huge range of tunes, old and new, live and really nailed it :)
 
#83
Led Zep

1975 Seattle Colisuem.
Wrong notes, 20 minute drum solo, 20 minute guitar solo. Complete snoozefest, most boring band ever.
 
#84
Eddy Money, Winterland sometime in the mid 70's opening up for Journey (pre-Steve Perry).

The EM band was total joke. Both Eddy and his band sucked. Eddy was like a drunk Jagger wanna-be, doing his little spins and twirls, usually ending up facing the wrong direction and awkwardly off balance. I mean it was BAD...... we wondered why Bill Graham would torture the Journey crowd with a bogus act like that. That's about the closest I've seen to a band getting booed off a stage.

A couple years or so later, I'm out on the road in B.F. Iowa or somewhere, and I hear "Two tickets to Paradise" on the car radio, and the DJ mentions the name Eddy Money. This can't be the same act from San Francisco, I thought to myself. It was.

Blew me away that he could score national success.
 
#85
Spolodaface said:
Prog-metal band Baroness was probably my worst live experience so far. Not Baroness themselves, they were amazing live - perhaps themselves one of the best acts i've seen live but their support was abominable. No support was announced at all before the gig so I sorta expected it to be an average metal band, I mean with a band like Baroness you are going to have a mix of people in the audience so it could go any way. Unfortunately it went Metalcore, or should I say Medio-core.

Supporting band, "SonDura" played about 45 minutes of cheesy melodic refrains to a blank-faced staring audience -one or two people at the back tapping their foot while the rest sortof looked at an invisible clock behind the stage, waiting for the headliners to come on. It was really, really awful - completely misjudged audience.

Half-way through the set there was a technical issue with the guitar and the singer attempted to rouse the audience with adolescent cries of "are you having a ****in good time?" with absoultely no reply from the audience (this was a sold-out gig and everyone had arrived early to get a good spot for Baroness). A few minutes later someone shouted "BASS SOLO!". The bassist looked confused and still visibly overweight and just stood there. Another heckler shouted "Seinfeld". Yeah, totally fail evening for the support :)

I looked them up on the internet the next day and it turned out all their other gigs were playing to pre-teens in high-schools.

Go figure.
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hahah i'm sorry for your troubles. But Baroness kicked butt right? They always do.
 
#88
well this might sound strange but i saw dinosaur jr. and built to spill recently in glasgow

built to spill were amazing

dinousaur werent

lou was sick, j. mascis guitar OVERPOWERED EVERYTHING, it was so bad that i was right infront of the drums.... i could feel them but not hear them. plus the levels on j mascis pedals were just all over the shop

but the thing that anoys me the most

J. MASCIS WASNT USING HIS PURPLE JAZZMASTER

altho i still maintain reel big fish are crap live
 
#89
Worst I've been to was Rush at the Molson Amphitheatre in Toronto 2008.

Living in New Zealand means the opportunities to see Rush are very limited. I was living in Toronto and they were playing, so I bought a good ticket ($CAD100) and was pumped. Arrived 20mins before the show was due to start and had to queue to collect my pre-purchased ticket. I had to queue with people buying tickets, which took ages.
Got to my seat and Rush were already into their 3rd or 4th song. Bad start. But it got worse. I can't make any comment on the quality of musicianship, because all I could hear was drums and vocals. The best way I could describe the sound was the same as if it was a mile away across a lake. It had that reflective, boomy sound. And I couldn't hear the bass. Who goes to a Rush concert to hear the vocals but not the bass?!?! Neil's drum solo was pretty awesome though.

Worst ever venue, and ruined my one and only possible chance to see Rush. I seriously couldn't hear the bass :crying:
 
#90
i_got_a_mohawk said:
I've seen flogging molly a fair few times, and on at least 3 of those occasions, the bass player has passed me a tinnie of Guinness. Bass player equivilant of the spidey sense? :bassist:

They have always kicked ass when I've seen them.


Worst band, without a doubt has to be Rancid. I used to be a huge Rancid fan, certainly one of the reasons I wanted to start playing bass 9-10 years back. Saw them in 2003, and they were just terrible.

I've heard high school bands sounding much tighter than that. All the support bands just blew them out the water.

Worst audience had to be a few months back. I went to see Sick of it All playing, and while I admit, it isn't going to be for everyone, they are one hell of a live band. They were flat out amazing, right into it as they always are. The kids (well, teenagers) who were clearly there to see AFI just sort of stood there jaw dropped. There was about 30-40 people who had clearly gone there to see SOIA and were enjoying it, but we kept getting dodgy looks from the AFI fans :rolleyes:

Youth of today, I just don't know!

I also expected AFI to be terrible, I saw them in 2001 and loved the show and was a big fan at that point, but when the albums after the Art of Drowning came out, it just didn't appeal to me anymore. Luckily they played a huge range of tunes, old and new, live and really nailed it :)
Click to expand...

Sick of it All (The Stone, SF) w/Biohazard and Fear Factory - The BEST show I have ever been to (and I am not really into that music anymore.) Crowd, energy, music - amazing. Mosh on the stage, stage diving, singing with Evan from Biohazard. I must admit Sick of it All may have been the better of the two - they were both outstanding though.)

Note: Fear Factory one of the worst.

Worst: Kiss, Cheap Trick (both touring w/Aerosmith - Aerosmith was excellent both times though and I am not a fan) and Fear Factory (above).
 
#91
Perhaps Yellowcard on tour with Blue October. The singer seemed to need to fit an F-Bomb into every sentence. The sound/playing wasn't bad, but the "angst" was just annoying. The other time I saw them, at the same venue (Frank Erwin Center in Austin), it had been just fine, and the talk between songs seemed a bit less attention-begging.
 
#93
Stevie Wonder in 1998... played a free show in Winter Park, Florida for some school. He showed up an hour late and half in the bag drunk. He only had a drummer on stage with him. In between songs he made the crowd know that "I'm not here for you, you're here for me." I thought, "this guy's a douche" and I left.
 
#94
Beginner Bass said:
Perhaps Yellowcard on tour with Blue October. The singer seemed to need to fit an F-Bomb into every sentence. The sound/playing wasn't bad, but the "angst" was just annoying.
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I won tickets to see Poison and Skid Row, and while I`m not really a fan of either band I still thought it could be fun. Long story short, the singer for Skid Row dropped the F-Bomb just about every other word. I left the concert not even 10 minutes into it because of how annoying it was.
 
#95
Years ago I took my ex-wife to see Shawn Colvin at an outdoor ampitheater (Wolf Trap). I kid you not - she spent 45 minutes B.S.ing with the audience while she attempted to tune her acoustic guitar. I actually got up and walked out. This was like being waterboarded.
 
#96
jmattbassplaya said:
I won tickets to see Poison and Skid Row, and while I`m not really a fan of either band I still thought it could be fun. Long story short, the singer for Skid Row dropped the F-Bomb just about every other word. I left the concert not even 10 minutes into it because of how annoying it was.
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Yeah. Blue October did the same. I missed the start of the band before them, and I think we only caught the last song of them (Shiny Toy Guns), so I can't speak for them. But it wouldn't shock me. It just sort of has the same effect of an author using a 20-letter word in each paragraph. It just seems like they're trying to detract attention from the rest of the performance.
 
#97
The worst concert I have ever been to/ or walked out of was Black Sabbath in the early 80's with Dio.
The worst sound ever. You could not distinguish what song they were playing.
I have never walked out on a show before or since. The whole group I was with just walked out, it was so bad.
 
#98
Many years ago in Atlanta: Pagan Holiday. It was actually on the night of the Winter Solstice, so the date and the band name were a match. A friend suggested we go to the Cotton Club and see this show.

We get there, and the chick lead singer is dressed in thermal longjohns. The chick bass player is dressed in BDSM leather with the requisite leather driving cap. I forget what the drummer's deal was.

Well, the noise commenced. It was somewhat laughable. We stayed for a little while, but when the lead singer/guitarist whipped out ah, ah, how can I say this in a PG way? A toy? A man part simulator? And she started hitting the guitar strings with it.

Us: exit ASAP. Just awful in every way imaginable.
 
#99
Antipodean said:
Worst I've been to was Rush at the Molson Amphitheatre in Toronto 2008.

Living in New Zealand means the opportunities to see Rush are very limited. I was living in Toronto and they were playing, so I bought a good ticket ($CAD100) and was pumped. Arrived 20mins before the show was due to start and had to queue to collect my pre-purchased ticket. I had to queue with people buying tickets, which took ages.
Got to my seat and Rush were already into their 3rd or 4th song. Bad start. But it got worse. I can't make any comment on the quality of musicianship, because all I could hear was drums and vocals. The best way I could describe the sound was the same as if it was a mile away across a lake. It had that reflective, boomy sound. And I couldn't hear the bass. Who goes to a Rush concert to hear the vocals but not the bass?!?! Neil's drum solo was pretty awesome though.

Worst ever venue, and ruined my one and only possible chance to see Rush. I seriously couldn't hear the bass :crying:
Click to expand...

I saw Incubus there in 08 and they kicked ass. The sound was really good. It must have been the sound guys screwing up. Blink 182 played there with Weezer and again it was awesome.


MY worst concert? Brand New at the Kool Haus in Toronto. Brand New was fine, but the opening acts were ALL screamo. And the volume seemed to be at 11 for everyone. Terrible. I had no idea where the guitar ended and the vocals began. The drums seemed to be getting picked up in someone else's mic.
 
#100
The Prodigy on an open field...the didn't mix in the bass properly...in other words you could not hear the bass or anything to recognize what the song was.

Metallica in an arena. No sound definition, too much bass. You couldn't hear the solos, or the guitar or the vocals
 

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