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What was the L O U D E S T concert you ever attended?


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I can't tell which one was the loudest after almost 40 years, but they all happened back in the '70s.

The electric Miles Davis Group (November 1971) with Keith Jarrett on keyboard and organ, and Gary Bartz on saxes.

The Mahavishnu Orchestra (June 1973). I could hardly hear the engine of my beetle after the concert.

Weather Report (September 1978), the concert which was released on DVD as part of Forecast : Tomorrow box set. The Stadthalle Offenbach is shaped like a shell, and I had a seat in one of the rearmost rows. One felt like being pressed against the wall be the sound waves.

Stanley Clarke with George Duke at the Stadthalle Offenbach (late '70s). I had a seat to the very left in one of the front rows - just in front of a huge tower of enormous loudspeakers. I escaped to the gallery after some minutes, and left early.

I think the folks who controlled the sound at those times must have been deaf as doorposts.

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Probably quite different by comparison to others' experiences (I've never been one for huge concerts that are potentially loud just by looking at the lineup on the poster), but the loudest concert I remember and still ENJOYED (I may have forgotten others that were loud but not all that enjoyable for their loudness) was DICK DALE playing a gig at full steam in a relatively small cellar club in my town (c. 1997). Turning your surf guitar way up AND then adding some (maybe to connect to those Indian tribal spirits he was into?? :crazy: ) sure was quite a handful to digest in such a relatively small setting.

I've been to other enjoyable concerts that left my ears ringing afterwards but the way I remember it this was in a decibel class of its own ...

Edited by Big Beat Steve
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The Mahavishnu Orchestra (June 1973). I could hardly hear the engine of my beetle after the concert.

I saw Mahavishnu on that tour in June '73 too - at Bristol, Colston Hall. Not just loud but long!

If my memory serves me correctly King Crimson at the same venue 3 months earlier were even louder. But I was sat at the front, right next to the right hand speakers.

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Due to significant hearing loss at a young age, I didn't go to a lot of concerts when I was actually interested in rock, plus you couldn't have dragged me to a metal show so I'm going to go with something somewhat unexpected:

George Coleman Octet at Smoke, summer of 2000, I think. Its such a small room for an octet to play at full blast. I especially recall that Gary Smulyan was standing next to Jim Rotondi and on every part that called for trumpet, Smulyan played one handed, with the hand closest to Rotondi trying desperately to cover his ears.

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Foo Fighters & Weezer at the Pepsi center a couple years back...

Gave my wife chest pains.

I think it was that concert that helped me decide that I had probably seen enough Foo Fighters concerts...but then Dave & co. still continue to amaze me. Perhaps I should have tried their unplugged tour...

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A few summers ago we saw Cheap Trick opening for i forget who. They were so loud i had to keep checking

my earplugs i thought they fell out.

Also when i saw P-Funk 10 years ago in Boston they had like 15 guitarist on stage and played for like 3 plus hours by the end

of the show it sounded like white noise ( it was before i started wearing earplugs ). To this day i am convinced that my right ear was damaged a little.

But the best part of that show was that from that day on i wear earplugs to all concerts.

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Herbie Mann! Sonny Sharrock drove people to the exits! (Roy Ayers had just left the group, so Sonny got plenty of solo space.) (Miroslav Vitous & Bruno Carr rounded out that edition.) And the Dead (on a triple bill - Velvet Underground and the Fugs opened) (those were the days!) - it was at Pittsburgh's old Stanley Theater (maybe 1968?), it felt like you were on a busy airplane runway.

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Oh, this is an easy one: David Torn and Prezens (Tim Berne, Craig Taborn, Gerald Cleaver) at Ann Arbor's Firefly Club last night (the last concert of Edgefest 2008). I swear to God, this concert sounded n o t h i n g like the ECM recording of the same name. It was like Last Exit with a Fender Rhodes. One big hour-long wall of white noise over pounding rhythms with no let-up.

God-damn that concert was loud.

Fun show, though. :tup

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I swear to God, this concert sounded n o t h i n g like the ECM recording of the same name.

I don't know if the Cowboy Junkies are still active, but they were big in the early 1990s and played very restrained, etheral music. Maybe even a forerunner of mumblecore. But then live, they turned it up 11 notches. (I saw them opening for Bruce Hornesby). They weren't the loudest I've ever seen by far, but perhaps the largest gap in volume between recorded and live. I loved the live show, and if they put a fraction of that energy into their recordings, I would probably have them all.

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Girls School & Motorhead at the Royal Manor, North Brunswick, NJ sometime around 81-82.

ouch.

Man, I would have KILLED to have seen that show!!!!

Ha! I knew you'd have a comment, the Manor was right in the neighborhood I grew up in. :lol:

Another show I remember for being pretty bad was Deep Purple at the Spectrum in Philly during the Perfect Stranger's tour. We got up to the 2nd row for the entire concert and my right ear was in line with Blackmore's amp. That ear stopped working for at least 24 hours.

I went these shows with the same woman - her hearing was shot from playing drums for years. It was pretty rough playing in a band with her...also way too loud.

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I didn't attend the concert, but one night I was playing a lounge gig in Dallas (mid-1980's) and two of these guys walk in to the bar:

manowar.jpg

I had never heard of their band, but they told me that they were listed in the Guinness Book as being the loudest band ever. Later, I looked it up, and sure enough...

I think they may also be in the Guinness Book for "Gayest Album Art".

I think THIS should have been organissimo's album cover, except with you guys in Biker Shorts

(did I say that out loud)

:crazy:

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The thing about Miles and loudness in his comeback period was the prevelence of low, low frequencies from Marcus Miller. I recall a 1981 concert in Chicago at the Auditorium Theater during which, part way through, I was alarmingly overcome by a sudden wave of deep depression (utterly novel to me). A while later I mentioned this to Martin Williams, who said he'd had a similar experience with that band and added that a CIA guy he knew had told him that the CIA had determined that large doses of ultra low frequency sounds (below the level of audibility) can cause sudden onsets of depression, and that the CIA had (or planned to) make use of these techniques.

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As far as I can remember The Clash but it was loud mostly because of venue & where I was at relative to the speakers. I think the most hearing damage I ever had from an event was at a local go-kart grand prix.

I think the "winner" will be the posters who saw My Bloody Valentine on their recent tour as the band was supposedly playing at 130 db & beyond (and handing out earplugs as you walked in.)

Edited by Quincy
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The loudest good concert I've attended was Ronald Shannon Jackson and the Decoding Society at the Caravan of Dreams--Vernon Reid on guitar, Melvin Gibbs and Bruce Johnson on bass guitars, Zane Massey saxophone, Henry Scott trumpet, Akbar Ali violin. The horns and violin players each had their own Fender amps, in addition of course to Vernon Reid's set-up and the twin bass guitars of Gibbs and Johnson. This was way louder than Ornette and Prime Time, who played the same venue multiple times.

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The thing about Miles and loudness in his comeback period was the prevelence of low, low frequencies from Marcus Miller. I recall a 1981 concert in Chicago at the Auditorium Theater during which, part way through, I was alarmingly overcome by a sudden wave of deep depression (utterly novel to me). A while later I mentioned this to Martin Williams, who said he'd had a similar experience with that band and added that a CIA guy he knew had told him that the CIA had determined that large doses of ultra low frequency sounds (below the level of audibility) can cause sudden onsets of depression, and that the CIA had (or planned to) make use of these techniques.

So can we expect jazz rock to be deployed in the war on terror? :wacko:

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Ted Nugent, AC/DC and the Scorpions, Spectrum in Philadelphia, 1979.

Scorpions had that album out with the guy and girl in the backseat and gum stuck to the girls boob and guys hand.

AC/DC was the Highway to Hell tour- with Bon Scott.

Ted Nugent was the Weekend Warriors tour.

THE LOUDEST !!

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