loudest band you've ever seen

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into the void at the provincial lounge back in 98, i think... my ears rang for 3 days

though i hear bailter space at the same venue just a few months later may have been even louder...

― chris andrews (fraew), Saturday, 29 April 2006 00:42 (eighteen years ago) link

Jucifer, yep. And it might've just been where I was standing, but I felt the effects of The Hives/ Reigning Sound a good two days after the fact.

― Will (will), Saturday, 29 April 2006 00:45 (eighteen years ago) link

The Who - Boston Garden, early 70's: insanely loud
ELO - Providence Civic Center circa 1976: louder

I imagine their volume levels were somewhat tame by today's standards.

― jim wentworth (wench), Saturday, 29 April 2006 00:48 (eighteen years ago) link

No Means NO circa 1995 were very loud. Animal Collective this year were also quite loud.

― The Boy Who Cried YSI? (Freud Junior), Saturday, 29 April 2006 01:21 (eighteen years ago) link

Like it needs another mention, but still.

My Bloody Valentine (at Hammerjacks! ... in Baltimore!)

― bkjj40a (bkjj40a), Saturday, 29 April 2006 01:26 (eighteen years ago) link

Loud
Bobetomagus
Melvins
Slayer

No so Loud
High Rise
Motorhead

― brg30 (brg30), Saturday, 29 April 2006 02:34 (eighteen years ago) link

Loop.

'Twas meh.

― There's a Guy Works Down the Chip Shop Swears He's Elvish (noodle vague), Saturday, 29 April 2006 02:44 (eighteen years ago) link

Monster Magnet circa 1994. Felt like being beaten.

― Bryan (Bryan), Saturday, 29 April 2006 02:46 (eighteen years ago) link

Embarrassing to admit, but the Get Up Kids in 1999. Also, Ryan Adams in 2001 at the same venue (damn you Agora Ballroom!). I was standing behind the soundboard for the latter show, and everything was peaked in the red the entire time...awful...what crappy ways to lose my hearing.

― Jam (1020am), Saturday, 29 April 2006 03:09 (eighteen years ago) link

A tie between CM Von Hausswolff and Zbigniew Karkowski, both at LAMPO in Chicago. They each had their strategies: CMVH had bright red flood lights pointed at the audience that created a totally saturated visual field to go with the high amplitude noise, overwhelming the senses...and ZK focused on pitches that would resonate with different spaces and objects in the room, making things vibrate and beat, with standing waves everywhere. Both shows where totally immersive and disorienting.

― TiPoIv, Saturday, 29 April 2006 03:27 (eighteen years ago) link

I always gauge loudness by the length of time my ears take to recover.

Kitchens of Distinction - Ears ringing for two days.

Test Department - Ears ringing ringing for three days.

― Jack Battery-Pack (Jack Battery-Pack), Saturday, 29 April 2006 04:58 (eighteen years ago) link

not a band, but just one man - idm idol Hrvatski

was like 10 drills digging into the brain
excess alcohol and substances were of little help

― nique (nique), Saturday, 29 April 2006 05:58 (eighteen years ago) link

Perhaps Kevin Drumm described it best with his album, Sheer Hellish Miasma

― TiPoIv, Saturday, 29 April 2006 06:33 (eighteen years ago) link

Not to derail the thread, but has anyone been to a show where speakers *actually* blew out Back-To-The-Future-style?

― TiPoIv, Saturday, 29 April 2006 06:35 (eighteen years ago) link

Killing Joke, 1981
Glenn Branca, 1982
Dinosaur Jr, 1989

― Dave Segal (Da ve Segal), Saturday, 29 April 2006 06:46 (eighteen years ago) link

Toshimaru Nakamura blew out a monitor speaker at the Purcell Room a few years back, it was smoking but not flaming. That was insanely high frequencies rather than volume though.

Loudest shows I ever saw - Manowar, Motorhead, Merzbow, Sunn O))), Swans.

― Matt #2 (Matt #2), Saturday, 29 April 2006 07:02 (eighteen years ago) link

Public Enemy @ Bumbershoot 2004

― Rodney's motives are beyond the comprehension of men (R. J. Greene), Saturday, 29 April 2006 08:00 (eighteen years ago) link

Sonic's Rendezvous Band 1977-80 -- so loud your ears'd be ringing and your food would taste funny the whole next day. Like hearing the Who or Led Zeppelin in a bar. Louder than early Sonic Youth and Swans PUT TOGETHER (and I saw SY/S and Branca too in 1982 so this ain't speculation.) Last year in a New Yorker interview Patti Smith mention in passing that Fred re-wired his blond Marshall stack so it was even louder and I was like "ah that explains it." He was called "SONIC" for a reason!

The Who in 1975 were pretting f'in loud too, I was in the very back of Riverfront Coliseum where the sounds rezound off the ceiling.

Saw John Cale's Sabotage tour myself, which I remember as a great show but not super-loud though he did have a "metal" gtrist IIRC.

― m coleman (lovebug starski), Saturday, 29 April 2006 09:56 (eighteen years ago) link

I recently saw Amusement Parks On Fire supporting Spoon in Manchester and they were really fucking loud. I think they'd asked to be turned way the fuck up because their songs are shite though.

Loudest good band: Primal Scream seconded.

― yer mam! (yer mam!), Saturday, 29 April 2006 10:34 (eighteen years ago) link

My Bloody Valentine live at the Olympia (Paris).

― snowballing (snowballing), Saturday, 29 April 2006 10:57 (eighteen years ago) link

MBV in Glasgow 1992, I think my internal organs are still vibrating.

― dr lulu (dr lulu), Saturday, 29 April 2006 11:00 (eighteen years ago) link

bailter space in 1990, student union, wellington

― Good Dog (Good Dog), Saturday, 29 April 2006 11:08 (eighteen years ago) link

oh yeah, Metallica And Justice for All tour, Logan Campbell Center, Auckland

― Good Dog (Good Dog), Saturday, 29 April 2006 11:12 (eighteen years ago) link

Radiohead,1996. Had to see a doctor afterwards.

― superbadger (superbadger), Saturday, 29 April 2006 11:24 (eighteen years ago) link

on the might of princes.

― Blue Filters (Gilkannon), Saturday, 29 April 2006 16:06 (eighteen years ago) link

I didn't think Monster Magnet were that loud when I saw them (96 i think).

I should also mention Big Sugar as being notable loud.

― Thermo Thinwall (Thermo Thinwall), Saturday, 29 April 2006 16:34 (eighteen years ago) link

i saw iggy pop in providence right after he put out 'beat 'em up', which was basically a slipknot album made by iggy. i went to a bar afterwards and felt like my eyes wouldn't focus. i literally could barely hear a thing for about a day, and i think my hearing is kind of fucked ever since.

however, it's still one of my favorite shows i've ever been to.

― Emily B (Emily B), Saturday, 29 April 2006 16:48 (eighteen years ago) link

I'm surprised nobody mentioned Atari Teenage Riot. I have been to alot of shows and I think they were the loudest, definetely could have taken out everyone's eardrum if they wanted to.

― sigmundooze, Sunday, 30 April 2006 01:32 (eighteen years ago) link

I remember finding Sonic Youth particularly loud (early 90s). That may have partly been because I just wasn't it it.

― Rockist_Scientist (RSLaRue), Sunday, 30 April 2006 02:04 (eighteen years ago) link

-ministry
-neurosis
-my bloody valentine

― Mr. Surly, Sunday, 30 April 2006 20:33 (eighteen years ago) link

I think I said this on an earlier thread but the very loudest show I withstood was seeing Prong in a small club on Halloween back in the early 90s. Prong had a huge backline they probably used opening for bigger bands in Europe and it was ungodly loud.

Sugar was really loud, as was a Nashville Pussy show I saw a year or so ago in a small club. I've seen bunches of hard guitar shows, but those two stick out in my head along with the Prong gig.

Tricky had the most ungodly loud bass sound I have ever heard live. It did not have that high mids cutting into your head like a hard rock show, but the bass literally would come in waves and rattle your body.

― Earl Nash (earlnash), Sunday, 30 April 2006 20:47 (eighteen years ago) link

"I'm surprised nobody mentioned Atari Teenage Riot."

The weirdest thing happened at the ATR show I saw in Chicago. Granted it was effing LOUD - but also incredibly physical, vis a vis the "mosh pit" to use the parlance of our times. When we exited said pit, we made sure all limbs were intact and my friend Christina found she had a new pager on her belt (?!!!) She had somehow hit someone, or jumped simultaneously with someone in a way that unclipped the pager from them and re-clipped it onto her. Very strange. Any Chicago people remember loosing a pager in 2000?

― TiPoIv, Sunday, 30 April 2006 21:02 (eighteen years ago) link

I've posted this before on one of the other loud threads, but my top three are still...

Black Flag (five-piece line up with Dez) somewhere in downtown LA.
Curve (Cuckoo tour at the Palace)

and believe it or not... Yes (90125 tour at the Forum)

― LOL Thomas (Chris Barrus), Sunday, 30 April 2006 21:27 (eighteen years ago) link

OMG you know who is way louder than is expected of them?...THE ROOTS. Dude needs to not have so much high end on the rhodes though, it's like KREEEEEEEEEEANG.

― nklshs, Sunday, 30 April 2006 22:22 (eighteen years ago) link

pansonic (nee panasonic), by a mile

― jk_ (jk@gabba), Sunday, 30 April 2006 22:29 (eighteen years ago) link

I was just about to say the Roots, actually. They played on campus here at Fordham yesterday and the ringing in my ears just stopped.

― Maciej Kasperowicz (Maciej), Sunday, 30 April 2006 22:40 (eighteen years ago) link

the dirtbombs
babyland

― gear (gear), Sunday, 30 April 2006 22:52 (eighteen years ago) link

thw white stripes were painfully loud at the tsongas arena during the elephant tour.

― AaronK (AaronK), Sunday, 30 April 2006 22:55 (eighteen years ago) link

Unsane

― Aaron A, Sunday, 30 April 2006 23:04 (eighteen years ago) link

Swans. Though I did love them the Children of God era show I saw was really louder than necessary. Although it occurs to me MBV were loud too. In that case, though I had the luxury of being in a bigger club and therefore, not as close to the stage.

― honorary joy division roadie (Bimble...), Sunday, 30 April 2006 23:12 (eighteen years ago) link

Leftfield were incredibly loud on the Leftism tour.

― Brigadier Lethbridge-Pfunkboy (Kerr), Sunday, 30 April 2006 23:14 (eighteen years ago) link

MIA. Painfully loud bass courtesy of Diplo's little laptop, which pretty much ruined the concert for me; you could barely hear MIA herself in the intervals between the bass blasts. Earpugs didn't help. I moved to the back of the club, then eventually another floor of the club. and it was still painful.

MIA was followed by LCD Soundsystem, at appropriate volume.

― dee eff (dee eff), Monday, 1 May 2006 00:00 (eighteen years ago) link

Live Skull - maybe not THE LOUDEST, but THE LOUDEST TREBLE - ARRRRGGGGHHHHHHHHH: BRILLO EARS - 3 DAYS RINGING!!!

― Paul (scifisoul), Monday, 1 May 2006 00:05 (eighteen years ago) link

Husker Du circa "Diane".

― twoheadedboy, Monday, 1 May 2006 05:13 (eighteen years ago) link

Wire in 2004
Sunn 0))) in 2005

― S- (sgh), Monday, 1 May 2006 05:17 (eighteen years ago) link

Aside from the obvious - Lightning Bolt in a tiny club, Thrones in a
tiny basement, etc., nothing has pierced the eardrums like Prurient.

― shieldforyoureyes, Monday, 1 May 2006 07:02 (eighteen years ago) link

Tie for first: Jesus Lizard/Sonic Youth, 1990, and (o rly? ya rly) The Go-Go's, 1984.

― pixel farmer (Rock Hardy), Monday, 1 May 2006 11:35 (eighteen years ago) link

http://makemyday.free.fr/goldart3.jpg

― m coleman (lovebug starski), Monday, 1 May 2006 11:55 (eighteen years ago) link

teenage fanclub, early 1990 - first hearing damage i ever suffered, *sigh*.

― something less threatening (heywood), Monday, 1 May 2006 14:47 (eighteen years ago) link

Harmony Rockets (Mercury Rev's free noise alter ego) at the Brooklyn Anchorage. That band, that space, two great tastes that went deafening together. I think I may still have permanent hearing damage, but I wouldn'd trade it for the world.

― Alone, Jealous and SSRI'd (kate), Monday, 1 May 2006 14:51 (eighteen years ago) link

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