bands you stopped liking after you saw them live

The new answer: A few years ago, I went to see Leon Russell in Santa Cruz. I had always loved Leon Russell's music, mostly from listening to my mom's copy of 1970's Leon Russell. At this concert, just like Boston, he made no attempts at all to connect with the audience. He just launched into note perfect renditions of his songs but with no emotion at all. We left after the first set and I felt like my big statue of Leon Russell had just been pulled over in front of me. Very disappointing.
(I still love his and Bonnie Bramlett's Superstar!)

Ditto.

Seeing them at All Tomorrow's Parties in Long Beach a couple of years ago was particularly heinous. They'd finish a pretty, sad pop song, and then the Marty guy would scream into the mic things like "Yo, Dog, We here in the LBC! Snoop Dizzle and The Shizzins! LBC, Muthafucka!" in an exaggerated accent. The songwriter would stand there awkwardly (though seemingly amused) as the other guy would riff on things like "Funny Hip Hop Voices" and "Lord of the Rings." It totally and completely turned me off of the band.

I have to say that Dinosaur Jr. was terrible live. First of all, J Mascis is a total dick with no personality, unless his personality is being a dickhead. Second, it was incredibly loud. I mean dangerously loud. I've never been to a show that loud, and I'm young and I have been to a lot of shows. I saw some college girl actually start crying. It was so loud that you couldn't make out the instruments, and you couldn't even understand which song they were playing. Interestingly enough, one of my friends fell asleep standing up at that show. And he's a huge Dinosaur Jr. fan.

that's probably otm.
Half the bands I see don't seem to know how to put on a good show and that's why I quit going to these newbie indie gigs.

Isis seconded. Boring awful droneage. Though, I can't say I was a big fan in the first place, but now I just won't listen to them.
Bloc Party seconded. They were such a disappointment, I guess because this was before all the hype and the "Helicopter" sampling and I didn't really know much about them except for the fact that their songs were fun and the drumming was pretty good. But their show was so dreadful. For them I always refer back to this review on TMT: "They suck live. And because of that, in my eyes, they basically now suck. Good album be damned, Bloc Party sucks more than anything has ever sucked before."

Architecture in Helsinki. Meh.
And I can't take the Liars at all, now. too much satan for me.

Also, Black Heart Procession thirded. I paid 12 bucks to see them with the Castanets. The Castanets never showed, and 2 of the 5 BHP members were missing. All the singer could say was "guess they had somewhere better to be". Thanks for coming to our show tonight, we piss all over your town!

-- mox twelve

I think I had the opposite reaction. I only really liked their most recent album and even then wasn't particularly blown away by it but after seeing them live I was converted.

I don't get this sentiment (and others like it on this thread). If you're not going to like a band's music because you find someone to be an ass, you'd be eliminating most, if not all, of the greats. Who gives a fuck if they aren't very nice people? Why does it affect your appreciate of their work? To extend it to other domains, many, if not the majority, of great painters, writers, filmmakers, etc were probably assholes. But, you know, Pablo Picasso was never called an asshole (even if his behavior was as assholish as it can be).

Besides, the dude from Islands doesn't even come off that way. He actually seems to want to perform. What I find intolerable in live acts is when they seem to not want to be there and have disdain for their audience. But that's something else.

Maybe in your town. Out here he was more interested in talking down to us "kids" than playing. I secretly enjoy that brand of arrogance when the rockstar has the music to back it up...

But kornrulez got there first.

Meek Mill

four tet bored ppl itt 13 years ago, and did the same to me the other night. so samey blah

I don't know if seeing Devo killed my interest in them but it was around the same time. The band was the classic lineup plus the newer drummer but only the drummer had any energy. Mark M especially seemed to be going through the motions

Broken Social Scene made me loathe them after a hideously overlong self-indulgent gig about 13 years ago. The whole audience seemed to be checking their watches.

another vote for destroyer. one reason might be that the tracks i like from the albums are usually very long and often instrummentals and he doesn't play them live at least not when i saw him. to be honest they are not very concert compatible. most striking example: the laziest river.

Swans. I was a big fan up to the 1997 "farewell" tour, wasn't overexcited by the 2010 reunion and what remained of my interest soon evaporated after seeing a couple of shows at which I was increasingly irritated by the overlong, formless "epics" and Gira's increasingly messianic demeanour.

gah @ increasingly x2

Believe it or not The Cure on the "Wild Mood Swings" tour. Longtime fan and had seen them several times over the years prior beginning in '85 but wow...this was awful: an arena in New Jersey, a crowd full of pre-teen Hot Topic goths and their parents, Robert Smith in a NJ Devils jersey (!!) drunk out of his gourd running through a bunch of stuff I had and still have little interest in. It was a birthday gift ticket and I was waiting for * at least* a little pre-"Wish" action but it wasn't happening. I split early and didn't listen to them again until maybe 10 years ago.

Mercury Rev. I was going off them anyway but seeing their preening prissy preciousness in the flesh was the last straw.

Was this pre- or post-Deserter's Songs?

Definitely post!

Saw a Palace Brothers gig at the Borderline in London in '94, not 100% his fault but he was so purposefully quiet and weedy and the crowd were hugely rude and chatty that the whole thing was completely surreal. Took over a decade to realise I liked his music.

I still like Lloyd Cole, but my liking for him took a definite nosedive after I'd seen him live a couple of times, with his arrogant between-song banter and unfunny attempts at humour.

The other thing about Mercury Rev is they were supported by Flaming Lips - before everybody got bored with their shtick - and I've never seen an act so comprehensively upstaged by their support ever.

Disagree with a bunch of these, who live shows I've really enjoyed (Cake, Olivia Tremor Control, The Fall).

But I definitely have a few bands whose albums I stopped enjoying completely because of the live show:
- Slint - jesus what a slog that show was
- The Go Team - that Thunder Lightning album did not work live at all
- Four Tet - stopped going to laptop shows after this
- That band who sings "on every occasion, i'll be ready for a funeral"

Real Estate and Alvvays are the exceptions to rule here. Both shows were inexcusably dull, but it hasn't stopped me from loving the albums.

Cloudland Canyon. The first time I saw them live the lead guy got pissed off for some unknown reason and they cut their set short after like 3 songs. The second time I saw them one of their synths broke and they again cut the set short because they didn’t know how to get it working again.

lol @ Broken Social Scene. I caught a "secret" bar show in Toronto not too long after Craig's experience... so we were there for long and indulgent and I enjoyed it... however I'm not sure I've listened to them a single second since. It was just enough of that for my life. Also I think soon after there was that teen romance movie where the plot was based around making it to their show? Could've been partly this too.

Can't really think of a more direct answer on this topic. It's more typical that I'd get into a new band that has great live shows and get turned off by their first album.

From reading thread, got to stick up for Deerhoof - one of the best acts I've ever seen!

Buffalo Tom (especially after support act Bettie Serveert was great)

Can't really think of any offhand but can remember being put up in Wolverhampton after a Galaxy 500 gig (I think, could be a different occasion but I think that fits timeline) & the person putting me up's flatmate came back from the Chills show at another venue in town. I think they proceeded to destroy their Chills records but may have stopped just short of.

After seeing Pink Floyd in 1987 (the first post-Waters tour) I didn't listen to their albums for years.

I also quite liked Deerhoof live. One of the least showy bands I've seen but captivating in their simplicity, and they played super tight

I've always been too broke to splurge on gigs so I've convinced myself, Glenn Gould-style, that recorded music is generally superior to the live experience anyway. Besides, I tend to dislike communal events (dance, opera and theatre are simply not for me, give or take a few works) and prefer one-on-one interactions with aesthetic objects. Now that those brief caveats are out of the way, I've rarely been disappointed with live performances by musicians who operate in non-song-oriented genres (classical, jazz, 'avant', etc.), perhaps because their art is generally less reliant on recording mediums to begin with. Basically, if my sole reason for going to a gig is to hear the already-familiar alongside a crowd of randos, I'd rather stick to my couch, although classical music is an interesting exception in that the acoustics make enough of a difference to justify the ticket price (I'm also just more of a fan, I guess).

I wasn't a massive fan, but I haven't listened to the Pixies since I saw them less-than-phone-it-in in 1990. From what I've read, this was/is apparently typical of Pixies shows.

In 1994, I couldn't wait to see Evan Parker. Based on the recordings I'd heard, I expected his sound to completely fill the room; it barely made it past the first three rows. (He redeemed himself somewhat two nights later with a brilliant soprano duo with Roscoe Mitchell.)

It took me many years to warm up to Pavement again after seeing them on the Crooked Rain tour