…Jim Staley on trombones, Ikue Mori on electronics, and John Zorn on alto saxophone.
Friends and musical cohorts since the early ’80s, these three master improvisers come together to perform a freewheeling set of outrageous and mind-blowing improvisations. Recorded at Roulette, founded in 1978 and one of New York’s most adventurous venues, the music is full of surprising twists and jumps from one mood to another with mercurial synchronicity. Dedicated to the memory of Downtown theatrical genius Richard Foreman, Alchemical Theatre presents nine pieces of telepathic, counter-intuitive New York improvisation by three legendary figures of the Downtown scene.
Category: live
The Warm Up Tour was the name given to Peter Gabriel’s run of live dates in June, July and August 2007. In advance of the tour, Peter said:
“When I decided to get a band together it was for the 25th anniversary of our WOMAD festival on the last weekend of July. I then decided to do some other dates around it but don’t have a new album to play yet. So, I thought I would ask the fans through the full moon club on my website to put in requests for songs that I had not been playing recently. It is that list that you sent in that has determined what you are now about to hear. Some of these have not been played for many years and we are intending to brush off the rust.” – pg
The penultimate show of the run was at the aforementioned WOMAD Festival…
In 2009, the Triton venue (near Paris, France) was sold out to celebrate the 35th anniversary of Univers Zero, an iconic band of the Rock in Opposition movement.
These two exceptional concerts highlighted a radical and unique style of music, at the crossroads of new music and chamber rock, skilfully blending acoustic and electric instruments, as heard on the cult album ‘Ceux du Dehors’.
Around Daniel Denis (drums), Michel Berckmans (oboe, bassoon), and Andy Kirk (keyboards and guitar), three historical figures of the group, complemented by four other talented musicians, offered an intense multimedia show, intertwining a condensed version of key pieces from the repertoire with more recent compositions.
Tangerine Dream are unquestionably one of the most influential electronic groups of all time. Their music has made an immeasurable impact on ambient, new age, techno, trance, and progressive rock, as well as modern film score composition.
On August 1, 1987, Tangerine Dream performed a landmark open-air concert in front of the Reichstag in Berlin, celebrating the city’s 750th anniversary. Held at the Platz der Republik and drawing over 100,000 attendees, the event unfolded near the Berlin Wall – a powerful symbol of Germany’s division at the time. The band’s signature electronic sound, paired with stunning visuals and fireworks, made for an unforgettable experience. It’s even said that the music could be heard across the border in East Berlin.
After touring solo for Devils & Dust in 2005 and stomping across stages with the Seeger Sessions Band in 2006, Bruce Springsteen’s 2007 tour with the E Street Band was a welcome return to regularly scheduled programming.
The trek was appealingly normal, in that it was simply a run of shows in support of Bruce and the band’s excellent new album Magic, released in late September. The result was more akin to outings behind Darkness on the Edge of Town (1978) and The River (1980) because that’s what artists did/do when they drop a new album. No bigger occasion or overarching circumstances. No multi-night residencies. Just straight up doing the job. One might think the same for 2012 with the release of Wrecking Ball, but that marked…
The Numero Group kicked off their 200 line of titles in 2017 with Savage Young Dü, an unprecedented archival dive into the early works of Minneapolis punk trio Hüsker Dü. Fifty entries later in that chapter of the label’s discography, Numero has a new Dü title that takes a special look at what may be their most pivotal year as a band.
1985: The Miracle Year is a 2CD that chronicles the group’s biggest gambles yet, through the filter of their blistering live shows. Kicking off with a powerful 23-song local set at First Avenue not even a month into that year and following through with another 20 tracks recorded around the globe over the next nine months, The Miracle Year offers an alternate path through the year that saw the group issue third and fourth albums…
…expanded 25th anniversary edition featuring additional live bonus tracks from other periods in Wilson’s solo touring career.
When Brian Wilson took to the stage at Lou Adler’s Roxy on the Sunset Strip in April 2000, the tiny, 500-capacity venue was filled with love. Friends (Nancy Sinatra, Jackie DeShannon, Don Was), fans (Jon Bon Jovi, Bette Midler, Lindsay Buckingham), and family members (daughters Carnie and Wendy, nephews Jonah and Patrick, wife Melinda) packed into the venue to see the Beach Boys’ leader reinvent himself as a solo artist. Though a famously recalcitrant live performer, he’d embarked on his first full solo tour in 1999 and emerged triumphant. The Roxy shows on Friday and Saturday, April 7 and 8, 2000 would cap off that…
The Cranberries performed on MTV’s Unplugged in 1995 in promotion for their sophomore album, ‘No Need to Argue’, but the audio has never been released, until now. Released in the full 9-song, 45-minute performance.
…Recorded at the Brooklyn Academy of Music with a string section during the promotion of No Need to Argue, the broadcast featured favorites from the new album (“Zombie,” “Ode to My Family”), the already-sterling “Linger,” a few songs that would appear on their next album, 1996’s To the Faithful Departed (“Free to Decide,” “I’m Still Remembering”), and the fan favorite “Yesterday’s Gone,” which never made any of their albums but was beloved enough to be licensed for inclusion on the last expansion of No Need to Argue.
…includes five previously unreleased recordings. These include Lucinda Williams’ ‘Sweet Old World’ and Bob Dylan’s ‘Every Grain of Sand’, both of which featured on “Wrecking Ball”. The additional tracks include Tom Petty’s ‘Thing About You’ and Bill Monroe’s ‘Get Up John’ along with ‘All I Left Behind’ which was co-written by Harris with Kate and Anna McGarrigle.
This live project, which includes the talents of the always great Buddy Miller, is an interesting reflection of an American icon. Eclectic, it is reflective of Emmylou Harris‘ excursions into areas of music beyond the country and rock spheres she has already conquered. But it is the country arena that best showcases her ever-flowering ability with a song. “I Ain’t Living Long Like This”…
Jim Jones All Stars once again unleash upon us all their intense, high-octane and evangelical fusion of hard driving rock’n’roll, garage rock, gritty rhythm and blues and gospel through the release of their new live album, Get Down ~ Get With It. And there is no question at all that this electrifying and explosive collection of songs perfectly documents the sound of a band who are pioneering the revival of an age-old rock’n’roll spirit and supercharging it to a whole new and unprecedented level.
It was back in 2022 when the first seeds were being sown for the new rock’n’roll venture by Jim Jones with a batch of new songs being recorded in Memphis, resulting in the release of the first single, It’s Your Voodoo Working, in October of that year. This heralded the birth of Jim Jones All Stars…
Few guitarists can transform a single note into a melody that sings, burns and heals the way Carlos Santana can. This special collection of live performances-captured from rare and legendary radio broadcasts spanning key moments of his career-offers a front-row seat to the artistry of one of music’s true visionaries.
From the opening bars, Santana’s unmistakable tone pours out like liquid fire, blending Latin rhythms, rock urgency and jazz-inflected improvisation. Backed by his ever-evolving ensemble of world-class musicians, he turns each performance into a journey, shifting effortlessly from hypnotic grooves to soaring, transcendent solos. These recordings showcase the very heart of his genius: the ability to communicate…
Bugge Wesseltoft’s solo piano album It’s Snowing On My Piano (1997) is one of the most successful albums that the ACT label has ever released. For many people – especially in Germany and Norway – this music, made with such care and love by the affable and generous-spirited Norwegian, has become an essential part of their holiday season. And yet, for a Christmas album, it is anything but typical. From the very first note, the meditative strength of the music is palpable. Wesseltoft creates a locus of peace and tranquillity – a state of being which seems even more precious today than it did when the album first appeared. In the intervening years, Bugge Wesseltoft has played the music from the album many times in concert. Each time, he reinterprets the music…
Dave’s Picks Vol. 56, the fourth and final Dave’s Pick of 2025, feature two nearly complete shows recorded March 20, 1981, and March, 21, 1981, at the Rainbow Theatre in London. The shows were the opening two nights of a four-night stand at the venue.
The concerts, which were the first time The Dead returned to Europe in seven years, feature performances of such Dead classics as “Friend of the Devil,” “Scarlet Begonias,” “Fire on the Mountain,” “Althea,” “Truckin’” and “Alabama Getaway.”
“These London shows are right up there with the best,” Dead archivist David Lemieux says in a video shot in front of Big Ben. “Some really, really wonderful, wonderful music to end the year.”
Recorded and filmed October 5, 2024, before a sold-out crowd at London, England’s historic Islington Assembly Hall, Lighthouse: Live from London sees McKagan and his band performing songs from throughout the iconic musician-songwriter’s legendary career, including stellar renditions of tracks originally found on his critically acclaimed third solo album, 2023’s ‘Lighthouse’.
Lighthouse Tour ’24 saw McKagan lighting up sold-out houses across North America, Europe, and the United Kingdom, joined by his murderer’s row of musicians, guitarist Tim DiJulio, guitarist/keyboardist Jeff Fielder, bassist Mike Squires, and drummer Michael Musburger, with live sound engineered by longtime collaborator Martin Feveyear.
As a resourceful sound alchemist and idiosyncratic sound architect with multi-layered and often floating guitar sounds that can pile up into a wall of sound, Swiss guitarist Dave Gisler enlivens contemporary jazz. Since 2017, he has been working continuously with his congenial trio partners Raffaele Bossard and Lionel Friedli.
After collaborations with the Chicago trumpeter jaimie branch, who sadly passed away before her time, and the luminary of modern jazz David Murray, the trio decided to continue without guests and focus on the essence and energy of their distinctive trio sound. This live album is another milestone for this promising trio, which is guided by style-independent factors such as density, contrasts, and energy.
In a recent thought piece on The A.V. Club, Josh Modell ruminated on the dilemma of bands touring endlessly around the hits that made them famous, even as they continue to record new material (or not). He rightfully noted everyone from The Pixies to Van Halen for their habits of living in the past on stage, writing, “I wonder if there’s not a bit of shame in strict nostalgia. Sure, Frank Black has made plenty of new music since the Pixies started playing again, but it hasn’t reached anywhere near the same audience. What does a once-and-maybe-current great songwriter do?”
This is the same question that’s dogged Chris Difford and Glenn Tilbrook of Squeeze for five years. The British duo formed one of the most evocative songwriting partnerships…
Pianist Horace Silver leads his mid-’60s quintet through a combustible, hard swinging evening on the superb 2025 archival recording Silver in Seattle: Live at the Penthouse. Recorded by KING-FM radio host and engineer Jim Wilke, the concert was one of many Wilke captured for later broadcast on his show. Thankfully, he saved the tapes, and they are presented here in a vivid restored quality. Joining Silver on tour was his then-main quintet featuring trumpeter Woody Shaw, tenor saxophonist Joe Henderson, bassist Teddy Smith, and drummer Roger Humphries. Taking into consideration the minor line-up shifts in Silver’s group from 1964 to 1966, including Shaw taking over for Carmell Jones and Smith being replaced by Bob Cranshaw in studio, this is essentially…
Recorded in Lisbon in 2023, ‘Cornucopia Live’ documents Björk’s expansive tour, presenting high-quality live versions of the album’s best tracks alongside updated fan favorites like ‘Isobel’ and ‘Pagan Poetry’.
Björk has always gone all-out on her live productions, and ‘Cornucopia’ was her most monumental tour yet, billed as an attempt to unite her various interests – nature, technology and sound. She directed the ambitious event herself of course, but brought in help from James Merry, and had Andrew Thomas Huang, Gabríela Friðriksdóttir, Pierre-Alain Giraud, Nick Knight, Tobias Gremmler and Warren Du Preez & Nick Thornton-Jones along for the ride. There’s a filmed version recorded beautifully by cinematographer…
5-CD Super Deluxe Edition that features Zappa’s entire October 31, 1978, performance as well as a bonus gig from earlier in the Palladium residency on October 27.
…Zappa’s annual Halloween shows took root at New Jersey’s (also sadly demolished) Capitol Theatre in 1972 before moving to Chicago in 1973 and then, finally, New York City in 1974. Zappa knew how special these yearly events were, even filming Baby Snakes: The Movie at the 1977 shows. Sadly, the tradition was short-lived, taking a break in 1979 and 1980 (the latter year for health reasons) before returning in 1981 with two shows taped for broadcast on MTV and therefore designed as much for the at-home viewing audience as those in the Palladium’s seats.
Prolific multi-diamond artist and producer SYML invites listeners into an intimate space with his new live album, Paris Unplugged.
Recorded while in Paris, France, this past summer at Le Consulat, the album distills his emotional songwriting into an unfiltered performance that feels deeply personal and universally moving.
Accompanied by Brian Eichelberger, Zawadi Morrow, and Kyle Moore, the songs are stripped of excess production, revealing the fragile heart at the center of his music and offering fans a chance to experience the closeness of his live shows-where silence, melody, and emotion intertwine. This is SYML at his most human: present, unguarded, and profoundly connected to those listening.
Brian Fennell adds, “I was on the roof three…