best places to watch live bands?

karkus30

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Having been to the Town & Country Club in Leeds to see Primal Scream some years ago, I found the sound to be very poor due to the acoustics.

I was wondering what are your best and worst venues around the country.

I will start off with Newcastle Town Hall - best.

Town & Country Leeds as worst.
 
Always enjoyed the old Leeds Queens Hall, what a barn of a place that used to be!
Accoustically I suppose it wasn't the best venue, concrete floor walls and ceiling but early eighties groups such as Black Sabbath, Whitesnake, Kiss, Saxon, Motorhead etc weren't exactly looking for subtlety, volume, volume and more volume, yes please.:D

Sheffield city hall was the alternative locally, in comparison a soft furnishings extravaganza :D, saw Thin Lizzy, Iron Maidan, Judas Priest there and very nice venue and an even better bar, what more could you ask for?

Sheffield Arena has taken over the mantle from City Hall for the major groups visiting our area, only seen Sting there and I didn't like it much, I was sat up in the gods and the sound was very echo y very indistinct it would have sounded markedly different on the ground I suppose.

The ultimate for me has to be Birmingham NEC, but it needs to be full to capacity, as with the old Leeds Queens Hall its not much more than a concrete barn but fill it with 10,000 people and I grin from ear to ear :)
 
Originally posted by Zone
Always enjoyed the old Leeds Queens Hall, what a barn of a place that used to be!


Sheffield city hall was the alternative locally, in comparison a soft furnishings extravaganza :D, saw Thin Lizzy, Iron Maidan, Judas Priest there and very nice venue and an even better bar, what more could you ask for?

Sheffield Arena

The ultimate for me has to be Birmingham NEC

I saw MeatLoaf at SA, not impressed at all and Rush at Birmingham NEC was better but not brilliant, Manchester and Newcastle Arenas about the same.

Its interesting how the small town hall venues with all heavy drapes are not as poular with bands, must be audience capacity I suppose.

Middlesbrough town hall is pretty reasonable and Redcar Coatham Bowl is great, but can get a bit rough.

What about Uni halls, any good ones ?
 
Aberdeen Exebition Centre ( is that how you spell it !) .Oasis live 2 weeks ago brilliant.:D :D
 
I've always enjoyed gigs at Wolverhampton Civic Hall - good acoustics and usually good atmosphere.

Leicester De Montfort Hall also deserves a mention.

Birmingham Academy is growing on me although the postition of the bar can make chatter noisy during the more acoustic bands eg Starsailor

Have always found the acoustics at Nottingham Rock City on the poor side although I'm sure there are many of you out there who will disagree with me.........
 
Originally posted by Matt M


Have always found the acoustics at Nottingham Rock City on the poor side although I'm sure there are many of you out there who will disagree with me.........

Thats interesting, was thinking of going to a Death in Vegas gig there. A mate told me it was a good place to go, but your comments make me wonder, particularly as DIV are known for an aggressive sound, good acoustics a must.
 
coming from norwich, it's not that often we get decent bands here with the largest venue being the U. E. A(uni of east anglia). It's a concrete construction with bad acoustics. Best bands recently include one of Karkus30's faves Queens of the Stone Age. Robert plant will be coming soon too. Best gig there for me, Faith No More. I usually travel to London to see bands. Venues include, Brixton Academy(good sound), Astoria(dingy), Earls court(weird). Milton Keynes bowl is my fave(Metallica X 2, AC/DC and a couple of Ozzfests), best advice is to get close to the stage.
 
Originally posted by Dapper Dan
Best bands recently include one of Karkus30's faves Queens of the Stone Age. Milton Keynes bowl is my fave(Metallica X 2, AC/DC and a couple of Ozzfests), best advice is to get close to the stage.

They took over my car cd player and forced me to like them, then they made me buy the Rated R one yesterday.

Metallica, never seen them, I was a late convert. I have the DVDs, but me and the missus would love to see them live. Dont seem to be touring the UK though :( :(

As to getting close to the stage, the Zimmer tends to spoil the moshing and the damage it does during bouts of crowd surfing have ruled that out.:D
 
Reading Festival has to be the best place to watch live gigs, as bands tend to do someting special!! Plus you have camping so you can get battered and not worry about driving home :D
 
Metalica opening the Fredie mercury tribute, was exellent Iron Maiden Donnigton superb Queen of the stone ages Leed festival last year blinding, Maralyn Manson inserting a glow stick up his a**e not so good. Even worse the missus has dragged me to six Bon Jovi gigs
 
sheff city hall small,your always near to the stage watched bad company last night and elvis costello a few weeks ago
sheff arena s good last gig was ac/dc ,don valley stadium pants
leeds roundhay too big too far away from the stage
Stoke victoria hall used to be good not seen a band there in 15 yrs though
 
Best place to hear live bands???

My back garden but no ones taken me up with the offer
 
Indoor has to be Manchester Evening News Arena the best by far(and ive seen loads indoors) it doesnt matter where you sit even if your up top in the gods and god it is high( much higher that Sheffield where the sound is tinny) the sound is awsome,better than Birmingham NEC as for Sheffield yuk i saw oasis there god the sound was terrible that was nowt to do with the band.
Outdoors ive seen Simple Minds at Milton Keynes Bowl,Jean Michelle Jarre at Maine Road,U2 at Roundhay Park and of course Oasis at Finsbury Park ,the best for sound they was all good

The worst has got to be Manchester Gmex with Sheffield Arena coming a close second

This is ofcourse IMHO

I forgot to say that my fav place is the Manchester Apollo it is just like your cinema no.5 screen nice and cosy :)

Samantha
 
Sun City Superbowl (I know it's not in the UK but my envy forces me to respond!) is brilliant. I've seen Sting, Natalie Cole, Moody Blues, Bryan Adams, Joe Cocker there. Brilliant acoustics. I've also seen loads of live concerts at other SA venues but all those were disappointing.
 
Oasis at Belfast Odyssey was excellent, only a relatively small venue but not at all bad.

Plenty of decent places to eat and drink outside as well.

Nice touch when during Don't Look Back in Anger they turned all the house lights up and you could see everybody partying.

Worst venue / gig - Oasis at 'Old Trafford' (Lancashire Cricket Club - the boys refused to have Old Trafford mentioned anywhere on the publicity material).

Sound very very poor - down to the mix though as Robbie Williams the year before was OK - and ruined by the knobs throwing pints of ****** around. Do you think they do this at home - scum.

Always found NEC Arena OK.

Milton Keynes Bowl - Ok if you are by the mixing stage - better get their quick before Wimbledon build a bloomin great football pitch on it though.

Nobody has mentioned Nottingham's Rock City - my god there are some weird looking people in the world...
 

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