The Batlord

Saw a few live albums threads, but mostly for "best live album evar!!!" discussions, and I just wanted to ask whether people think they're anything but an indulgence. For the most part I've always thought they were -- although sometimes a live version of a song could actually trump the recorded one, but usually not.

The fact that they are recorded minimizes the spontaneity that makes going to a show exciting, since after you've heard the live album once, it's just another version, and likely one that wouldn't have been the take used for a studio album. There's a certain energy to a live album that you don't get with a studio album, but it's still just an inferior reproduction of the real experience, not to mention that the production can never give the recording the same sound quality as a studio one.

And yet, here I am listening to a live Acid Bath bootleg. I've just listened to their recorded material so much recently that I guess I need something less familiar, but there's also a different context to certain things that the band does that isn't as apparent on a studio recording. Like, on one or two songs on their studio albums, you'd hear the singer recite some kind of poetry, but I always figured it was just to add some color to the recording, but on this live recording he does that more than once before songs, and even opens the show with a poem, so now I know that he's using his performance to express himself in more ways than just through his singing, which is pretty neat.

I don't know that I'd be as interested in listening to live albums by bands with more recorded material than Acid Bath, since they only have two albums, but I can see myself trying to track down stuff like this by bands that I just can't listen to enough of.

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