The Power of The Live Record

There is truly no feeling like going to see live music. The whole experience – the euphoric pain on the balls of your feet from standing for hours on end, the lump that creeps through your chest and up your throat from the sheer volume of the bass, the sweat that trickles down your forehead from jump after jump – is unmatched. A live performance engulfs all your senses, leaving you with a post-concert emptiness once it’s over. This is why I love the live album. It captures the essence of a performance and allows us to be transported back to the intoxicating moments of a live show.  

Photo of an outdoor concert at Merriweather Post Pavilion in Maryland.

What’s entwined into a live record is the human aspect of live music that we all love. Live music is not just a performance; it's a connection. As Jeremy Montagu writes in his article, “How Music and Instruments Began: A Brief Overview of the Origin and Entire Development of Music, from Its Earliest Stages,” the purpose of music is “dance, ritual, entertainment personal, and communal, and above all social cohesion.” This is why it is imperative that every band, at some point in their career, puts out a live record. On a live album, you see the flashing lights, feel the fresh air of a festival, and smell your neighbor's sweat. 

If you’re not entirely convinced, here are some reasons why live albums are so necessary. 

Audience Connection

Hearing an audience in the background of a song evokes the same feeling in me as seeing an audience member on one of the jumbotron screens at a show. Whether they are crying, screaming, or merely singing along to a song, it’s an important reminder of the power music has on fans. It is the moment you realize everyone in that room is experiencing their version of an overwhelming eruption of emotion to a specific song. The audience on a live record is not just a passive listener but an integral part of the experience. It's you. It’s me. Every clap, whistle, and scream on these tracks are us, as listeners, literally being heard. 

Hearing an audience is hearing human connection. Take “The Fish Cheer/I Feel Like I’m Fixin’ to Die” by Country Joe Mcdonald & The Fish as an example. One of my favorite videos out of Woodstock, 1969, is the video of McDonald singing this song to the over 300,000 audience members at the festival. It’s clear not all of them knew the song, but its repetitive nature and relevance as an anti-war anthem allowed a moment for the crowd to come together to sing and clap along to the music without a care if they knew the lyrics or not. Its impact continues to be heard on McDonald’s live album, Museum of Modern Art 1971 (Live). Even you, as an online listener, are compelled to sing and clap along with the audience while listening to this version.

Live shows cultivate a unique culture that varies from crowd to crowd. It makes each concert distinctive and allows audience members to bond over what feels like a big inside joke. Whether this be stomps to the beat or a call-and-response between performer and audience, these rituals are moments of connection, celebrating music together. For example, at any live performance of The 1975’s “Robbers,” you’ll hear the audience echo “Stay, stay, stay” and take over the line “Now everybody’s dead” when Matty Healy invites them to scream it for him. This phenomenon was also exhibited at Queen’s performance of “Radio Gaga” at Live Aid in 1985. At this show, 72,000 audience members joined in a clapping sequence to the chorus's rhythm, bringing new life to the song. These traditions aren’t scripted; they’ve become ingrained in that fanbase’s culture, and on a live album, the tradition allows fans unable to attend those shows to be part of that sacred ceremony.

We all have those lines in songs that feel like they were written specifically for us. There is something so euphoric about singing the lines that you resonate with when others are around singing it with you; It enhances the listening experience, knowing it deeply affects other fans as well. You feel seen. It’s why hearing the roar of a crowd on a live album is so meaningful. It reinforces the universality of the human experience. 

Rich Sound

A live album, whether recorded at an in-real-time concert or as a raw recording in a studio, will always have more depth than a polished album. Would we go to concerts if the songs sounded exactly like they did when they were recorded? No. We expect something different, something new. Studio versions are tight, clean, and concise, but live performances give us something more—something unpredictable and alive. As someone who cranks up the volume on my phone until the instrumentals vibrate through my core, live recordings deliver an intensity unmatched by studio albums.

In a live setting, musicians are in their zone; this is what they were born to do. On a record, they may be confined to a radio-friendly runtime of three to four minutes. Live, musicians have the unrestricted ability to perform whatever songs they want in whatever way they want to.

With less time constraints and more creative freedom, we hear the unrelenting, long-winded solos like on “Red House” on Jimi Hendrix’s live record Hendrix In The West, making the song’s runtime jump from 3:50 to 13:12. We hear lyrical additions like the strained repetition of “We belong together,” at the end of Pearl Jam’s “Black” on the MTV Unplugged live record. We hear Led Zeppelin’s John Bonham push the limits of percussion on “Moby Dick” on the live record, The Song Remains The Same, through his over 10 minutes of animalistic drum playing. On “Mountain Jam,” off the Allman Brothers Band’s Eat A Peach, Berry Oakley’s masterful bass is displayed throughout over 30 minutes of jamming, pulling an instrument that can sometimes go unappreciated into the spotlight. 

Jimi Hendrix, Eddie Vedder, The Allman Brothers Band, and John Bonham (from left to right).

Dijon is a more modern example of why we need live recordings featured on music streaming platforms so severely. After falling in love with his album Absolutely, I stumbled across the corresponding live film, “Absolutely,” in early 2024. While I love it as an album, the live versions of the songs on YouTube create a whole new listening experience. The sounds of the instrumentals are buttery yet gritty, with crashing strings and raspy vocals. The hums, reverbs, and bends of the guitars are enchanting. The crescendos of the piano bring new warmth to each song, and Dijon’s creative chemistry with his co-creators is palpable. The songs sound whole and human, so why aren’t these versions on Spotify? I don’t want to have to pull up YouTube on my computer whenever I want to listen to them. Call me lazy, but we deserve to be able to put performances like Dijon’s on our playlists. 

Humanizes the Music

For fans, artists are like cryptids. A wall grows between the listener and the creator because, although we are touched by what they create, sometimes it’s hard to recognize that there is a person behind the music; Until they are right before you at a show. 

My friend Elisabeth reaching for the stage at a concert.

Seeing a band or artist you love live tears down that wall. They are no longer just a carefully crafted voice in our headphones. Instead, they are alive in front of us: blinking, sweating, breathing. Through quirks, imperfections, and moments of vulnerability, we are reminded that the person behind the art is not some distant figure but one of us sharing the same human experience.

Freddie Mercury was an icon not only because of his overwhelming talent but also because of his quirky, loveable personality. In the album Live at the Rainbow ‘74, Mercury’s charm is on full display, from giggling over a joke about being delivered diamonds from the devil to playfully warning his “darlings” (how he would refer to the audience members) that they would need to have their handkerchiefs prepared for “White Queen (As It Began).” Live albums like these are a gateway to understanding Mercury's stage presence for those who did not have the honor of seeing Queen perform live. 

Mercury performing live at the Rainbow.

Similarly, The Bootleg Volume 6: Bob Dylan Live 1964 - Concert at Philanthropic Hall features the duet, “Mama, You’ve Been on My Mind,” sung by Bob Dylan and his collaborator, Joan Baez. In this version of the song, Dylan, often seen as almost a fantastical prophet in the music industry, shows a chink in his armor as he forgets the words of the song, and Baez playfully changes the noun in the chorus from “Mama” to “Daddy,” adding to Dylan's confusion. The two break out into adolescent laughter, prompting the audience to laugh as well. Through these “mishaps,” the listener sees the humility in Dylan and Baez, gaining a new insight into their character and relationship (if you want to learn more about them, read Grace Abdayem’s article here). 

Not only does a live album turn an artist into a person, but it also captures the raw human energy in their music. For example, Rage Against The Machine recently released The Democratic National Convention 2000 (Live), a live recording of their protest concert outside the Democratic National Convention in LA in 2000. You don’t hear a clean recording – fitting because this concert was anything but. You hear on this album the messiness of a concert stage thrown up quickly and centered in protest. The tension of being in a crowd of people surrounded by a 12-foot fence and over 2,000 police officers in riot gear. The strained vocal cracks of an enraged Zach de la Rocha. Without its imperfections, the album would never have captured the true essence of this performance, leaving listeners without a true understanding of the band’s message. It's not polished or pretty, but it’s real.

One of the few snapshots of Rage's protest concert.

The human experience is a shared one, and that sense of community is apparent when musicians communicate with their audience, an experience that can only be captured in person or on a live album. 

If you want to listen to any song mentioned in this article, listen here!