What's the loudest show u been to?
 

I would have to say MBV followed by WIRE at Maxwells in Hoboken. Small little club, but wow, i thought the walls would come down.

I saw Motorhead in quite small venues several times in the late 80s, and they were pretty loud.

Dinosaur Jr in about 1988 too.

More recently, Konono No 1 in the foyer at the Barbican last weekend was pretty damn noisy.

Mogwai's early shows (pre-MYT) were fucking unbelievably loud. Atari Teenage Riot used to break faces with sound well. Keiji Haino in Newcastle last year was ridiculous. I'm not entirely sure anything needs to be that loud. They were handing out earplugs at the beginning and telling people to not ever think about being a hero and not using the ear plugs.

interpol -dec '04

ive had tinnitus ever since.

MBV
Haino
Cows
A few Bardo Pond shows
and Ride in 1990.

Mogwai in their prime were fantastically loud but the crown goes to Bradford Bahamas for the horrific racket that they produced the first time i saw them.So loud you could almost see the cracks on the glasses at the bar.The crowd mostly left.

tight contest between lightning bolt and jon spencer blues explosion. both believe in "11"

I've probably mentioned it before, but I saw a Brasillian samba band called Olodum once. There were about 16 people on stage, around a dozen of whom were drummers. We were right next to the speaker stack, and it was awesome.

I think Mogwai have the record for the loudest show ever, in New Zealand a few years ago. Funny thing, I've gone off their record (the first two notwithstanding) but they still have one of the greatest live shows around at the moment.

I was kinda bored by Mogwai when I saw them recently, but that may have been down to the audience (a load of university students standing around waiting for something to happen) being crap. I also suspect that the students union where the gig was held may have put some sort of noise limit in place, although it would amaze me if Mogwai had allowed themselves to be booked into a place where that would have happened.

Oh, and I'm adding Primal Scream on the Exterminator tour to my list of loud gigs.

Oh, fuck yeah. I'm not a huge fan of Primal Scream, I got dragged along to one of the xtrmnator shows, I was astonished at how loud they were. Certainly a better live band than they are on record.

Deicide were quite loud, too.

The loudest proper concert that I've been to is Dinosaur, Jr. at the 40 Watt with My Bloody Valentine opening.

It was the first show at the new Washington St. location where the club still resides after many, many moves over the span of the earlier years of its existence. I've posted accounts of this show nearly every time there has been a thread here about your favorite live shows and I've posted a friend's account also at least once too. Maybe I'll revisit the subject later on, but for now there's another show that I'd like to briefly write about, although there are definitely some other notable runners-up too.


I've written of this before as well, but I went to a Gobblehoof show in a very small below street level place called (at the time) The Downstairs on Clayton St. in Athens that was actually even louder than the Dino/MBV one.

My girlfriend at the time and I were downtown earlier in the afternoon on the day of the show and she happened to know the guitar player from high school in DeKalb County and he told us they were playing. So we go to the show, and immediately get a little starstruck because Michael Stipe and his big ol' dome is there. This is the only show at that venue I ever went to at this place that had folded chairs set up and Michael was front row center of the maybe three or four short rows of chairs.

So, the band starts playing and what is instantly apparent is that it feels like your ears are in a lot of pain. We stuffed trash from our pockets and whatever we could find in our ears and stayed through the whole show. It was definitely way too fucking loud but the band was really good and it was awkward to leave as well since my girlfriend knew the band a little. What amazed me is that Stipe remained seated for the whole set which went on for almost an hour or so I would guess.

I saw The Hub at a small venue last week, and that was really loud. But, Sereena Maneesh this summer were even louder.

The loudest shit I ever encountered definitely would be Phil Niblock in Brussels in 2000. During soundcheck the walls were immensely vibrating and power failed three times.

Twas quite amazing nonetheless...

motorhead! i vas standing really close to the stage

black label society (believe me, that's all they had going, the loudness) and slayer at ozzfest 2004, the shocking thing is that it was deafening loud yet it was an open amphitheater they were playing. i saw dino jr last year in central park and, it being a park, the sound dispersed a lot so it wasn't as loud...still, whenever j stepped into his distortion pedal, you noticed the jump in volume.

exodus two years ago and morbid angel last year were loud as fuck.

and the award for loudest instrument i've heard live goes to flea's bass when i saw the chili peppers and, believe me, that's the only thing they had going.

i've never seen them live but people say that sunn o))) make mbv sound like dentist waiting room muzak in comparison.

My mother was pretty loud on me when I came home shitfaced for the first time as a teenager.

She was creating real good feedback and super sounding riffs and even slapped me one or two times

that must have been really loud. i hate ozzfest though

I've not been to that many shows so I can't really say.

Modern Life Is War was a fantastically loud live band.

SunnO))) are extremely loud, but I think MBV were louder.

Khanate's crazy loud too, my brother brought them to a tiny venue and he says the ground was shaking outside the venue

DINOSAUR JR
loud as hell.

when? this year? i missed them this year

thurston, nels cline, william winant and mats
gustaffson at atp la 2002. afterwards i found
myself barely able to hear having a conversation
with someone barely able to talk.

hmm, I happened to catch Mono playing in a record store before I saw Black Dice once, both of those bands were pretty loud.
However, I think Animal Collective was the loudest show I've seen recently.

Petrol club in Gent, somewhere in the beginning of this year.

The Cramps in 1991. I got to pogo on Human Fly, which was rather silly for a guy like me (I could have played a hobbit in Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings). It didn't take long for me to find myself lying on the floor. Somebody helped me, I stood up, carried on dancing in a safer spot but had to stop eventually. The safe spot was close to the right speaker. And Surfin' Bird was blasting out of it. I felt really sick.

I can't remember if JSBE was so loud back in 1996, but it was certainly wild from the start (RL Burnside trying to cool things down).

I have been to a LOT of shows. The two loudest shows I have had the pleasure to see were Dinosaur Jr last year and my very first concert ever, David Lee Roth during the Eat Em & Smile Tour. LOUD painfulll

Melvins or Wolf Eyes. Not the same show, just the two loudest sets I've ever experianced.

ohh okay its not what i was thinking about, the other show was in amsterdam i think

ahh, i had a wonderful time, so many shitheads in one place, if i wasn't peeing myself with laughter from one thing it was from another.

They had a show next day in amsterdam.
HAH sucks to be you.

i know

Napalm Death
 

The Ramones were pretty loud.

But I have to agree with the geezer who already mentioned Motorhead.

Motorhead were indeed loud.

But Napalm Death were fucking LOUD!!!

i missed motörhead when they came a few years ago, i kick myself for it.
i wish i could have seen napalm death when they were good.

Borbetomagus
Tonic, NYC
2001 or 2002

a monitor caught on fire and Chris Corsano (working sound) ran it out of there. Loud.

Paper Rad, it was in a small basement. Amps at almost full volume in a basement=do the math

keep in mind I do not go to live shows very much

slayer.

either MASCIS & THE FOG in 2001 or DINOSAUR JR last month.

i think my ears are still ringing.