Best official live album?
 

In your opinion, which is the best official live album? Fleetwood Mac Live (1980), The Dance (1997), or Live in Boston (2004).

This should be a poll.

A: THE DANCE

Its only flaw is that it is missing Gypsy and Gold Dust Woman.

I was trying to make it a poll and messed up the first time! :laugh:

They each offer something different, I think. I'm actually not that familiar with the Live album(:eek:), though I do own it so for me it's between the polished, controlled 'show' of The Dance or the more raw and rough around the edges nature of Live in Boston. The Dance was my first visual experience of the Mac, and it was all so pretty and impressive. I'd never seen anything like Stevie Nicks before and she blew me away, and Lindsey has rarely looked better. Live in Boston as a real live show was so different to that, it took me a while to come round to it, though those versions of Go Your Own Way and Stand Back are my all-time favourites.

...I think I'll go with The Dance.

I feel The Dance was incredible. I was sick with obsession over it. There were a few weeks there, when I must have watched that thing 30+ times in just 2 weeks. But I think the DVD did more for me than the audio.

So, for a CD, I chose the first live album.

Michele

Easiest poll ever.. The 1980 album is totally disjointed (although what's there is still good), bootlegs of actual full concerts are much more appealing to me.

I voted The Dance.. whatta show, I love the new music like Temporary One and Bleed to Love Her.

- Spike

The Dance...there is no other choice IMO. :nod:

The 1980 Live album. It captures the band at their peak imo. The version of Rhiannon alone is better than the entire Dance album. Plus, Over And Over, the sublime Sara, Fireflies, Don't Let Me Down Again, Not That Funny, Oh Well, The Farmer's Daughter, One More Night, the string breaking at the end of Don't Stop... pure rock and roll.

THE DANCE, hands down, no questions asked. :nod:

I chose Live '80... it's a snapshot in time. These newer live albums are just trying to recapture what was really going on when Live '80 was recorded.

^^^^^

The live album is explosive at times... Over and Over is a raging burning inferno at the end. GYOW in Cleveland is one of the best. NGBA is dope!
Rhiannon amazing!! Monday Morning opens with sonic orgasms...

There's some really magical moments on the Live album.

It's a toss for me between The Dance and the 1980 album. I would probably choose The Dance, for sentimental reasons, because that was what rekindled my interest in the band.

This was a toss up between Live and The Dance for me.
LIB is good, but seeing as how I'm not thrilled with Say You Will, I decided against it.

I'd much rather listen to Live or The Dance!

I went ahead and went with Live, just because I'm obsessed with that time period. Plus, "Over and Over" and "Fireflies" are nice treats! Not to mention fantastic versions of "Rhiannon" and "Sara."

I agree! I love you hear the highs and the mistakes, there's rawness and passion on that album.

Hard to compare them with the Live Album, since it was another era. But anyway, I'd choose The Dance cause it's very well produced. Maybe "too studio" style, but I love it anyway. It was a good production for a reunion.

Definitely The Dance.
Well, I don´t exactly know that from 1980... should I?
But I can imagine and I think that I would like The Dance still lot more.

Live In Boston can´t be best... why? that´s simple... there is someone missing...

I think I'd have to go with the '80 Live double album, for reasons others have pointed out. I'm glad that the appreciation for 'Rhiannon' on this album has improved with time. When the album was released, a major criticism I recall both in the printed media and from fans comments, was that the band had waited too long to release an official live version of 'Rhiannon'. In the late 70s, I remember that FM radio would play live versions of 'Rhiannon' from various radio specials of the day, such as the King Biscuit Hour, I believe a Connecticut-recorded live 'Rhiannon' got occasional play throughout the East coast, and perhaps nationally. This was about 1978-79.
So, before the release of the live lp, a live 'Rhiannon' had been heard and was popular or known enough that the 1980 live lp 'Rhiannon' -at the time- was considered inferior, and ridiculous to think of now, but...too late.

"None of the above"...

Live At The Boston Tea Party, Volumes 1 through 3.

Haha.. ur a mad man!!!

BTW.. i have all three of those and they kick ass...

I chose The Dance for sentimental reasons... plus, "Silver Springs". Enough said.

BUT I've never heard Live 1980 in its entirety so I feel like I can't properly vote on this... I haven't even heard the "Rhiannon" from it :eek:

Although I love some of the performances from the 1980 release (namely Rhiannon) I gotta go with The Dance. Apparently I'm not alone! :wavey:

I have to totally go with the 1980 Live album - Rhiannon and Sara are Magic and Go Your own way is remarkable and Landslide is mystical and haunting. Hands down my favorite:)

I believe Live in Boston is simply amazing. Even without Christine McVie.

I'm watching it right now-- I forgot how much I loved it. That "Beautiful Child" in itself is just pure magic. And "Say Goodbye"...

Is it just the accompanying CD that is being polled here?

My vote goes to the 1980 Live-album.

Simply because it's raw, FM at one of the peaks and it got gems like Firefliues, Farmers Daughter (the original live Sara) and other great rocksongs.

The Dance is way to polished and smooth, although I played it last week for the first time and perhaps a year and I enjoyed watching it.

The CD-version of Live in Boston misses a lot from the original DVD-/concert-performance. The choice of songs included on that album does not represents a SYw-show if you'd ask me...

Alas, do known bootlegs also count? Or radio-shows?

Because then I'll vote for:

The Rockhoppers / King Biscuit Flower Hour 1975

The Sin City vegas-show is also very good!

Actually you have a point...

Like several other people I voted for the 1980 album simply because it was raw, not the polished, sugar coated album that The Dance was.

1980 will always be the better album if only for Stevie's version of Rhiannon (and although I haven't listened to this album for a while I recall I'm So Afraid wasn't all that bad either) :nod:

Amazing to see so much support for the 1980 live album. While I love it, for me, it doesn't compare with The Dance. :shrug:

I have major issues with both of them. But certainly The Dance is the more immaculately crafted labor of love. It's elegant, an artifact of good breeding.

The 1980 album is akin to a concert program -- cool photos & moments, but it has beer spilled on it. It's "street" (for Fleetwood Mac, at least).

(Same is true of the 1997 concert video vs. the 1982 & 1987 videos.)

The Dance. No competition. Really. I have "Live" on vinyl, but not CD. And it always skips and rips accross the vinyl halfway through, so I've never heard it all the way through either. That pisses me off because it wasn't cheap. :eek:

Oh yeah for sure. The Dance has it's share of problems. The fact that they didn't film it in 16:9 blows my mind.

My problem with the LIVE 1980 record is that it sounds very dirty. The performances are good, but take "Don't Stop" for example... the ending where Lindsey breaks a string and you hear Christine talking about it? Interesting for sure, but... it doesn't belong there. Give me some CLASSIC versions of the songs that I can listen to regularly. I have to say, "Fireflies" is the only one I don't typically skip over.

See? That's exactly why I *DO* love Live '80! :thumbsup: It's a raw snapshot of a moment in time... even if it does show boogers in Stevie's nose, or John McVie's armpit stains ;). Everything FM ever did in the studio was polished up to a blinding sheen. Give me some grit. I don't need 400 backing musicians to 'fatten' up the sound... I wanna hear FLEETWOOD MAC! Not Fleetwood Mac plus Carlos, Brett, Steve, Taku, Neale, Sharon, Mindy, Lenny, the 126 piece USC Trojan Marching Band, etc etc etc. :nod:

Which is probably why I prefer the 1980 album. I don't want to hear a rock band sound "elegant", I want to hear them sound dirty, raw and real. The Dance has too much polish for it to sound like a real live experience, but there's plenty of real moments on the Live album that makes it feel like you are in the venue and hearing the songs, mistakes and all, in that moment. The inclusion of the string breaking at the end of Don't Stop, for instance, is just fantastic. I'll listen to the album versions if I want perfection.

Exactly! I agree with everything you've just said.
I think The Dance holds a lot of nostalgia for people because it's the album that introduced a lot of younger fans to the band, but artistically and as a representation of the band live, the 1980 is more effective imo. I always think of The Dance as a TV special, but the Live album is a chronicle of the band on tour in their prime.

There definitely seems to be a dividing line between those who were fans prior to 1997 and those who became fans afterwards. I became a fan in '93, so I really thought I'd never see the Rumours kids together ever again. So naturally I have very warm and fuzzy memories from the Dance reunion, and watching the concert on TV (I actually still have my Dance VHS copy :lol:). Hearing Silver Springs on the radio constantly was a sonic orgasm to me :laugh:. Even when I watch the concert to this day, I find it sweet and touching. But you're absolutely right... it was more like a made for TV movie. It was almost like Big Band Broadway Does Fleetwood Mac! Too many musicians, too many rehearsed monologues and dialogues, too many soft camera lenses.

I like the Live '80 album because it's the real deal. The kids had been touring for 18 months... so you hear that in Stevie's ragged Rhiannon vocals. You get to hear Christine introduce the first song from their brand new album Tusk: Over And Over. You can hear strings break, band members discussing things. There are performances from 3 continents. You just can't recreate or buy any of that :thumbsup:.

"Sara" from the 1980 live album is stunning... I forgot about that one. ;)

I would probably love the 1980 version better if they'd release all the video footage with it and put it on DVD.

OH Hells yeah!!

The marching band is a highlight for me! Especially Don't Stop, it's my favorite version. I understand what you mean about the fattened sound, but I'm one of the people who were snared into the Fleetwood Mac universe because of the Dance, although like Brandon I'm annoyed by the 4:3. The dvd doesn't look so hot on my widescreen tv.

I like the Live 80 album a lot, but it needs to be remastered, badly. I just got it on vinyl recently and haven't had time to spin it yet. I'm hoping it's better than the cd transfer. So I basically can't pick between the two, because they are so different yet supposedly "live".