And right now . . . right now . . . right now it’s time to . . . kick out the jams, motherfuckers! screamed Rob Tyner as the MC5s took to the stage in 1969. Not every live show can be as flat-out incendiary as Detroit’s finest but a great gig is still one of life’s most intense pleasures – and ever more important to the music industry as record sales plummet..
So here goes for 30 questions on live shows, classic concerts, live music on TV, major events and all that rock and roll.
Answers: here
1 What was the 1976 live album by Led Zeppelin (actually the soundtrack to a concert film of the same name)? Which twelve-and-a-half-minute track was mainly an interminable drum solo?
2 Stop Making Sense was a concert movie about which New York band? Which Academy Award-winning director made it?
3 What was the title of Pet Shop Boys’ first live CD, a set they played for the BBC at the Mermaid Theatre in 2006? Who guested and sang ‘Jealousy’?
4 Before Later . . . with Jools Holland launched on the BBC, he hosted a rather more anarchic music show on Channel 4. What was it? And with which band did he start his career?
5 Which rockabilly classic was Eddie Cochran’s only US Top 10 hit? Who did a memorable live version of it on a classic 1970 live album?
6 Who was the main character, played by Bob Geldof, in the film version of Pink Floyd’s The Wall? Where did Roger Waters lead an all-star cast in a live version of this epic in 1990?
7 After the Coldstream Guards played ‘God Save the Queen’ at the Wembley Live Aid in 1985, who played the first set? With which fitting song did they open proceedings?
8 Madonna has played ten world tours: The Virgin, Who’s That Girl?, MISSING, The Girlie Show, Drowned World, Re-invention, Confessions, MISSING, MDNA, Rebel Heart. Can you name the two missing from the list?
9 Who, in 1991, was the first artist to release a session recorded for MTV Unplugged as a live album? When Robert Plant and Jimmy Page did so, what alternative title did they use?
10 Which band’s song ‘Free Nelson Mandela’ led to the 1988 Nelson Mandela seventieth Birthday Tribute concert at Wembley? Which US TV network screened it but erased any mention of Nelson Mandela or apartheid?
11 Whose 1996 reunion tour, and subsequent live album, was called Hell Freezes Over? What was the title of their comeback album 13 years later, together with an ensuing final tour?
12 James Brown Live at the Apollo, recorded in 1962 and released in 1963, is a classic live album – but where is the Apollo? Which Brown lyric does manager Jimmy Rabbitte comically appropriate to try to inspire the band in 1992 movie The Commitments?
13 At which band’s gig did Islamic terrorists murder 89 people at a Paris venue in November 2015? What was the name of the venue?
14 What was the name of the 1992 tour organised by the Jesus and Mary Chain? Which Britpop heroes-in-waiting were bottom of the bill below the Mary Chain, Dinosaur Jr and My Bloody Valentine?
15 Which song took up the whole fourth side of Marvin Gaye’s 1977 double album Live at the London Palladium? Who performed a medley of his best known duets with him?
16 Where was The Who’s famous live album recorded on Valentine’s Day 1970? Where was a second gig recorded the next evening, which was included on a 40th anniversary edition of the album in 2010?
17 On 12th July 1985, Live Aid was broadcast from London and which US city? Who was the co-founder alongside Bob Geldof?
18 What was the name of Bob Dylan’s famous two-part tour of 1975/76 Which female singer and former lover accompanied him?
19 Whick punk rock icon played a tour for anarchist group Class War in 1988? What was the tour called?
20 At which major sporting event did Diana Ross miss the target in 1994? Who didn’t do much better while introducing her?
21 Who invited strippers to perform with them at an open-air gig in London’s Battersea Park in 1979? To which track did they gyrate and disrobe?
22 Which major live event took place in cities across the world on 1 July 2005? Which band performed ‘Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band’ with Paul McCartney?
23 Which reggae band beloved of John Peel were Live at the Counter Eurovision in Belgium in 1979? What was unusual about the release of this live album in terms of their career?
24 Who made a classic mostly-live 1979 album called Rust Never Sleeps? Which song features twice on it?
25 When Rod Stewart mimed to ‘Maggie May’ on Top of the Pops in 1971, who pretended to play the mandolin? ‘Maggie May’ was originally the single’s B-side, but received more airplay than the purported A-side: what was it?
26 The Last Waltz was a valedictory concert held on Thanksgiving Day 1976 by which band? Who directed the movie of the concert?
27 The Buzzards and The Peacocks. Explain.
28 Bill Graham was the American promoter behind the famous music venues Fillmore East and Fillmore West. In which two cities were the venues located?
29 Where did Dylan record a 1979 live album in a rock style that upset some fans and critics? Which West Coast band accompanied Dylan on another tour and live album ten years later?
30 Who performed a famous reunion concert in Central Park in 1982 (it was released as a live album)? Which song from the movie The Graduate opened the set?