The Daft Punk and the best 25 live albums

How much is an album from live today? Little in economic terms, still much in terms of reputation, even in a phase in which we are surrounded and submerged by live content.
Historically, a sort of test for artists has always been a sort of test. We wrote it long ago about “Jova Live Love”: the live can become a postcard, a faithful document of a tour, or a real “other” album, where the songs are transformed thanks to the energy of the stage and the public. Live remains an important positioning tool also for the pop of the Z generation, lastly in Italy to Olivia Rodrigo has just announced “Live from Glastonbury (a BBC Recording)”, the full publication of the Glastonbury 2025 set, thus leaving the orbit of the only film-confiring/streaming. The duets with Robert Smith of care become a tool to reach a generation different from his.

In this panorama is interesting the list that has drawn up the SCOGS community, the collectors’ website – an audience therefore very high rate of passion. The lists are always partial, of course, but they give indications for (re) discover the classics: below their top 25, obtained from the “social picks” of the platform.

The Daft Punk, “Alive”

In the ranking, at number 1, there is “Alive 2007” of Daft Punk: fascinating choice, but questionable if we think about the historical weight of many classic rock. The motivation reads:

“What makes a live album lasting album? The interaction between artist and the public and the way the family songs are remodeled in real time play a fundamental role. ‘Alive 2007’ of the Daft Punk responds to these expectations. (…) Instead of playing the songs in their original form, the Daft Punk treat their work as construction bricks, stratified riffs, refrains and drops in a dynamic set.”

The shortcomings

However, some perplexities remain: the grateful Deads, who made the album Live an art, so below with “Live/Dead”? “Under a Blood Red Sky” of the U2 far from the top ten. The “unplugged” of the Nirvana not as high as many would expect – personally I would have put it in top 5, perhaps I would have chosen it as the best live album ever, both for the disarming beauty of the performance, and for how the “unplugged” format changed the idea of ​​what could be a live in the 90s, even with the help of TV.

In the ranking, then, there are sensational absences. That of the Pearl Jam (who have transformed the live into a format with the official bootlegs, from 2000 onwards), and by Bruce Springsteen with the monumental “Live 1975–85”. Then there are no “Rock ‘n’ Roll Animal” by Lou Reed (but also the most recent lives, such as the acoustic “Perfect Night Live in London”), “Alchemy” by Dire Straits, “4 Way Street” of Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, so much to mention the first names that come to mind.
A reminder of how vital, endless – and controversial – the format of the live album is. It is the beauty (and the limit) of the rankings: they photograph a taste of the moment – here of a very active community – not a definitive “truth”.
But this remains a stimulating list, which turns on the debate and recalls how much live album is still a unique form to tell an artist. And maybe in a while we will do ours …

The best 25 live albums second discogs

1. “Alive 2007” – Daft Punk
2. “Live” – Donny Hathaway
3. “Made in Japan” – Deep Purple
4. “At Fillmore East” – The Allman Brothers Band
5. “Roseland Nyc Live” – ​​Portishead
6. “Live After Death” – Iron Maiden
7. “At folsom Prison” – Johnny Cash
8. “Stop Making Sense” – Talking Heads
9. “Mtv Unplugged in New York” – Nirvana
10. “101” – Depeche Mode
11. “Mtv Unplugged” – Alice in Chains
12. “Frampton Comes Alive!” – Peter Frampton
13. “Strangers in the night” – Ufo
14. “Live at leeds” – The Who
15. “It’s alive” – Ramones
16. “Live at the Apollo” – James Brown
17. “Cheap Trick at Budokan” – Cheap Trick
18. “Live Rust” – Neil Young & Crazy Horse
19. “Live and Dangerous” – Thin Lizzy
20. “Under a Blood Red Sky” – U2
21. “Waiting for Columbus” – Little feat
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23. “Curtis/Live!” – Curtis Mayfield
24. “Live/Dead” – Grateful Dead
25. “Live Bullet” – Bob Sever & The Silver Bullet Band