Mis-guided passion, mis-spent cash, my advice.....

Priceless it is.
Not-so-priceless is recording a band with a horrible singer. Your job then is to MASK the lack of talent, and that can be very difficult!
Allen

There are quite a few bands/performers that allow audience recording. The Steve Kimock Band is one and he offers wonderfully inventive guitar playing and jams that will make your hair stand on end. You can also simply download his shows for a modest fee from his website (www.kimock.com).

Here some bands tha allow taping. I have also found many jazz acts encouraged me to make a recording if I took the time to politely ask and offer a copy of the recording to the band. The quality of sound you can get with a pair of quality mics and a professional CDR or DAT recorder is amazing truly. Vintage tube mics (rebuilt with better components usually; you know the drill) running into a Grace mic preamp (with a quality A/D converter) that outputs a digital signal is the way to go. That will output into a CDR, DAT, or notebook (then you can record at 24/96khz for truly high fidelity).

Here are the bands:
Radiohead
Upside Groove Coalition
AC/DC (I thought that was interesting)
Allman Brothers Band
And You Will Know Us By The Trail of the Dead (not a great band, but a great name)
Andrew WK
The Ataris
Ben Folds (Five) (no mic stands, no video)
Big Head Todd and the Monsters
The Big Wu (until last year, they even allowed people to patch right from their soundboard--too many takers)
Black Crowes
Blues Traveler (allow some board patches)
Billy Bragg
Candlebox (yes, but who cares?)
George Clinton and the P-Funk (they allow audio taping, but have rules like "Most of all, Ain’t No Party like a P-Funk Party.")
Clutch (these guys are great!!! they allow audio and video)
Counting Crows
Cowboy Junkies
Darkstar Orchestra (allow a "daisy chain" patch)
Dire Straits
Drivin n Cryin (some bands I put on because they made me giggle)
Ekoostic Hookah
The Flaming Lips (bring them to summerfest now!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)
Bela Fleck and the Flecktones
Fugazi (but the singer doesn't want anything released)
Funky Meters
G Love and the Special Sauce
Galactic
Godspeed You Black Emperor (they are great)
Government Mule
Grateful Dead (or what is now known as the Dead--they are to blame for all of this great taping)
Guided by Voices
Guster
Arlo Guthrie (even has a tape trader's board on his site)
Ben Harper (but it has to be stealth)
Indigo Girls (that ones for UWW if she see's it)
Iron Maiden (for proteus' cd player. Bruce was quoted as saying "F*** (expletive) Metallica - Record any you want! And spread it on the Internet if you'd like!")
John Brown's Body (these guys sometimes purchase copies of their shows from tapers)
Lambchop (that's right "i hate summerfest" lady, even your sock puppet band likes this:))
Los Lobos
Maroon 5
Dave Matthews (Band)
John Mayers (yucky)
Medeski Martin and Wood
Metallica (they are strict, but probably said yes to tapers because they are sick of taking freedoms away from people)
Moe
Mogwai
Motley Crue
OAR
Ozomatli (great great live band)
Pearl Jam
Phish
Willy Porter
Queens of the Stone Age
Rage Against the Machine/Audioslave
The Roots
Rush
Rusted Root
The Samples
John Scofield (AKA, god of the guitar)
Seven Mary Three
SidePocket (hello proteus)
Sigur Ros
Spoon
Tenacious D
U2
Umphree's McGee
WEEN (yes)
Wilco

Great thread. I never thought of doing that and I sure didn't think there were that many bands that allowed it -- thanks C, that was a great list!

There are some sound recordists' (engineers) here as well as musicians, instrument manufacturers, elctrical engineers who love tinkering with gear all of whom would have the same sort of satisfaction from what they do not to mention other interests many have.

I have beeen involved in music as a session player, musician and recordist and since adding Audiophile to my list I find myself going in the other direction, I uderstand what you are saying as there are some people here with incredible set-ups not to mention good ears that would most certainly enjoy and benifit from being involved in the recording process but as time is against most of us I cant imagine too many Audiophiles giving up what precious little (time) they have in pursuit of a new hobby and associated joys what mic for what and where, one more take...and yes those singers who are anything but(thats like having teeth pulled...without anesthetic) not to mention some of the (ego's) people/musicians you have to deal with.

I cant be the only one to have a pile of cd's that are waiting to be listened to that will always be ahead of them and since becoming an Audiophile I have been enjoying listening to the music of others more than ever and as I said I have been becoming increasingly infatuated with sound reproduction rather than recording (despite this taking time away from my playing which is a trade-off I'm constantly wrestling with as my musicianship slowly declines).

Be careful hanging around here it may just happen to you too.
Cheers

Rockethouse,
I hear you, but I really do not have the funds to delve into audiophile gear, so I use what I have to get a hold of useable mics and preamps.
Another cool thing about recording is when people listen to your sessions and then tell you that the particular band they're hearing doesn't deserve to sound so good! Ha ha!
Allen