The Best Live album

I like my live recordings to have an element of rawness and improvisation.

Allman Bros... "Live at Filmore East" (I love improvisation and no other rock band has ever done that better than the Brother's, especially with Duane... incidently I saw them live last year and it was by far the best show I've seen in years... they still got it)
Johnny Cash... "Folsom Prison Blues"
Jimmy Page & The Black Crowes... "Live at the Creek"
Eva Cassidy... "Live at Blues Alley".

My all time favorite is a live bootleg Grateful Dead recording at Cornell University in 1977. This recording really captures their "wall of sound" they had during that time and their improvisational prowess which makes their live stuff so great. I am by no means a Dead Head... but when you listen to their good live recordings it is obvious that Jerry Garcia is a stone cold genious.

:-)

Spencer

Greatful Dead - Reckoning also released as For the Faithful.

Diana Krall - Live in Paris

One recently released and just totally shocked me is by pianist Michel Camilo, "Live at the Blue Note". I was at the used cd store, rifling thru the bins and noticed this one because it is on Telarc. After further examination, it is also processed in DSD. I sampled it at the store with headphones and as soon as playback started, I jumped startled as I thought someone was sneaking up behind me in the store but it was actually the MC introducing the band on the disc. The "air", the width and especially depth of soundstage on this disc is uncanny and mind boggling! Even though this is not my favorite style of jazz music, I bought it because I figured that if it sounded soo amazing through the the poor quality equipment used and abused to sample discs in a pre-owned cd store, then it would provide nirvana and extascy when played back on my high resolution system...and boy was I right on...it has earned benchmark status as a demo disc of the thousand+ that I own and I don't mean one cut of the whole 2 cd set...the whole thing is killer!!! Check it out..you'll be soo glad you did...Jeff

Minor correction to Lokie: The Dead were no longer using the Wall of Sound PA in 1977. At the time of that deservedly-famous Cornell show, they were playing through the reinforcement system operated by Bill Graham's FM Productions. If your tape is off the board, as opposed to an audience recording, it doesn't really matter.