The 30 greatest concert films of all time, ranked
As Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour storms into theaters, we decided to take a look back at the best concert films ever seen on the big screen
Film Features Concert films
Concert films are suddenly back in the news in a big way, with Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour cranking up headlines and driving huge revenue at the box office, selling over $100 million in advance tickets before its October 13, 2023 premiere. Those are eye-popping numbers for a concert film, a niche traditionally reserved for titles that play only to hardcore fans of a particular act.
The best concert films—and Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour may wind up in this league—play beyond their respective target audiences by capturing the essence of either a specific time or artist. That’s true of the other concert film that’s been creating a lot of buzz this fall: the restored version of Stop Making Sense, the 1984 Jonathan Demme film that’s proven to be the definitive filmed document of Talking Heads. To some extent, the following 30 films all do something similar and they prove that a good concert film can be a transcendent experience, with music and images powerful enough to offer a bridge between bygone eras.
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Echoes from Pink Floyd: Live at Pompeii. Unadulterated, unbridled, euphorically rhapsodic, bombastic bliss.
I pray this gets the 4K remastered treatment like Stop Making Sense and get re-released in theaters.
This is why Pink Floyd is the best prog rock band: those motherfuckers could play. They could make a 23 minute song that you wouldn’t want to end.
Fugazi: Instrument1991 The Year Punk BrokeBunch of Kunst: A Film about Sleaford ModsDon’t Go Gentle: A Film About IdlesJohnny Cash in San QuentinBob Dylan: Dont Look BackAll of these ARE concert movies since they focus on tours and concert footage exclusively from a period in time for the artists.
This is a good list (though I’ll always think SMS and TLW deserve a tie at the top), but it looks like your reason for doing the re-post in the first place (Swift) didn’t even make the honorable mentions. I don’t think you guys get paid when you don’t include her in the slideshow…
It’s a bit hard to rank a movie that hasn’t come out yet.
Didn’t even notice that, thanks. Though as much as I’ve seen written about it I feel comfortable having assumed it was already out.
The abomination that is Rattle & Hum is included, but the raw energy of Under a Blood Red Sky is not. GTFO.
rattle & hum deserves to get yeeted for the bono/mlk overlay alone
… or Slaine Castle. But I think this list is of films released in theatres?
I’ve had a soft spot for Rattle & Hum because I was in the crowd at Sun Devil Stadium for the concert they filmed for that part of the movie, and I’m in several of the crowd shots (my kids get a big kick out of 18-year-old me on camera). And, in fairness, it was a fantastic concert live.
It highlights U2 at their most earnestly cringy but also ends with All I Want Is You, which is one of my absolute favorite U2 songs. So I’ll allow it.
These are all great if you like the bands so no complaints on the order. I would have had Ziggy in the top five tho…NIN All That Could Have Been is excellent but did not get a theatrical release.
(Checks to see if “Jazz on a Summer’s Day”(1959) is on the list. Finds that it isn’t.
Stops reading.)
Highly recommend Long Time Running with Tragically Hip. This documents the last several shows after Gord Downie was diagnosed with a fatal brain disease. Which sounds like a bummer but it is not. It will make you laugh, cry, appreciate life, and appreciate the Hip. And wonder again why they weren’t bigger here in the US.
I have always loved The Kids are Alright. Formative watching in developing my love of The Who.Thirty Years of Maximum R&B was a straight to video follow-up that didn’t capture the madcap editing that is so essential to the original’s charm, but is nonetheless a good film filled with great performances (and a terrible one from their 1989 reunion) and some more good interviews.
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admittedly niche, but joni mitchell’s shadows and light is an incredible live album/film with an absolutely monster fusion band (pat metheny/lyle mays, jaco, michael brecker, et al)
Posted the same thing in the greys. That band was amazing and she still manages to upstage them all.
Not sure it belongs on this list but I love Peter Gabriel’s Secret World: Live. I think it was just a DVD release. Ditto for U2 at Slaine Castle. I’d love to go back in time to see that one in person!
I actually did see U2 at Slaine castle! Except I saw the first weekends show in August , the DVD was of the second show on the 1st of September.
That must have been amazing. I’e seen them 4 times – all in big stadiums. Hoping they re-up their option to go back to Sphere in 2024. If so, Mrs. F. and I are in. If they ever tour again we’ll probably hit multiples dates.
Cutting room floor scraps of a dying Michael Jackson makes the list, but no Depeche Mode 101?!
A dying pedophile.
they’re all dying.
thank you , as I looked at this list I was like, something is missing but I couldn’t remember what film I was thinking of and yes it’s DM 101.
Hard to believe that Jeff Lynne’s ELO Wembley or Bust did not make this list.
Because ELO sucked, of course.
Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, even if it is blatantly wrong.
Stop Making Sense is the correct answer, but I’d like to mention Rush in Rio.
The band had re-united and recorded a new album five years after Neil Peart lost his wife and daughter. Their North American tour was a huge success, so they decided to accept a long-standing invitation to play in Brazil. They played in front of their second largest crowd (the largest was the previous night in Sao Paolo, in the rain), recording their performance on old equipment because that’s all the Brazilians had.
The crowd was so hype they sing along to “YYZ”, an instrumental. They weren’t mixed out because they were so loud they couldn’t be.
The crowd was so hype they sing along to “YYZ”, an instrumental. Okay, that clip is impressive AF.
I’m not sure I appreciated how good their drummer is, before seeing that.I’m in my mid-50s, so I’ve been aware of Rush for a long time. And I always low-key hated them. I mean, I would still hum along to “Limelight”, because of course; and maybe I didn’t totally hate “Spirit of Radio”. But “Subdivisions” was just so goddam ubiquitous, and its lyrics were sophomoric – same of the “Limelight” lyrics – and all the most pretentious kids at school liked them. Fuck that band.(I was a post-punk and new wave guy. And music cliques were very serious in that era. Visage kids didn’t talk to Journey kids: just not done. Classic rock was for stoners. Today’s kids with their tolerance and their diversity: ugh. We didn’t have that shit in the early 80s! It was bullying and gatekeeping, the way art appreciation should be.)Here’s the point: about 10-15 yrs ago I learned that Rush had recorded several instrumentals. I love rock instrumentals; absolutely love them. So I googled a bit, then torrented a bunch of stuff, edited out a couple transitions in Audacity where necessary, and made myself a mix of Rush instrumentals. 12 tracks, 55 mins.News flash: those motherfuckers can play their instruments. And the composition chops are really there. True, there’s a touch of too twee & clever in the pieces. But it’s a pretty small touch: you have to be really hyper-critical, just looking for something to bitch about, to mark it. The fact is, that’s a damn enjoyable ~hour of music.So I guess my eyes have been opened to that band. I still don’t really like their songs that much (although the movie I Love You Man did nudge me in that direction; and “Limelight” is still fun to hum to). But I have far more apprecitation for them than I did when I was younger, and I respect them.Slow learner, I guess.
Forgot to mention: their gear arrived late at the venue, so on top of recording on less-than-ideal equipment, they also didn’t have time to do a proper soundcheck.
This was the last stop of the tour anyway, so the performances really feel like the band isn’t holding anything back. It’s “fuck it, we’ll do it live” at its best.
Stop Making Sense is the greatest concert film ever made because director Jonathan Demme focused on one particular concert, never breaking away from Talking Heads onstage.Not sure if you mean literally one concert, or just that the focus is basically one show. It was actually shot over 3-4 days.
Monterey Pop is several times better then Woodstock. I will not be accepting questions thank you.
The Joshua Tree and Rattle & Hum are when U2 lost the thread and Bono’s worst aspects got out of control. Even the band knew this when they course corrected with Achtung Baby, though in concert they never fixed it.We talk about band’s difficult second albums, but really it’s their difficult fifth album. Bands that put out no more than four albums and then call it quits (and stay quit) do it right.And as someone else mentioned, Under a Blood a Red Sky is much better than Rattle & Hum.
The Police’s difficult fifth album (Synchronicity) was still quite good.
I know they can be divisive but Styx hit their stride with albums 5-10. Then fell apart on 11 (Kilroy). Equinox – Paradise Theatre, although the seeds of transition started on Paradise.
Sign O The Times would have done MUCH better with a normal marketing campaign. I was a SUPER fan at the time and I knew almost NOTHING about it! I saw it on the best screen in town at the time and it was only playing for one week…and I found out the day before from ONE newspaper ad. There were about five of us in this HUGE theater. Total marketing failure! But, I’m SO glad to have it on Blu ray now.
“Stop Making Sense” is so good that I can’t even listen to the relatively lifeless studio version of “Burning Down the House” anymore. And I usually prefer studio album versions.
To me live versions are the true measure of a band. I never cared for Burning Down the House at all until hearing the live version, which sounds like an entirely different song.
The trouble with Stop Making Sense is that they filmed it one tour too late. The actual performance is still killer, but the weak ass material from Speaking In Tongues drags it down. The should have filmed the Remain In Light Tour instead.
Unhinged comment
plus you get adrian belew instead of alex weir
The Stop Making Sense version of Slippery People is way better, too.
same with “ Life During Wartime” , that funky synth intro is forever ingrained in my brain , when I hear the studio version it just lacks.
Only correct answer. I skipped school to go to the Pleasant Street Theatre in Northhampton to watch the film. Original airing day, I might add. Jesus, I’m old.
There is one film that could easily be near the top of this list but has never seen the light of day. When Kate Bush gave her first concerts for 35 years in 2014, a few nights were filmed with a view to being released. After some time, she announced that they would only release an album (she made some unconvincing arguments about the live albums she grew up listening to). I can only assume that her perfectionism had something to do with it, but having been lucky enough to attend one night, I can confirm that it was visually amazing.
Summer of Soul should be higher than 14!
Fun Fact: The T.A.M.I. show was notable for one great slight. James Brown wasn’t the finishing act. Apparently when James and the Flames showed up, they found they were second to the last….being trumped by a couple of schmoes called The Rolling Stones.Now James knew this was a mistake….simply put Mr Please Please always closed because well, he was James Brown. So they went up to the director and simply said ‘uh this is a mistake – James always closes’. The director, Steve Binder, shook his head and said nope….The Stones close. (Supposedly Keith Richards said Mick had gone up and said the same thing but was convinced by Steve to stay there)James turned around and was about to say ‘we out’ but then Bobbie Byrd took him aside and said something to the effect of “James, if they want someone to follow, lets make it hurt all the while.” and James said sure.What followed has now been considered one of the greatest sets filmed with James and the gang absolutely blowing the roof off. Its got it all and show exactly why you never do anything but let James Brown close. 6 standing ovations, 3 caped lead offs, pure frenetic energy, and a tight professional band at the top of their game. And above all, A youthful and vibrant James Brown absolutely owning that crowd in the palm of his hand.The Stones literally stood in the wings and watched this unbridled chaos and were flummoxed as to how the hell they were going to follow….that. Keith later said following them was probably the biggest mistake of their entire career.
No “Message To Love”? Have you ever HEARD OF IT? That should be your #1. ELP’s first live appearrance EVER, plus Free, Tiny Tim, Jimi, the Doors and MUCH more. It’s the “anti-Woodstock”, worth watching for the drama alone. Joni Mitchell in tears? You bet. Not much peace and love here. Reality isn’t so pretty. Neither is GREED.
Prince’s Sign O the Times is kind of fake though. A lot of it isn’t actually concert footage.
Joni Mitchell’s Shadows and Light could’ve made this list. One of the all time greatest touring bands ever with Jaco Pastorius, Michael Brecker, Pat Metheny, Lyle Mays and Don Alias – and she still upstages them all.