Awesome (band): Difference between revisions

Bands and artists with their own pages:

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* In June 2005, sextugenarian Knight of the Realm Sir Paul McCartney takes the stage at London's Hyde Park for the 'Live 8' charity event and plays... an awesomely near-apocalyptic version of the terminally Manson-linked Beatles metal freakout [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IVw4u7rq6Ig Helter Skelter].

* The original 1985 Live Aid concert can be considered a Moment of Awesome for music. However, Phil Collins, love him or loathe him, takes the cake by flying on a Concorde jet to play in both the London and Philadelphia shows.

** [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-wju_9Is_60=18 This]. Just... this. Hagiwara Mai (the one on the far right who opens the song) is amazing for a 12 year old.

* Alan Jackson had one of these at the 2000 Country Music Association Awards. The academy had invited legendary country singer George Jones to perform his Grammy-award winning song "Choices" during the show, but only an abridged version right before a commercial break. Outraged at what he perceived to be an act of disrespect against a traditional country music singer, Jackson stopped halfway during his own performance and begin playing "Choices" in protest. That takes ''balls''. You can see it [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tJVp6FM0aH0 here].

* The [[Sex Pistols]] renting a barge and following Queen Elizabeth's Silver Jubilee parade while blasting "God Save the Queen" deified them in the minds of the [[Useful Notes On Punk|Punk]] community. Even after the group utterly failed in the U.S. and fell apart, they are still remembered for having the cast-iron balls to actually do it.

** There are some slight misconceptions in that statement, but I urge fellow tropers to read Jon Savage's magnificent history of English punk, "England's Dreaming", to get the real story. Savage was on the boat, which, to up the Moment of Awesome quotient of this moment, was called, yep, the Queen Elizabeth.

* "[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aHyy4a4SVa0 The Call of Ktulu]" as performed by Metallica and the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra.

** And, from the same occasion, a tribute to [[Ennio Morricone]]...[http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=aPxCeJHUeE0 this is the Ecstasy of Gold].

* The New York Philharmonic Orchestra's visit to North Korea in early 2008. Not only was it a move to strengthen USA-North Korea relations, but it allowed the usually heavily censored media free and unrestricted access to it. Included on the set list were the works of Gershwin, Wagner, and Bizet, as well as ''Aegukka'' (South Korea's national anthem) and ''The Star-Spangled Banner''. The concert is especially amazing when you consider that since there was no peace treaty for the Korean War, the United States technically ''still at war with North Korea''.

* The story of Sepultura, the first big metal band to come from the third world. After suffering under a brutal dictatorship until 1985 this band rose from poverty and limited resources to become the symbol of Brazil's metal scene. Playing in their homeland to a roaring crowd makes for a huge Moment of Awesome.

* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B3hJ5-ngUow That sound you're hearing is a crowd of thousands roaring along...to an instrumental. Rush - YYZ.]

* I think this has to count: [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBHfb2sVWV4 Funtwo and Joe Satriani rocking out on the same stage at the same time!] For those of you a little less Youtube nerd inclined, Funtwo is the guitarist in the most viewed version of [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QjA5faZF1A8 Canon Rock]. If you don't know who Joe Satriani is, go and shoot yourself now (or look him up on Google, if you really must)

* So the [[Dead Kennedys]] were invited to the Bay Area Music Awards to perform California Uber Alles. Only, a few measures into the song, [[Face of the Band|Jello Biafra]] shouts "hold it" and tells the audience that they've sold out now. They proceed to play an entirely new song, Pull My Strings, which is the single most sarcastic, angry and dead-on criticism of the entire music business ever written. Kick. Ass.

** Here's the best part. At the beginning of the performance the band were wearing shirts with a big "S" on the front and neckties that hung down their backs. When they started playing Pull My Strings they pulled their neckties around to the front so that it now looked like they were wearing giant dollar symbols.

* The live version of Free Bird. Left until the second encore, added another 4 minutes of solo bringing it up to a seven minute solo, and started the [[Memetic Mutation|"shouting 'FREEBIRD!' at concerts" meme]] that endures to this day.

* 14 March, 2009: The Sound Relief concerts, held in Melboune and Sydney to raise money for victims of the Victorian Bushfires. In Melbourne, a crowd of over 80,000 (the largest paying crowd in Australian music history), including this troper, braved pouring rain to attend the event.

** Speaking of Steve Vai, I bet you've never seen anybody play a [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jY8wyKuLY2k&feature=related triple neck guitar before.]

* When the [[Red Hot Chili Peppers]] were trying to get Warner Bros. Records to pick up "Under the Bridge" as their next single, some executives came to see them play it in concert. Anthony Kiedis missed his cue to start singing the song, so the entire crowd did it for him. Kiedis was angry with himself for screwing up until the executives told him that when the whole crowd sings your song for you, that's your next single.

{{quote| ProfessionalWidow83: ''Excuse me, but this makes me want to fight, fuck, and dance all at the same time.''<br />

byakuugan86: ''I want Tori to chain me up violently and play my body like a piano while she sings cruel in a deathly tone''<br />

** [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QKpJg7dV8NU Marnie Stern] doesn't just rock like the men, she outplays a vast majority of the male guitarists out there right now. But the moment would probably be when New York Times called her album [http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/26/arts/music/26choi.html?_r=1&ref=music&pagewanted=all "the year’s most exciting rock ’n’ roll album."] From a girl? Impossible!

* How did Snoop Dogg respond to [[Moral Guardians]] going all [[The New Rock and Roll]] on gangsta rap and publicly destroying hundreds of various rappers' CDs? By telling them that just because you destroyed them doesn't mean ''he (or the record label) didn't make money off the sale of them.''

** Similarly awesome moments were found on two separate occasions on Conan's [[Late Night]], where he grabbed his guitar and joined in with Bruce Springsteen and his band for performances of "Merry Christmas, Baby", and "Pay Me My Money Down".

* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aopK2A8MCd4 This fan-made video] for Dashboard Confessional's "Thick as Thieves." [[The Oner|One long, unbroken chain of card tricks]] that was entered in a contest against dozens of standard "relationship" videos that took the song literally. And when the fan discovered that he'd gotten a single word of the lyrics wrong, he ''redid the whole thing''. Kudos not only to him for thinking outside the box and having the balls to do it, but to [[Dashboard Confessional]] for showing that they too enjoy creativity.

** On the subject of [[Dashboard Confessional]], take their song Vindicated as an example. While an epic track on its own, the story behind it is also awesome. Chris was to write a song for the Spiderman 2 soundtrack. He wrote it, but then watched a screening of the movie, scrapped the previous song, then sat down and wrote Vindicated... in ''15 minutes''.

* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T7WxTP3ger8 This performance] by Owen Pallett of his song ''Lewis Takes Off His Shirt''. While playing at a festival, Pallett's set is interrupted by a thunderstorm. He continues to play amidst lashing rain and howling gales, and despite lightning almost hitting the stage. The techies start to shut things down and tell Pallett to stop playing and leave the stage for his own safety. To which he responds, "LET ME FINISH THIS SONG!". Which he does, with style. Absolute astonishment and rapturous applause ensues.

** Rob Zombie and Alice Cooper singing a duet on "School's Out" at the end of May 21st, 2010's "Gruesome Twosome Tour" concert. To footage of freakin' DEVILMAN.

* Perhaps the most obscure reference on this page, but Iranian musician Shahram Nazeri wrote a song in support of the protesters after Iran's controversial 2009 election while in New York and then returned to Iran, refused to disavow the song and was briefly arrested. The song contained lyrics such as (translated): "The soil of the homeland is in the hands of others, rise, my son and reclaim what is yours."

* Back in the days when Jim Crow laws were the norm (but kinda-sorta on their way out) was the same time the Rat Pack was in their prime. [[Frank Sinatra]], Dean Martin and Sammy Davis Jr. were incredible draws for Las Vegas; when Sinatra announced that the [[Rat Pack]] would boycott any venue or hotel that wouldn't allow ''[[True Companions|his friend]]'' Sammy on the premises, the resulting backlash desegregated Las Vegas practically overnight.

** Not to mention that at the next gig, with Jason still stuck in America and with virtually everything organized via Twitter, Amanda and her fans managed to get instruments, props, and a ''giant screen onto which they projected Jason via Skype'' so that fans could see him better and so that the sound quality from his end would be close to Amanda's. Keep in mind that these gigs were international, saved/reorganized within hours of showtime, and all so that the fans could have an amazing time despite the insane circumstances.

*** Think about it; Jason Webley managed to sing along over a transatlantic Skype call. Which means Jason Webley managed to sing along ''and cope with a delay measured in seconds''.

** Oh yeah, and [[Jimi Hendrix]] opened up for them earlier that same year, when he was an unknown in America. So the Monkees had a hand in popularizing electronic music ''and'' heavy metal/hard rock.

* The band [[Phish]] had a festival called Big Cypress on December 30th and 31st 1999. Some 85,000 people attended, making it the largest concert on Earth on the eve of the new millennium - a crowning moment in itself, given the other acts playing that night. The most impressive part, though, is that for the second set of their New Years Eve show, they played from midnight until dawn on New Years Day - ''seven and a half hours'' of music.

* Cee Lo Green in a turkey suit with Gwenyth Paltrow and the Muppets. Yes.

* How could anyone not say anything about Green Day's 1994 Woodstock mud fight? One of the most awesome things I have ever seen in my entire (but short) life so far.

* Any time the Irish tune "Mason's Apron is played, expect sheer damn awesome. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mtSjM3YU7Qw Here] is The Chieftains playing it live as a solo for flutist Matt Molloy; at 1:55 you can see ROGER DALTREY sitting backstage looking bugeyed. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jq0ER7coJPE Here] is The Chieftains again, this time with Leahy, and the relevant part is at 2:40; the fiddler jumps back and forth between bowing and plucking the strings at a blinding speed.

* [[Sabaton]]'s song ''Metal Crue'' is full of [[Heavy Meta]]. So full of it that just about every other word of its lyrics is the name of a metal or rock band. And somehow all of it is put together in a way that actually avoids [[Word Salad Lyrics]].

* There's [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uu9lUbf5GQ0 a youtube video of The Jesus Lizard performing "Seasick"] in a small club, where about a minute into the song, vocalist David Yow gets hit in the head with a glass bottle thrown by an audience member. Naturally, he falls to the floor, then club security is conferred with and the glass is swept off the stage. For a lot of bands, this would likely cause a concert to be cut short, and understandably so. However, after managing to get back on his feet, Yow mockingly ''asks his attacker to try it again'', and when no such thing happens, the band start the song over and complete the rest of the set.

* [[Five Iron Frenzy]] played their last show ever, wanting to end on a high point and not rehash the same things over and over. Reese Roper's voice on [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UPru3nUMfL4 their last song ever] is a major [[Tear Jerker]].

* In the music video for Firework by Katy Perry, every main character gets one.

** One teen boy gets one when he decides he's had enough of his father bullying his mother. He runs into the room and ''shoves his father against the wall.''

* In 1992, [[Duran Duran]] were considered all washed up. Their last album, 1990's ''Liberty'', was a massive critical and commercial failure, they were having difficulties with figuring out songs for a new album, there was a lot of behind the scenes drama, and they were considered pretty much relegated to the '80s forever. Then in January 1993, they anonymously released a single to radio, which got lots and lots of positive feedback and airplay. That song? "Ordinary World", which introduces the band to a new decade and the new decade to the album commonly known as ''The Wedding Album''. While it was only mildly well received by critics (it did a lot better with British critics than the narrowminded American ones), it went platinum worldwide and showed that they definitely weren't consigned forever to the past. (Then they completely messed things up in 2001 with the whole "reunion" crapola, but that's for another topic.)

* The fact that Canadian folk rock stalwart [[Gordon Lightfoot]] is still going strong and touring even in his seventies, after many decades of hard living and a lot of medical complications, could be considered a Moment of Awesome.

* The 2009 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame concert. John Fogerty playing with Bruce Springsteen, [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MSUgWCHpmHM&feature=related U2 playing with Patti Smith and Bruce], Crosby Stills & Nash playing with Bonnie Raitt, and toss in some occasional Mick Jagger and other rock royalty.

* [[Pink Floyd]], Dark Side of the Moon. While the album itself is most definitely awesome, special mention must be made to the fact that it remained on the bilboard charts for [[Up to Eleven|FIFTEEN YEARS]], a feat replicated by no one else and which is most assuredly a crowning moment in its own right.

* Disco Demolition Night. The first time a musical genre was ever declared dead. It started out as a joke, then became the epicenter of the rejection of the shallow, narcissistic, and manufactured values that disco music spawned. After that night, disco records stopped selling like hotcakes, and radio stations dropped disco in favor of rock music.