We are officially out of office for the US Memorial Day holiday and will return with a new post on Tuesday. In the meantime, I wanted to share with the community a stunning new archive of live music, spanning from the mid-1980s to the recent present. Aadam Jacobs, apparently a tireless music fan in Chicago, brought along his tape recorder to more than 10,000 live shows during the past five decades, and after being featured in a documentary, was approached by the Internet Archive to digitize and upload his collection of tapes. This is going to be a long-term project, and as of this writing, just over 2,700 shows have been added to the archive.
And oh my, what a collection! Highlights include a very early Nirvana show from 1989, the Replacements (including a Prince cover), Daydream Nation-era Sonic Youth, early Bjork with her band The Sugarcubes, REM (YouTube version below), and all kinds of fabulous obscurities like personal favorites Scruffy the Cat, Mojo Nixon, and Baby Flamehead. Neko Case, Rilo Kiley, Husker Du, The Jesus and Mary Chain, I could go on, but I guarantee you’ll find something here that will make your day.