Elvis Presley at War Memorial — May 25, 1977
Elvis Presley played the Rochester War Memorial on what would be among his final tours — he passed away just three months later in August 1977. Whatever the tabloids were printing, the King of Rock and Roll could still command a room with his voice alone, and Rochester audiences got a show that included “Suspicious […]
AC/DC at Buffalo Memorial Auditorium — May 24, 1991
AC/DC brought the Razors Edge World Tour to Buffalo Memorial Auditorium behind one of the biggest albums of their career. The Razors Edge had gone platinum multiple times on the strength of “Thunderstruck” and “Moneytalks,” and the tour was one of the highest-grossing rock tours of 1991. With Brian Johnson at the helm and Angus […]
U2 at JB Scott’s — May 23, 1981
U2 played JB Scott’s on Albany’s Central Avenue just months after their debut album Boy had introduced the world to Bono, The Edge, Adam Clayton, and Larry Mullen Jr. The Irish band was still small enough to play 500-seat clubs — the same circuit as Joan Jett, who had played this exact room the night […]
Joan Jett and the Blackhearts at JB Scott’s — May 22, 1981
Joan Jett and the Blackhearts played JB Scott’s in Albany in May 1981 — the Bad Reputation era, just months before “I Love Rock ‘n’ Roll” would make her a household name. The debut album had come out in February, Jett was grinding out a grassroots following after being rejected by 23 record labels, and […]
Siouxsie and the Banshees at Harro East Ballroom — May 21, 1986
Siouxsie and the Banshees brought the Tinderbox Tour to Harro East Ballroom just one month after the album’s release — and Rochester got the band at one of their creative peaks. The show opened dramatically: dry ice billowing, a red curtain rising, then the earthquake riffs of “Cities in Dust.” Tinderbox had landed only weeks […]
ZZ Top at War Memorial — May 20, 1994
ZZ Top brought their Antenna Tour to the War Memorial in Rochester, reuniting with a city that had seen them through decades of touring. The Texas boogie trio had survived the synthesizer era of the ’80s and were returning to their blues-rock roots on Antenna — a back-to-basics move that longtime fans celebrated. Billy Gibbons’ […]
Fleetwood Mac at Buffalo Memorial Auditorium — May 19, 1980
Fleetwood Mac rolled into Buffalo Memorial Auditorium on the Tusk Tour — supporting the sprawling, experimental double album that represented Lindsey Buckingham’s deliberate attempt to escape the commercial perfection of Rumours. The band was the biggest act in the world at this point, and their live show was both a pop music spectacle and a […]
Johnny Winter at Broome County Arena — May 18, 1976
Fifty years ago, Johnny Winter brought his twin-neck Gibson and incendiary Texas blues-rock to the Broome County Arena in Binghamton. Winter had just released Captured Live!, documenting what audiences already knew: he was one of the most ferocious guitar players of his generation. In 1976 at the height of his CBS recording run, Winter was […]
Ray Charles at Clemens Center — May 17, 1985
Ray Charles brought his full orchestra and his singular genius for genre-crossing to the Clemens Center in Elmira. The man who had invented soul music by fusing gospel and R&B, who had conquered country music with Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music, was still a commanding stage presence in 1985. Southern Tier audiences at […]
Duke Ellington Orchestra at The Unicorn — May 16, 1975
The Duke Ellington Orchestra — led by Mercer Ellington after the maestro’s passing the previous year — brought the legacy of one of American music’s greatest composers to The Unicorn in Ithaca. The orchestra was determined to preserve Ellington’s music exactly as he’d arranged it, and a college-town crowd got an evening with one of […]