Terrific photos! I agree the audience reaction really depicts fan adoration or whatever is occuring on stage.

Thank you, thankyouver'much.

In my youth, as a concert addict, I used to be one of those people who always fought their way into the front row. The performers made more eye contact with the closest row and could hear what they say. The audience often sets the tone for the performance. One of the worst concerts I ever attended was on Bob Dylan's tour in '94. The audience was instructed to stay in their seats and not even stand up...there was a total lack of interaction between Dylan and the audience, and it was a tedious affair from which I made an early exit. That being said, I don't like concert DVDs that focus too much on the audience. "Rush in Rio", in what could have been a fine document of a great show, puts entirely too much emphasis on the crowd; even the audio is mixed like it was the Beatles at the Hollywood Bowl or something.

Joekipper, what do you consider to a few great concert dvds, not only for artists but all of your criteria?

All in all, "Trilogy" by the Cure is the best concert DVD I have ever seen. Not only was it a great performance by a band (what other band would dare to perform 3 complete albums, song by song?), but the production, video and audio, on the DVD is outstanding as well. It's even edited in a most tasteful manner. The Band's "The Last Waltz" comes in 2nd. Scorsese does a great job, and it wasn't easy to film a concert in 35mm because of the time limitations of the film canisters (part of Muddy Waters performance was missed when all of the primary cameras ran out of film at the same time.) "Live at the Apollo" by Roxy Music is very good, as is "R30" by Rush. I'm amazed that Rush can play better than ever, when most vintage bands start bringing in guest musicians because the originals can't play their parts anymore.
Roger Waters' "In the Flesh" is better than any other Floyd project, and probably even better than the vintage "Live at Pompeii", which was marred by wacky direction. A few of my other personal favorites are "Live at the Royal Oak (Utopia), "One for the Road" (the Kinks), and "In God We Trust, Inc.", (the Dead Kennedys, live in studio). For variety's sake, I will mention that a few weeks ago, I enjoyed viewing "Morricone Conducts Morricone" I also know that there's a lot of concert footage that still hasn't been cleaned up and released. I'd love to see a show from the Who's "Quadrophenia" tour, and from Emerson, Lake and Palmer's "Works" tour with the orchestra.