Live albums

Great topic: this is an issue I've wrestled with in recent reviews, and the conclusion I've reached (for myself) is that the audio option has more lasting merit, because it engages the imagination more than a video. It's true the visual experience is easier to absorb, but only on a passive level: you're allowing someone else to decide where you'll be looking, whereas headphones give the listener freedom to direct their own internal concert film.

A classic example: the ELP album 'Pictures at an Exhibition', versus the same music presented in the aptly titled 'Rock and Roll Your Eyes'. A modern example: Porcupine Tree's 'Anesthetize', where the BluRay viewer is held hostage by someone else's (typically spastic) editing choices...

A good concert recording can transport you to the arena floor, but watching it on film there will always be that barrier of a TV screen or computer monitor separating you from the performance...

(There are of course exceptions. For me, it's films like the Miles Davis Isle of Wight concert, as seen in the 'Miles Electric' DVD. Or the recently released 'Roxy: the Movie' from Frank Zappa...not by coincidence vintage material, from a time when our collective attention span was still intact...)

Didn't mean to tie the poll, but I prefer audio.
Video means you have to look at the screen, directly at the screen and not around the screen.
Last few gigs I went to, although I looked at the stage most of the time, it was good to look around at other people and the size of the venue.
And at least at home with audio you can close your eyes and not have to worry about things getting stolen off you!

If you want to see the band perform, then the video of course, but if you want to listen to the music, then the audio provides you the best option, without the distraction of the visual performance. So l guess it would depend of what I'm in the mood for.

I would go for audio because it's a lot easier to put a CD on than sit down and watch a DVD. Also you can do other things whilst the CD is playing. I have a few excellent music DVDs but I hardly ever watch them for this reason.

most bands have scores of live albums.. even more if you go into boots...  visual presentations are much more rare and thus valued.

Granted most are just 4 or 5 standing around playing.. and still even more are just note for note redictions of the studio stuff.  Perhaps that is why there are only a diffinent handful of groups I'd even be interested in live material from over and above what is out there already.. and thus tend to be the ones who should be seen as well as heard to be fully appreciated.

I'll repeat what has been said - depends on the band. I'd definitely love to see a live Henry Cow DVD. They used to set up the stage with old lamps so it looked like an old ladies' dining room from the 40's. And when musicians are multi-instrumentalists, I've always found it incredibly satysfying to watch them switch instruments.

Aaaand sometimes I'd rather not see the ugly, silver plastic digital MIDI keyboards, that erhmm . . . some keyboardists of older prog bands use.

Nowadays I prefer to get the DVD, but only end up watching it a couple of times.  From then on, I just listen.

Audio. I rarely ever re-watch videos. I enjoy videos as much as the next guy, I think they're awesome, but I'd rather have the music and listen to it whenever I want to without having to sit down and watch it every time.

In ideal circumstances, I prefer the performance with video, for indeed it is great to be able to see the band play the music. But CD's are easier to listen to, and you don't need so much free time to listen to them (well, actually you can put the video on and just listen to the music whild you do something else, but that would be just about the same as just putting it on CD). And the most important point for CD's is that you can rip the music and make compilation CD's, or put them in my IPOD lists and so on, and listen to them wherever I want along with whichever other music I want.