Bands You Saw Before They Were Discovered

[EvilSmurf]

My wife saw Alient Ant Farm when they were still playing support band at bars.

[theRealMacoy]

the Tragically Hip

they are a canadian band from kingston ontario. saw them in a number of little tiny pubs when i was in town for school.

i remember the lead singer Gordon Downy having pretty intense b.o. at one show. fantastic shows with the electric spark of a band about to take off clearly palpable.

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also the Bare-Naked Ladies

about the same time period i saw them a couple of times in a little bar in toronto. they were an unknown college band at the time. at one show i actually bought one of their bands tapes which later went on to be the largest selling self-released album in canadian history.

BNL's shows were also really great with incredible amounts of energy.

cheers,
sean

[Fishwhenican]

I saw Johnny Cougar (John Mellencamp) a LONG time ago. He was the opening act in a three band show where "Head East" was the headliner. He just blew away the other bands! My buddies and I used to go to clubs to see a band called "Pure Jam" and the lead singer for this band was Joe Mellencamp who was John's brother. They were really good but obviously never made it like John did.

Only other thing was a once removed brush with someone who made it really big. My best friend the last couple of years I was in Ohio, Paul, was the keyboard player in a band we were in. He was a couple of years older than me used to play in a band called "The Greaser Band". He was really good friends with the lead singer, Dwight, and they were a really good band. By the time I had met Paul, Dwight had moved to Nashville and then LA to become a big star. Dwight was really good and all of that but we all knew a lot of really talented musicians and figured Dwight was simply crazy. I can remember Paul telling me on more than one occasion that Dwight had called the night before and how crazy he was to be out in LA basically starving. He used to say "that idiot is out there living on Chip Dip".

Anyway, a few years go by and I have moved away but still talk to Paul every now and then. On one of these talks he is all excited asking if I saw Dwight on TV the night before. I am ask him wha the heck he is talking about. He asks if I watched the Country Music awards the night before. For some crazy reason I actually had seen it. I wasn't much into Country music then but my wife wanted to watch it and there just wasn't anything else on that night or something. A light goes on over my head just as Paul is saying Dwight just won the award for best new artist. "Dwight" is Dwight Yoakam. Guess living on chip dip pays off for some.

[KaneKungFu123]

so many bands are put together and didnt really exist until they made it.

[cwsiggy]

G-Love and Special Sauce
The Verve

[DukeSucks]

May not count, but I saw Foo Fighters in a club before they put out their first CD and anybody heard of them. They opened for Mike Watt, who was backed by Dave Grohl on drums and Eddie Vedder and Pat Smear on guitar.

[Kramer.]

Wilco

I was totally uninterested in seeing a "country" show, but a friend dragged me to Club DeWash in Madison to see them in 1994. Great show, and I've loved them ever since then.

[*TT*]

Fugazzi - They played on the white house lawn, one of their first gigs, only like 20 or so people in the audience. One of the best shows I've ever seen surprisingly.

Samhain - first live performance after the Misfits broke up

Blues Traveler - Live at CBGB's

Living Color - Live at CBGB's 2 years before their first album

Beastie Boys - When they used to be called the Young & the Useless. I also owned their Pollywog Stew 45"

C&C Music Factory - don't ask, and I won't have to tell you

[vexvelour]

Nonpoint. Crappy Miami local band that got signed and became somewhat known. Sirius plays their songs all time.

[Theodore Donald Kiravatsos]

[ QUOTE ]
Verve Pipe. Meh. They were more or less weekly at a local college bar for a year or so. I hated them and I hated the fact that my favorite bar was so packed when they played.

[/ QUOTE ]

MSU or WMU? Or M?