I know we've had several topics about bad shows. But I didn't see specifically about setlists.

What's the most frustrating setlist you've watched live?

Mine was when I got the chance to see Behemoth live for the first time. But at the time they were playing The Satanist in full. The only extra songs off the record were "Conquer All" and "Chant For Ezkaton 2000. After years of waiting to see them live, it was disappointing. Although the show itself was good. I hate it when bands make setlists based on one album.

Deep Purple have to waste so much time with 70s nonsense like "Lazy" and have no time for 80s material or their Steve Morse era.

It's not even worth seeing them live anymore.

They plugged "Anya" into their current set but aside from 2-3 tunes from the newest record, it's the same show.

Some of my somewhat disappointing experiences with setlists are In Flames, Between the Buried and Me and Sleep.

I saw In Flames right around the time they released Come Clarity, or maybe it was around the time they released A Sense Of Purpose, I don't know, but I was a big fan of their Colony and Clayman era material, and they played maybe 3 songs from these albums.

Sleep I saw a the Heavy Montreal a few years back, and they played barely nothing from Holy Mountain.

I also saw Between the Buried and Me at Heavy Montreal, I think it was in 2018, as they were just freshly out of their 10 year anniversary tour for Colors, and they played only one track from Colors because of this. It's my favorite album of theirs, so I was a bit disappointed, although I do understand they were tired of playing the tracks from Colors.

During the Mindcrime and Empire era of Queensryche, they barely touched Rage For Order live. Usually only playing Surgical Strike. In my opinion, Rage is their best piece of work. They finally started playing more songs from it after DiGarmo left. Never understood why other than they wanted to play the popular stuff.

I saw them in 2018 and 2019.The only non 70s material I recall them playing was Perfect Strangers,Knocking At Your Back Door,Sometimes I Feel Like Screaming,An Uncommon Man and Time For Bedlam.
I had to look online for that setlist from 2019.I had forgotten that they played those last three I mentioned.

I saw Killing Joke in '94.They had recently put out Pandemonium ,and Youth was back in the band.I was REALLY hoping to hear some stuff from Brighter Than A Thousand Suns,Outside The Gate and/or Extremities.....as those are three of my all time favorite albums by anyone.Oh,and I wanted them to play Eighties.
Not only did they not play Eighties,they completely ignored the three albums I mentioned as well as Whats This For,Revelations,and Firedances.
So we got 8 songs from Pandemonium(way too damn many..)
5 songs from the first album
2 songs from Night Time

They have been of my favorite bands for over 30 years.That was the only time I have seen them live,and I can honestly say I didn't enjoy it very much.

Seeing Maiden live on the last few album tours were mostly disappointing as I was not a fan of the last three albums for the most part.

I forgot. It is also worth mentioning Opeth. I think every Opeth fan gets a little frustrated when they go to see them live. As the songs mostly exceed 10 minutes or more, I understand that it is difficult for the band to compress everything into 1:30 of a show. Especially after their style change. But I take the set of "Garden of Titans" as an example. Several songs left aside to make way for songs like "In my time or Need", which has been playing for years and years. Nowadays it's hard to even see Blackwater Park songs live. I really like Still Life and My Arms Your Hearse, and I was able to watch them 3 times, with years apart between shows, and I couldn't see any music from those albums.

When bands release new albums, I know they're going to throw a lot more of those songs on the setlist vs past favorites. Totally get why they do that. But when it's an album I don't prefer, it becomes frustrating. The worst is when the band is actively ignoring those earlier songs for whatever reason.

Septicflesh when I saw them headline back in 2012 ONLY played their new stuff. Almost everything was off the two latest at the time, Communion and The Great Mass. I like a few songs off those, ok, but god damn there were 5 whole albums they chose to blatantly ignore. The one exception was "Virtues of the Beast" from Sumerian Daemons. It was the one throwback they were willing to do, and it ruled. Apparently, they might have played "Unbeliever", another song off of Sumerian Daemons but I have no recollection of that.

Manowar in Santiago in 2010. Only time I saw them, but they played nothing from the 80s or 90s, only songs from their recent albums.

Megadeth in 2012. They were playing two nights, also in Santiago. First night was the Countdown to Extinction anniversary tour, and as announced they played the album in full. The second night was announced as a special Peace Sells setlist with deep cuts, but they only played the standards (Peace Sells, Wake Up Dead) plus I Aint Superstitious (which was a rarity, but also the weakest song in the album). I wasnt expecting Black Friday or (at the time) The Conjuring, but calling that setlist as being a celebration of Peace Sells was a joke.Apparently Devils Island and My Last Wordswere supposed to be played but were dropped at the last minute for whatever reason.

Maiden in 2006 in Chicago during the AMOLAD tour was great, and one of my favorite concerts, but it must been a bore for casual fans or fans who didnt particularly appreciate the album. The Maiden England 2013 setlist OK, but not including Infinite Dreams or the rarities from the original Maiden England VHS (Still Life, Killers) was a dissapointment.

Holy shit. I thought you were exaggerating with this post. They literally played material from Warriors of the World onwards, and somehow further managed 17 tracks from that era. Imagine seeing that gig.

https://www.setlist.fm/setlist/manowar/2010/teatro-caupolican-santiago-chile-73d4dee5.html

Deceased are an awesome band, but they play way too much of their early stuff live. It's kind of irritating because their post-Fearless Undead Machines full-lengths are by far their best stuff. Of those albums, you'll get "The Premonition" and maybe two or three other songs if you're lucky. It's cool when bands pull out lesser-known tracks, sure, but I don't need two-thirds of the setlist to be from an era of the band that they've long since evolved beyond.

Does King actually use death metal vocals on the Luck of the Corpse material?

Can't think of too many instances where I've been overly disappointed.

Metallica
This is a case of a song or two being played in a certain designated slot, and knowing they've being playing others I'd prefer eg:

- in 2019, they were rotating Ride the Lightning with Disposable Heroes, and I wanted to see Ride, but got Disposable Heroes instead. Lords of Summer also opened the encore, which isn't a great song.
- in 2017, they played Stone Cold Crazy in the cover song slot, which is one of my least favourite covers they've done. They also played Manunkind, which is a rarity so kinda cool, but I'd rather they'd have played a better song from Hardwired.
- in 2009, they played The Judas Kiss, which is my least favourite song off Death Magnetic, so would've preferred a different song from that album.

Type O Negative
I only saw them once in 2007, and it was a pretty disastrous show. Pete was ill, so they showed up late, but nobody told the crowd (I believe we only found out after the show), who got pissed off at having to wait with no explanation. The set was abbreviated, so they cut some songs, including Love You to Death and Christian Woman. They still played These Three Things and The Profit of Doom though, which were lengthy new songs. I think to placate the crowd, it'd have been wiser to cut These Three Things and put Love You to Death and Christian Woman in its place. I still enjoyed the show for what it was (especially now Pete has died), but I think this change could've improved the atmosphere and post show backlash somewhat.

The Offspring
Throwing a non metal in here, but God their setlists are predictable. Seen them three times over the past 7-8 years, and a huge chunk of the setlist is always the same.

Morbid Angel were headlining one day at the Metalcamp festival in Slovenia in 2008. I think Vincent was freshly back in the band, and of course they didn't play any song off Tucker albums, which was a total bummer. I recall it being a fairly short setlist as well.

I think that was the only setlist disappointment I ever had, though I may have forgotten some stuff by now.

I can''t think of any set choices so bad they've totally ruined the experience. I think there might have been one but I am totally drawing a blank. These might not have played my favourites and it was a let down but I still enjoyed them - Autopsy not doing more than one track from Acts of the Unspeakable, Belphegor not doing anything from the first album, Dark Fortress practically forgetting they ever wrote the first three albums. Finally seeing Edenbridge after years, and all the songs bar 1 (and she forgot the words to it) being from the most recent albums was a letdown too, I love their early stuff. Somehow Delain always seemed to omit my favourites in favour of what for me would be the filler tracks.

Probably the biggest one was Devin Townsend's By Request setlist at Plovdiv, besides Deadhead and Deep Peace I didn't really like anything he played. I like a LOT of his stuff a LOT, but by God he's also done a lot of songs that doesn't interest me whatsoever too. I couldn't believe how dull it was, at least to me. Least it was 2 sets the second being Ocean Machine in full. He did the Ziltoid sequel in full at RAH too, that whole album stinks - but his second set was definitely the best time I've seen him. Rest of the time his setlists have been really good though, though I go for a smoke during Lucky Animals, I hate that song so much.

Not necessarily the choice of songs so probably not really answering the question, but in 2010 Mayhem played in London, it snowed that day and they were the only band that actually made it, Anaal Nathrakh were meant to be there and I can't remember who now but someone else I wanted to see at the time. They spent over 90 minutes setting up the drumkit while everyone was already in the venue waiting for something to happen then only did about 40 minutes, they were actually decent but at the time I was pretty fucked off.

Not metal anymore depending on what she's doing, but Anneke Van Giersbergen. She did 6 albums with The Gathering, more than that since she's left, but at her solo shows she does like 2 songs from albums she was on, and the rest of the set is covers. I don't bother anymore.

Can't beat that Manowar one from earlier in the thread though, what the fuck.

Been quite lucky with my Maiden experiences, I've seen them on the 2013/14 tour and the Book of Souls tour. That's actually the only post-7th Son album I really like so the setlist having loads of those didn't bother me at all, great shows - if I'd seen them on any other tours where they played most of the new albums it would've been annoying. The bigger bands have usually delivered for me, always enjoyed the setlists when seeing Megadeth, Kreator, Slayer, Maiden, Motorhead, and Sabbath. I also had to make a trip abroad every time I wanted to see The Gathering and luckily their set choices were always great.

The last 20+ years of Maiden tours have resulted in overplaying the 80s classics.

I never, ever need to hear "2 Minutes", "NOTB", or even "FOTD" again. Give me more newer stuff, or some deep cuts from the classic years, instead.

I saw Coroner at Wacken 2012 and their set was pretty bad. Only one song from the first 3 albums, and from what I recall, they played it slower than on the record.

Admittedly, I'm a much bigger Coroner fan now than I was back then, but this set was fairly uninspiring. Even now, for as much as I like Mental Vortex, there's too much from Grin/the self-titled.

Yeah, looking at the setlists they did the same thing throughout the whole South American leg. The whole tour was heavily biased towards their newer material, but they threw 2-3 oldies into the mix in Europe.
I am not a super fan so it was boring more than anything else, but other people were crushed.
There were some speculation that it was due to some legal/copyright issues.

I was angrier with the Megadeth/Peace Sells show as it fell like a scam given the way it was advertised. I ended watching basically the same setlist in two consecutive nights. Good show, but I would've gone only the first night if I had known beforehand.

I agree on getting some of the lesser played cuts from the classic albums in there. They play a lot of newer stuff on tour though. One thing I will say, love the new stuff or hate it, they support their new material. A lot of older bands will put out a new album then the tour has one or two songs and the rest are the classics. Maiden's setlists are usually pretty well stocked with cuts from the newer albums, at least on the tours I saw for the last couple, but I they aren't coming here for the new album and I'm not going to drive to see it. But in Maiden's defense, and in defense of most bands with a large catalog of classic songs, I have always thought there was a distinct drop in crowd energy when they play the newer stuff at shows I've been to. So I'd guess they keep that in mind when putting out a setlist. I know a lot of fans who haven't bought a Maiden or Priest album in 30 years but will go see them to hear the worn out classics.

In terms of the nostalgia tours, I think they could've separated Somewhere Back in Time from Maiden England more. They were too similar, if the first one was more like Live After Death (which would've meant nothing from Somewhere in Time, Seventh Son or the ever present Fear of the Dark) and the second more like the Maiden England VHS, there would've been more variety, and space for deep cuts like Die With Your Boots On or Still Life.
And in the album tours, they could leave out some of the staples, and give room to less played songs from the classic era, or to songs from past albums from the reunion era. AMOLAD was played in its entirety and its songs have only appeared sparsely since. This is not only Maiden, though, most classic bands almost completely abandon their newer songs after the album tour.

Saw Anathema on a US tour sometime in the mid 2010's. I think they were with Paradise Lost or Devin Townsend. They are one of my favorite band and I was really looking forward to seeing them. Was a quite surprised when the lights dimmed and only two people (Danny and one other...I forget who) walked out on to the stage, sat down on stools, and started playing acoustic renditions of the band's music. Granted, if it's going to work for any band, it's going to work for Anathema --but this was completely unplanned and never mentioned in any of the tour information. Apparently, the rest of the band had issues with visas or something and couldn't make it.

Overall it was okay, but man...I was expecting to be *moved* by this show, after years of really really wanting to experience Anathema live, and instead I was barely even nudged.

Otherwise, I saw Smashing Pumpkins in New York maybe 5 years ago, on a 'semi-acoustic' tour. Billy played Disarm on some instrument that sounded like nails on a blackboard doing (dis)harmony with a fleet of ambulances and firetrucks. It wasn't just disappointing, it was actually painful to listen to. The rest of the show was also just okay. Happy to be seeing Pumpkins, but would have preferred to hear the songs in the incarnations I know and love, as opposed to semi-acoustic revisions.

During Opeth's Heritage tour, they had the idea to play an acoustic set in the middle of the show. I think they *knew* it was a bad idea, you could kind of tell from Mike's extra-effacing demeanor during that part of the show. I think Heritage is a 10/10 album, and I enjoy all of Opeth's music from all eras (by far my favorite band), but unless they are playing Damnation in full, their setlists are better off as a jumble of old and new, heavy and soft, instead of keeping 'em separated.

The first time I saw Manowar (probably around 2012, as Lord of Steel had just come out) it was the same, only newer stuff. All the times I've seen them since it's been pretty balanced, though they should absolutely play more from the early albums. Still haven't seen them perform the Battle Hymns title track...


As for Iron Maiden, I've seen them a few times and absolutely don't need to see them again. The set lists seem to always be combinations of the same classics which everybody has heard a million time, and the newer songs that I don't really care for.

I remember this being in 2011 opening for Blackfield, I went to the NYC stop. You are correct, the band outside of Daniel and Vincent had visa issues and could not get into the states, and this went totally unannounced. I had completely forgotten about this.

I was also pumped on seeing Anathema for the first time, I was very high on WHBWH at the time. I can’t say the setlist disappointed me per se (as per the theme of the thread), but was a little let down by the acoustic presentation. Daniel had to set up each song by using a looper pedal to establish “drum loops” (via tapping on the guitar’s body) and “bass lines” (lowest single notes on the guitar) before starting the song proper.

I remember being really hyped to see Into Eternity at Gigantour in 2006, and they ended up playing a ~15 minute set.

Setlist.fm doesn't have what was played but given that IE's songs are usually 4-5 minutes each, this is maybe 3 songs. At a fucking festival.

Maiden playing the entirety of AMoLaD at a big outdoor festival. It was quite a snoozefest.

I've seen Kreator twice and both times they only played 2 songs from the 80s, The rest was everything from the 2000s, I was so disappointed and bored.

Not frustrating per se, but I have mixed feelings about Triptykon playing so much Celtic Frost. The last time I saw them the ratio was five Celtic Frost songs with four Triptykon songs, and this was a rare gig without the 19-minute epic The Prolonging. I love the CF stuff and they're Tom's songs, but I'd like to hear more Triptykon! Sometimes I wonder if there should be a "Tom Gabriel Fischer's Necromantical Screams performs Celtic Frost" like there is for Hellhammer material, but I don't know if that would be feasible business-wise: would enough casual listeners go to see Triptykon (and not be disappointed) without the Fischer classics guaranteed in the setlist?

The second time I saw Anathema, I think it was 2017, they used the same looper petal. It wasn't an acoustic set, but they did intermittently play an acoustic number.

Probably Maiden on the Legacy of the Beast tour, back in 2018. I understand perfectly what fills the stadiums and it's the promise of the classics, not the newer material. I also don't have a problem with songs like Aces High, The Trooper, Run to the Hills etc. But for a band with such a rich back catalogue, would it kill them to change it up a bit? I went with a mate to that gig and between us we predicted nearly the entire setlist, aside from a couple of surprises like For the Greater Good of God.

I'd love a smaller-scale tour where they bust out some real deep cuts, maybe play some stuff that's never been played live (such as a song about a certain Macedonian), but I guess I'll just have to wait until they start touring for Senjutsu.

Every time I've seen Katatonia, their set list has frustrated me. They lean way too hard into new material and neglect a lot of great old songs. Then again, I don't think their music translates well to a live environment, so maybe I'm not missing much. And I say that as a huge fan of theirs.

'Walk in the shadows' was the lone Rage song during the Empire tour....

rotting chirst is one band i wish stuck more to their older material - a few years ago i saw them play two tracks from the debut, and the whole rest of the set from the (then) new albums, which pretty much all sound the same

i expect about the same if i end up going to see them at a fest next saturday

I saw Emperor at Heavy MTL that same year (only went for that day) and they ended up playing the best show I'd ever seen. Weren't they on the same day as BTBAM?

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I don't really mind if bands play a set of a full album, so long as it's an album I dig. But if it's a band I'd been waiting ages to see and I'm seeing them for the first time, I do like having a spread throughout their catalog.



This sort of trend springs to my mind too. I'm not sure if there are specific setlists that I found frustrating, but more-so when a band pretty much sticks to the same collection of "their hits" and never deviates from it. Usually this is something those legacy acts do, but I notice it for some smaller bands too. For the first time around it's not a big deal (since for me it's new), but I find I get frustrated when there are amazing songs that never see the stage because the band just can't shy away from the typical fan-service. Don't get me wrong, there are some songs I'll never get tired of hearing live - like Locust Star by Neurosis, or Ghost Trail by Cult Of Luna - but if I've seen a band a few times, I don't mind them swapping some of their typical setlist out for deeper cuts that very well may be just as good or even better on stage.

Somewhat related - and I wonder if others are the same way - over the years I've discovered I STRONGLY prefer knowing the setlist in advance, including the encores. There have been way too many instances where I go to a show hoping to hear a certain song, the band doesn't play it and I'm left thinking "that was awesome, but...." and it kind of brings down my mood. There are some cases where you can't know what they'll play, such as when I saw The Ruins Of Beverast at Covenant fest in Montreal in 2018 - it was an exclusive appearance, so it's not like you can look at other shows on the tour and see what they've been playing. But when I saw Agalloch in 2014/15 (?) in Toronto for the last time, I found the setlist ahead of time and it was primarily The Serpent & The Sphere, aside from a few cuts from the other records. Not my ideal setlist, but this gave me time to ruminate and accept it and as a result, I didn't have any unmet expectations and instead just appreciated what I did see. Also, even though TS&TS isn't Agalloch's best record, those songs are FANTASTIC on stage.

Belphegor played maybe two songs not off their most recent two albums in 2018 or so. And they weren't even like, top tier old songs. I guess I get that they don't wanna be a legacy act and all, but ya know, basically all b-tier tracks at best.

Isn't there already a Tom Warrior legacy band playing a mix of all his main projects? I might be misremembering.
At any rate, I've only seen Triptykon twice - The first time they were still pretty new so they played some CF classics. The second time I think they only played one or two CF songs.

Tom has a legacy band, Triumph of Death, that's been touring recently but it nearly exclusively plays Hellhammer songs. The only CF song they play is Visions of Mortality.

Yes, and Triptykon has played a few special gigs where the setlist was exclusively Celtic Frost.

Here is Anthrax in 3 different shows. One from 2009, one from 2019 (When I saw them at Rock In Rio) and another from this year.

https://www.setlist.fm/setlist/anthrax/ ... c6df4.html

https://www.setlist.fm/setlist/anthrax/ ... a777f.html

https://www.setlist.fm/setlist/anthrax/ ... 25548.html

Before watching the rock in rio show, I already knew what to expect. They've had this set base for 20 years or more.

Caught in a Mosh
Got the Time
madhouse
I Am the Law
Anti social
Indians

and few variations with a song here and there.

If you saw them in 1999 or 2022, you'll hear the same songs. And even their live releases, always come with the same set.

That's odd! I've seen them six times since 2006, and they always had a pretty heavy mix of all of their eras (except for the 90s, only ever playing Phobia). The best time I saw them was in 2010, when they were doing their 25th anniversary show - they opened with The Pestilence and focused almost entirely on pre-2000s stuff.

I finally got the chance to see Morbid Angel in 2019. I love both the Tucker and Vincent eras, and on this tour all they did was Tucker era stuff. I understood, and it was a great show, but it was a bummer finally seeing Morbid Angel and not getting to hear anything off of Altars or Covenant, my two favorite albums.

As much as I love Morbid Angel, these kind of posts (it's not the first time I read stuff like that) convinces me that I don't want to see Morbid Angel live. Not only is Vincent era MA obviously way better then Tucker era MA, but I find it to be quite petty to avoid playing material written and/or recorded by the other guy. It's also quite disrespectful of the fans. Worst of all, it shows that the band has a great lack of understanding of where they stand in the history of metal. Their material with Vincent is (almost) literally the ABCD of Morbid Angel. How dumb is it not to play that material when you tour.