{"id":597820,"date":"2026-04-11T21:34:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-11T21:34:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/597820\/"},"modified":"2026-04-11T21:34:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-11T21:34:08","slug":"man-who-recorded-over-10000-live-concerts-is-releasing-them-all-online-for-free","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/597820\/","title":{"rendered":"Man who recorded over 10,000 live concerts is releasing them all online for free"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"text-neutral-grey w-full mb-4 text-body-6 md:text-body-5 font-body dark:text-neutral-white external:text-custom-content-text external:dark:text-custom-content-text\">A music fan from Chicago is digitizing and uploading his four-decade-long collection of live concert recordings to the internet.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text-neutral-grey w-full mb-4 text-body-6 md:text-body-5 font-body dark:text-neutral-white external:text-custom-content-text external:dark:text-custom-content-text\"><a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\" class=\"hover:text-vertical-primary underline decoration-2 underline-offset-4 decoration-vertical-primary\" href=\"https:\/\/aadamjacobscollection.org\/\">Aadam Jacobs,<\/a> now 59, began a hobby of recording live concerts at a 1989 Nirvana concert, where he used a tape recorder to capture the performance. Jacobs met a fellow music fan who suggested that he tape the shows, and relive the performance for free via the tapes. <\/p>\n<p class=\"text-neutral-grey w-full mb-4 text-body-6 md:text-body-5 font-body dark:text-neutral-white external:text-custom-content-text external:dark:text-custom-content-text\">As someone who attended multiple gigs every week, Jacobs thought documenting them would be a worthwhile hobby. In the early years, he faced backlash from club owners who took issue with his taping. However, he soon gained a reputation as a staple of the Chicago music scene, and many allowed the \u201ctaper guy\u201d to enter for free.<\/p>\n<p>Article continues after ad<\/p>\n<p>Jacobs\u2019 collection spans four decades of rock, hip-hop and more<\/p>\n<p class=\"text-neutral-grey w-full mb-4 text-body-6 md:text-body-5 font-body dark:text-neutral-white external:text-custom-content-text external:dark:text-custom-content-text\">Now, after recording more than 10,000 concerts on analog tape, a group of volunteers in the U.S. and Europe are taking it upon themselves to catalogue, digitize and upload each of the tapes one by one. They are being shared to Jacobs\u2019 eponymous <a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\" class=\"hover:text-vertical-primary underline decoration-2 underline-offset-4 decoration-vertical-primary\" href=\"https:\/\/archive.org\/details\/aadamjacobs\">Internet Archive<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Article continues after ad<\/p>\n<p class=\"text-neutral-grey w-full mb-4 text-body-6 md:text-body-5 font-body dark:text-neutral-white external:text-custom-content-text external:dark:text-custom-content-text\">Once a month, volunteer Brian Emerick picks up near 20 boxes, each stuffed with 50 to 100 tapes, for digitization. These digital files are then sent to other volunteers who mix and master the shows for upload to the archive. <\/p>\n<p>Article continues after ad<\/p>\n<p><img alt=\"Box of Aadam Jacobs' tapes labelled with artists.\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1000\" height=\"562\" decoding=\"async\" data-nimg=\"1\" class=\"cursor-zoom-in\" style=\"color:transparent\"   src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Tapes.jpg\"\/>Aadam Jacobs CollectionEmerick picks up boxes like this every month.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text-neutral-grey w-full mb-4 text-body-6 md:text-body-5 font-body dark:text-neutral-white external:text-custom-content-text external:dark:text-custom-content-text\">The music featuring in the collection varies widely. From indie rock, punk rock, alternative music, to hip-hop, rap and experimental. Artists like Phish, Sonic Youth, R.E.M, The Cure, and Pixies make up some of the archive.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text-neutral-grey w-full mb-4 text-body-6 md:text-body-5 font-body dark:text-neutral-white external:text-custom-content-text external:dark:text-custom-content-text\">For more music news, check out our coverage of <a class=\"hover:text-vertical-primary underline decoration-2 underline-offset-4 decoration-vertical-primary\" href=\"https:\/\/www.dexerto.com\/entertainment\/kanye-west-blocked-from-entering-uk-by-government-ahead-of-wireless-festival-3347833\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Kanye West being banned from the UK<\/a>, or the <a class=\"hover:text-vertical-primary underline decoration-2 underline-offset-4 decoration-vertical-primary\" href=\"https:\/\/www.dexerto.com\/entertainment\/live-nation-ceo-blasts-disgusting-leaked-messages-about-robbing-fans-blind-3338145\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">LiveNation CEO\u2019s response to leaked messages about \u201crobbing\u201d fans<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A music fan from Chicago is digitizing and uploading his four-decade-long collection of live concert recordings to the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":597821,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[49,48,75],"class_list":{"0":"post-597820","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-entertainment","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-entertainment"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/597820","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=597820"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/597820\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/597821"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=597820"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=597820"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=597820"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}