The Best Live Music Clips Of Musicians Before They Became Mega-Famous

One of the main things that keeps me sane in this world is concerts. There’s really not much better in this life than going to a gig, having a beer, and dissolving yourself in the crowd, the singalong, and the mosh. Even as capitalism ruins the live music experience by reducing it into a painful, extortionate, profit-seeking venture, the sheer transportive power of the gig endures—even though you often have to abandon the larger, arena-sized-and-up gigs in order to find the balance between pain of entry and reward of experience. The industry’s been destroyed from all sides, of course, with gigging musicians finding it harder than ever now to make a living doing what they love—and the audience love them for—doing. Nevertheless, there’s still some joy to be squeezed out of it all, and I personally most often find it in tiny basement venues, the sweat dripping off the walls, a nonexistent barrier between the band and the crowd, and beers still reasonably-ish priced. Besides, another great bonus to those small gigs is that you never know what superstar of tomorrow you might be watching! Reddit has an entire subreddit dedicated to this exact topic—‘Preformances’—some of the best of which is highlighted below for your delectation. Enjoy.

Big Boi rehearsing and recording a video in high school, 1993, one year before the first OutKast album
byu/noam__chompsky inpreformances

Tracy Chapman performing Fast Car for the first time at Nelson Mandela’s 70th birthday benefit concert.
byu/shyopossum inpreformances

Eminem rap battling Kuniva at the hip hop shop in Detroit, 1996
byu/PigsCanFly2day inpreformances

18-year-old MF DOOM’s breakout song, then known as Zev Love X. Eight years before he put on the mask. RIP Daniel Dumile.
by inpreformances

with booty shorts like those, it’s suprising that post malone didn’t make it big sooner
byu/BME_Pain_Olympics inpreformances

Green Day live at the Cattle Club in Sacramento, California (February 15th, 1994)- 14 days after the release of “Dookie”
by inpreformances

An unknown band called The Killers play their new song “Mr. Brightside” in 2002 (2 years before the release of Hot Fuss)
byu/hawkyeager inpreformances

Maynard from Tool performs Sober, before it was Sober. 1987.
byu/100LL inpreformances

Nirvana rehearsing at Krist’s mother’s house in 1988
byu/lynivvinyl inpreformances

Rage Against The Machine - First Public Performance
by inpreformances

Vanilla Ice dancing like a madman in 1989, just one year before “Ice Ice Baby” was released
byu/PerdFergusn inpreformances

Shania Twain playing for friends and family at Christmas, in a home movie from 1991
byu/MulciberTenebras inpreformances

Bjork in 1981, in a band called Tappi Tíkarrass. Age 16
byu/HeStoleMyBalloons inpreformances