a personal index of setlists & chronologies

December 28th, 2025live jamz11 Comments

While I’ve come around to the utility of the LiveNation-owned setlists.fm (which Marc Hogan articulated well!), I still prefer a loving fan-made chronology or setlist database. Though there’s certainly some wonderful stuff to be gleaned from a giant universal database of live events, setlists.fm’s publicly-available sorting/slicing abilities are piddling at best. In general, as with streaming services, I suspect most artists are better served by not trying to cram their live performances into the same metadata container as every other act, not to mention the pedantic internecine labeling battles that are inevitable when combined with open web 2.0 style collaboration. Idiosyncratic musicians deserve their own data representation.

Below is a list of the spread-out setlist databases and live chronologies I’ve returned to while researching, or perhaps just enjoyed (and a few I’ve made myself). There are surely oodles more of these, the below list representing only the subjective limits of my interests and tastes. I’m adding to it, and there are even more listed in the comments. Please leave more.

To roll your own chronology, I recommend building from live tapes in circulation listed in the etree database, Newspapers.com searches (subscription only, or through your local library), Independent Voices (if artist was active in the ’60s/’70s), and archive.org text contents search. Many states maintain free newspaper archives, such as NYS Historic Newspapers and the California Digital Newspaper Collection. College newspapers from an artist’s performing region(s) are also extremely useful, and often digitized.

Artists

If a chronology is spread across multiple pages, I have often only linked to the starting point. I’ve attempted to focus on lists that are complete about gigs or circulating tapes, which includes some but not all jazz sessionographies. One exception is for Willie Nelson, since many of his studio recordings are notoriously messy to date and I find myself returning to it often.

Allman Bros. (1969-1971)/Duane Allman: Duane Allman Chronology

The Band: History
The Beach Boys: Eric’s Beach Boys Setlist Archive
Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band: United Mutations
Blondie: Blondie Gig List
Blue Öyster Cult: BÖC Giglopaedia
Bonnie “Prince” Billy/Palace/Will Oldham: Royal Stable

John Cale: On the Road
CAN: Known Live Events
The Charlatans: The San Francisco Sound
Don Cherry: Christian Oestreicher
John Coltrane: JazzDisco
Alice Cooper: Alice Cooper eChive
Chris Corsano: Cor-Sano
Elvis Costello: ElvisCostello.info
Creedence Clearwater Revival: The San Francisco Sound

Karen Dalton: Jesse Jarnow
Miles Davis: Miles Ahead
The dB’s: The dB’s Live Appearance Gigology
Dirty Three: From the Archives
Eric Dolphy: Alan Saul
Bob Dylan: BobServe, Olof’s Files, BobLinks

The Ex: All Ex Concerts

The Feelies: FeeliesWeb
The Fugs: Bruno Ceriotti

Jerry Garcia: JerryBase
Keith & Donna Godchaux: Lost Live Dead
Grateful Dead: JerryBase
post-Grateful Dead (1998-2023): OtherOnes.net
The Great Society: The San Francisco Sound
Guided By Voices: GBVDB

Hampton Grease Band: GreaseBase
Jimi Hendrix: Jimi Hendrix Setlists
Robyn Hitchcock/The Soft Boys: The Asking Tree
Hot Tuna: TunaBase
Robert Hunter: GDSets, Still Unsung
Hüsker Dü: Hüsker Dü Database

Incredible String Band: An Incredible String Band Timeline

Jefferson Airplane/Starship: JABase, The San Francisco Sound

King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard: KGLW.net

Ned Lagin: NedBase
Phil Lesh: PhilBase

MC5: Make My Day
Medeski, Martin, & Wood: MMW History
Pat Methany: pmdb
Moby Grape: Chicken On A Unicycle
Modern Lovers: Precise(r) Modern Order
The Monkees: Sessionography (with live chronology)
Van Morrison: Vanomatic

Willie Nelson: Country Discography (studio only)
New Riders of the Purple Sage: NRPS.net, Hooterollin’ Around
New York Dolls: From the Archives
Nico: Tapes

Phil Ochs: The Phil Ochs Setlist Archive
The Only Ones/Peter Perrett: Peter Perrett Lyrics

Charlie Parker: Miles Ahead
William Parker: Sessionography
Pearl Jam: Five Horizons
Phish: Phish.net
Elvis Presley: Elvis Presley In Concert
Prince: PrinceVault
John Prine: John Prine Setlist Archive

Quicksilver Messenger Service: Family Tree/Shows List

Lou Reed: The Lou Reed Rock and Roll Animal Web Page, Lou Reed Gigography
R.E.M.: The R.E.M. Timeline
Rolling Stones: Rocks Off

Paul Simon: Live
The Slip: SlipBase
Sonic Youth: Concert Chronology
Bruce Springsteen: BruceBase
Stereolab: UHF
The Stooges: Rock Prosopography 102
Billy Strings: BillyBase
Suicide: From the Archives