The Fourth of July isn’t just the anniversary of this nation’s birth, it’s also the day now recognized as marking the break-up of perhaps the greatest of all the ’80s college-rock acts: The Replacements, who performed their final concert exactly 20 years ago today in Chicago’s Grant Park.
To honor the occasion, we present, below, a full stream of the Mats’ 19-song performance on July 4, 1991, as broadcast at the time by Chicago’s WXRT and bootlegged as Institutionalized. Sure, it’s not the band it its prime — the set is heavy on All Shook Down, plus Bob Stinson was long gone, and, by then, Chris Mars had been replaced by Steve Foley — but it’s a great-sounding show, and certainly a historic one.
Stream the Replacements’ final concert after the jump…
The Replacements: Live in Grant Park, Chicago, 7/4/91 by Slicing Up Eyeballs
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I was there in the 10th row. Great day all around with Material Issue and NRBQ opening.
Awesome. I made this cd.
Sounds awesome! I loved Material Issue as well. I had heard of NRBQ but never heard their music. You saw the very last Mats show. That is something to tell the grand kids. Peace.
Wow. That was great. Thanks. I saw them many times, but, never this coherent.
At the time I didn’t care. Now I do. I’m old.
don’t remember much about this show, I was there with my best friend, after a few too many hits off the vodka he started crying about all the people who’d died on him at the hospital he worked at–I remember a lot of older hipsters (to me) playing frisbee. I didn’t really catch on to the ‘Mats till years later.
WOW.. this is cool man I had no idea anyone had the last show. This is significant. I kept waiting for a band to take on this sort of sound and that life would get better. That day never came. So many forgettable acts came on in the 90’s and 2000’s and none of them came close to Westerberg and the Replacements. God rest their guts.