The first Grand Funk album wasn't doctored at all, Don Brewer said, in fact the band only found out after its release that live albums of other bands were often doctored. And then followed suit on their mid seventies Caught in the Act which is doctored.
Schenker has always denied that he left UFO because of a guitar solo and it probably wasn't as simple as that. But Ron Nevison is on record for saying that it was Michael who - ever the perfectionist - wanted to rerecord a solo on Strangers in the Night and that Nevison would not let him because he liked the original. Two tracks were recorded live in the studio though with audience applause added.
The Eagles Live outing is hugely doctored, especially as regards the vocals. Some of them were dubbed in a studio on the East Coast, others on the West Coast - Frey and Henley couldn't bear to even see each other back then. When Timothy B. Schmidt was asked in an interview whether The Eagles' backing vocals were always live because they are so pitch-perfect, he laughed and said: "Let's put it this way: The Eagles take great care that everything always sounds right!"
Judas Priest's Unleashed in the East is usually called "Unleashed in the Studio" among insiders and the later Live album from the Turbo tour sounds incredibly doctored in my ears too.
I think the first Grand Funk album certainly sounds honest as does the Slade one. Deep Purple's Made in Japan is utterly undoctored, songs that weren't good enough just weren't used (they left off the Black Night encore because it sounded too knackered, later CD releases saw it reinstated and guess what: It does sound knackered!) , but the Mk III line up's Made in Europe is cut and paste as is much of Rainbow's On Stage. Deep Purple's eighties "Nobody is Perfect" is at least honest as it credits Child in Time to a North American and a European location - the song starts one place and ends in another, spliced together in the middle.
These days, I'm cynical of live albums and especially DVDs. DVD soundtracks of "live" concerts are often so heavily doctored that they begin to look mimed (as they probably are!), Whitesnake's Live DVD from two years ago is just laughable in that respect with a totally overblown studio sound that has nothing to do with how a rock band sounds live.
