hi,

just read your post and thought i'd give you my opinions on what you might want to look for in a camcorder. i've been photographing live music for over a year but am thinking about getting into videography too.

first of all, like you say it isn't so great that most of the controls are in the menu system instead of being directly accessible on the camcorder. what i would be looking for in a camcorder is direct exposure control in addition to the standard zoom and record buttons. i would go for a camcorder that has full manual control (i.e. the ability to change both the shutter and aperture manually) without going into the menu.

the canon mvx45i allows you to set the aperture and shutter. it isn't so great in low light apparently but has a fairly large aperture of f1.8 so maybe the problem is just in automatic modes? :\

anyway, that is perhaps too expensive for you unless you can find it cheap, but it gives you an idea.

decent gigs in decent venues are normally lit well enough to expose well without a problem. it is the smaller local gigs that can be a problem usually but i guess you probably know this!

the lowlight modes on camcorders basically increase the gain to get a decent picture and therefore make the picture noisy and lower quality. i don't know if there are any camcorders that handle this particularly well but its important to make sure you're not going to get a crappy but well exposed shot!

i'm not entirely sure i've been helpful. it looks kinda rambly and messy now i look back at it but nevermind! goodluck finding the right camcorder...