Top 10 Shows of 2006

[snuffbox 0]

1. Radiohead (Bonnaroo) - Not only the best show of the year, but the best I have ever seen.

2. CSNY (Milwaukee) - I had seen CSN & Neil before but never all together. Nearly 4 hours and the best, a roaring 'Keep on Rockin in the Free World' was saved for last.

3. Red Hot Chili Peppers (w/ Mars Volta support, Minneapolis) - I am very surprised that this show ended up being this good.

4. Blackalicious (Bonnaroo) - Very fun show, Gift of Gab is the best rapper on the planet.

5. Bob Dylan/Foo Fighters acoustic (Madison, Halloween) - A true American Icon that still plays to his best and remains vital with new material. Foos were a good opener.

6. Nine Inch Nails (Summerfest) - Kept the kinda lame new material to a minumum and left my neck sore for a week.

7. Govt Mule (w/ Donovan Frankenreiter support, Madison) - 2 blistering, mad passionate sets

8. Dresden Dolls (Bonnaroo) The most publicly appropriate electricty that two people can produce.

9. SIMS/Mac Lethal/POS/TurboNemesis (Baltimore) - A rotating carnivale of Midwest hiphop on a small stage in the Charm City

10. Cypress Hill (Bonnaroo) - A great set, even better crowd, and a boring Beck left blown out of the water on the bigger stage.

 

Honorable mentions for Death Cab, Bright Eyes, Tom Petty, My Morning Jacket, Cappadonna, Mathematics, Mason Jennings, & Dirge.

 

Your turns.

[Youth N Asia 0]

I haven't been to that many shows this year. I rank mine as

 

1. Lagwagon

2. Just Surrender

3. Warped Tour 06 w/Motion City Soundtrack, Rise Against, Senses Fail, Gym Class Heroes, Hellogoodbye

4. The Academy is w/Panic! at the Disco, Hellogoodbye, and Accepteance

5. Rise Against & Thursday

6. The Spill Canvas & Hit The Lights

[snuffbox 0]

Motion City Soundtrack actually made my list last year. Really fun live band.

 

I'm guessing that Warped Tour wasn't the first time you've seen them based on your taste?

[Guest Wart]

1. Pearl Jam(Los Angeles; July 10th)

2. Pearl Jam(Los Angeles; July 9th)

3. The Rolling Stones(Austin, Oct 22nd)

4. The Who(Houston, Nov 18th)

5. Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young(Red Rocks; July 20th)

6. Ben Harper(Austin City Limits Festival)

7. Bob Dylan w/ Merle Haggard(San Antonio, April 14th)

8. Tom Petty(Austin City Limits Festival)

9. Willie Nelson(Austin City Limits Festival)

[vivalaultra 0]

I haven't been to many concerts this year...I am poor, but attractive.

 

1. Sufjan Stevens-(Austin, TX Sept. 15th)-Absolutely wonderful. Very beautiful venue and a very beautiful concert.

2. TV on the Radio-(Austin, TX Sept. 16th)-They only played 45 minutes, but it was the most exciting 45 minutes I've had in a very long while

3. The Flaming Lips-(Austin, TX Sept. 17th)-Yeah, it was good...with the blow up spacemen and kids dressed like Santa Claus and whatnot.

4. Devendra Banhart-(Houston, TX Dec. 2005)-It counts because it was in the last calender year...and no indie kids were tazed by cops.

5. TV on the Radio-(Houston, uh...sometime around June, 2006)-The sound system was jacked up, but any TV on the Radio concert is gonna make my top concerts list.

6. Damian "Jr. Gong" Marley-(Austin, TX Sept. 17th)-Jr. Gong threw down...and I bought my Colombian hat that day.

7-10. Iron and Wine, Gnarls Barkley, Jose Gonzalez, Massive Attack (Austin, TX Sept. 15th-17th)-They were all at Austin City Limits and all very good.

 

I could stretch some more bands from Austin City Limits in there, but meh...I didn't realize that I only went to...3 concerts this year. I wanted to go to more, but lack of funds and my enjoyment of eating and driving my car afforded me little opportunity to go to concerts.

[Edwin MacPhisto 0]

TV on the Radio were the best, The Go! Team were a strong second. Also really liked Broken Social Scene, Yo La Tengo, GZA, and Wilco.

[King Kamala 0]

Haven't been to many shows this year either (Five by my count and two were Bob Dylan shows) so here's my top three.

 

 

 

 

 

 

3. Guster/Ray LaMontagne, August 19th, Cumberland County Civic Center in Portland, Maine. Really good show but a bit odd since the acts were such a drastic styles clash. LaMontagne played a more quiet, intricate folksy set that was quite good but I was constantly annoyed by teenage girls saying "God this is so BORING! When's Guster coming on?" every ten seconds. Guster came on and played a great show which had a surprisingly cool light show. Rogue Wave opened and they were decent as well, though again The Guster fans annoyed the hell out of me "Who are these guys?" I swear two-thirds of Guster fans are incredibly polite but the other third are a bunch of the most obnoxious frat boys and sorority sisters I've ever came across in my life at a concert.

 

 

2. Ben Folds, April 3rd, The Maine Center of Arts in Orono, Maine. Just a flat out great show. He played for nearly three hours on a Monday night in the middle of nowhere in Maine. Really impressed me. Setlist was good too; a combination of rarities, solo shit and stuff he did with the Five.

 

 

1. Bob Dylan/ The Raconteurs, November 9th, Cumberland County Civic Center in Portland, Maine. Bob Dylan, sold out arena, The Raconteurs opening. 'nuff said. Just a hot, hot show.

[Lord of The Curry 0]

Not even sure if I've seen ten shows this year but Bloc Party at Olympic Island in Toronto was fucking ace. All-around great show with J. Mascis, Broken Social Scene and Feist contributing.

[Murmuring Beast 0]

Been a long year and I'm finding it difficult to remember what I've seen.

 

The very best was Tom Verlaine. I saw Jenny Lewis twice - both times were excellent. I saw Morrissey twice and folk God Michael Marra twice. Morrissey was better the last time around with the smarter setlist. The Stones were hilarious. Julian Cope was a noisy, anarchic, mess. Glasgow band Uncle John & Whitelock were the only good unknown group I've seen this year.

[Red Baron 0]

Only one concert this year.

 

Tim McGraw/Faith Hill.

[Henry Spencer 0]

I've attended exactly three shows this year. Exciting. In descending order of show quality:

 

1. Man Man

2. Del Tha Funkee Homosapien

3. Of Montreal

 

I'm seeing Joanna Newsom and Smog tomorrow to make it an even four.

[cbacon 0]

1. Broken Social Scene/Bloc Party/Feist/J Mascis - Olympic Island

2. The Decemberists - The Kool Haus

3. Jenny Lewis With The Watson Twins - St. Trinity Church

4. Broken Social Scene - The Kool Haus

5. Wolf Parade - The Phoenix

6. Matthew Good (acoustic) - Sheridan College

7. Death Cab For Cutie/Ted Leo - Massey Hall

8. Jason Collett/The Constantines - Lee's Palace

9. The Weakerthans - The Underground

10. The New Pornographers - The Kool Haus

[Youth N Asia 0]

Motion City Soundtrack actually made my list last year. Really fun live band.

 

I'm guessing that Warped Tour wasn't the first time you've seen them based on your taste?

 

The only two times I have seen them were at Warped. The first time was alright, but I didn't know many of the songs. After I got both albums down I enjoyed the second time much more.

[Corey_Lazarus 0]

10. (band I forget the name of) - Rock and Shock Festival

They opened up the second night of the Rock and Shock Festival in Worcester. I thought they were December Aeternalis, but a quick MySpace search discovers that December Aeternalis is a black/death metal band, and this band was playing horrorpunk with a SSSSSLIGHT metal edge. I wish I could find out who this band was, because they were good.

 

9. Gwar - Sounds of the Underground

My first Gwar concert. Been a fan since I first heard "Saddam A Go-Go" about 8 years ago, and it's taken me THIS long to see Gwar. Show was great, with "Immortal Corruptor" and "Bring Back the Bomb" being the best songs on the list, and Oderus slaying a fucking T-Rex was mint. Plus, the first victim - a fucking pig (dressed like a cop, how fitting) that said he couldn't let Gwar play - sprayed fake blood all over me and my girlfriend, who both wore white shirts to celebrate the occasion.

 

8. Behemoth - Sounds of the Underground

I'm not a Behemoth fan at all. I don't like black metal, so that eliminates most of their earlier work, and Nergil's (or whatever the fuck his name is) growl sounds atrocious (as in just grating on the ears) on their album. Plus, I always felt they were just sorta Krisiun with corpsepaint (listen to the music and the production on it, and you'll see where I'm coming from). But fuck...GREAT live show. Tons of energy, and there was just insanity in the pit.

 

7. Bad Ash - Rock and Shock Festival

Local punk/ska group, their live show was better than any of their songs. The trombone player was nuts, the bassist had a lot of pseudo-nerdy stage presence, and there was a fucking dreadlocked luchadore running around doing random backup vocals. They covered "Astro-Zombies," which was terrific, and they nearly stole the show from the REAL headliners of Gwar.

 

6. Children of Bodom - Lupo's (w/ Chimaira and Through the Eyes of the Dead, March)

I'm not even a big Bodom fan. I'm usually the first one to talk about how they're pretty lame compared to other metal from the same area, same style, etc. But FUCK can they put on a great live show. It certainly helped that Lupo's is a great club to see bands live in considering its size (not too big, not too small, JUUUUUUST right). Seeing two drunken skins threaten to beat down a 14-year-old kid for stealing their bottle of Jager and handing it to security (although the guard asked the kid to get it for him) was funny, too.

 

5. Mastodon - Unholy Alliance Tour

First time seeing Mastodon live. I wish I'd seen them on their own headlining tour in a smaller venue, because almost none of the people at this show were interested, which is a damn fucking shame. Brett's mannerisms onstage are great (the little bird-like head-bob during instrumental parts of the songs had me laughing), and I don't think there was a single flaw in the whole set (and there's usually a flaw in every band's set).

 

4. Children of Bodom - Unholy Alliance Tour

This is here for comedic purposes. They were HORRIBLE. Alexi was either stoned off his ass or drunk as shit, because he kept fucking up in EVERY song. The lead melody to "Needled 24/7" came in about three seconds too late, and everything was just off-time incredibly.

 

3. Municipal Waste - Rock and Shock Festival

My introduction to one of the finest thrash bands around today. Everything about their set had me with a woody. The chosen attire (denim vests with band patches sewn on, which I have adorned since early spring), the pure thrashy goodness (and I've loved thrash more than any other style of metal or hardcore for as long as I can remember), the fucking BOOGIE BOARD (literally: the frontman takes a boogie board with, I believe, a shark painted on it, throws it into the crowd, and then jumps on top of it)...jeez. Pure fucking energy. Tons of hot, sweaty punk/hardcore chicks going in and coming out of the pit, plus this drunk-off-her-ass cunt that was just rambling on and on to some 13-year-old about how much she loves metal and punk and how she hasn't gotten laid in a few months...wow. That provided a shitton of entertainment when the band wasn't playing. Made me fall in love with 'em, and I can't wait to see 'em open for Gwar AGAIN this Friday.

 

2. Slayer - Unholy Alliance Tour

The worst Slayer concert I've been to. And that doesn't say anything, because it was still one of the best concerts I've been to. The setlist was nearly perfect (better than when they played Reign in Blood in its entirety, even) with the introduction of "Cult," "Eyes of the Insane," and "Jihad" from Christ Illusions to it, plus one of the best tracks from God Hates Us All (that, of course, being "Disciple," even if "Payback" is my personal favorite on that album), along with the classics ("Dead Skin Mask," "War Ensemble," "Hell Awaits," "Seasons in the Abyss," "Mandatory Suicide," "Angel of Death," "Raining Blood," "Altar of Sacrifice/Jesus Saves," and "South of Heaven"), and the only reason this isn't #1 is because of how great #1 was.

 

1. GWAR - Rock and Shock Festival

I'd seen them at the SotU tour, as read earlier, but this show kicks that one's ass. Not for the live show itself (I preferred the SotU performance in terms of what happened onstage), but for the setlist. I'd been told for a few years that Gwar only played their newer, heavier stuff live, so I'd likely not hear "Saddam A Go-Go" or "Sick of You" live unless it was a Gwar-only show that was going to last a few hours. Well...I got into the flow with a couple of songs off Beyond Hell, and then BAM! "Saddam A Go-Go" kicks in as Gwar goes to Hell (the theme of this show was Gwar is killed and sent to Hell, where they must slay their way to the Beast himself, Jewcifer, and then prove to him that they are the heaviest, most evil band in the universe). The victims were the usual for the past few years - Nazi Pope, the Leader of the Gwar Fanclub, President Bush - and Hitler Christ was Gwar's guide through the inferno. Oderus' reaction to witnessing Satan for the first time - "HOLY SHIT, THE DEVIL'S A JEW!" - still make me fucking laugh. My vest is stained from Gwar taint, my girlfriend got an ear infection from fake blood and semen getting shot deep into her ear, and overall the day was great. Autographs from Jeffrey Combs (Herbert West in Re-Animator), Bill Moseley (Otis in The Devil's Rejects), and Sid Haig (Capt. Spaulding in The Devil's Rejects), plus GWAR? Fucking awesome day.

 

This list is subject to change, as I'm seeing Municipal Waste and Gwar again this coming Friday night. Hopefully they both blow me the fuck away again.

[Wyld Cannon 0]

I only went to two shows this year I think and they were both awesome.

 

American Nightmare/Dillinger Escape Plan/AFI

 

I don't know how these bands got together but I'm pretty sure there were 3 different audiences packed into Avalon that night. American Nightmare was pretty lame, I wasn't into the, I had heard of DEP but never heard them, my buddy who I went with is really into them. They are loud. I don't like Math Rock but I can appreciate the complexity. I don't like jacked up lead singers though its weird. At one point he grabbed a speaker, stood it up, and kicked over for no reason.

 

AFI was awesome, played 1/3 Decemberunderground, 1/3 Sing The Sorrow, and 1/3 older stuff. They ended with God Called In Sick Today which was awesome.

 

mewithoutYou/Thursday

 

There was another band here but fuck I just can't remember. Thursday is one of my favorite bands and they delivered. Awesome show.

[Youth N Asia 0]

I've seen Thursday twice and both times I was underwhelmed. If it weren't for Rise Against and a suprisingly decient Billy Talent the show wouldn't have made my list

[C Dubya 04 0]

7. Govt Mule (w/ Donovan Frankenreiter support, Madison) - 2 blistering, mad passionate sets

Your turns.

 

I told you to go to that.

[Mik 0]

I've seen only a few this year...

 

1: The Cribs/Death Cab for Cutie/Franz Ferdinand: Cribs rocked as the opener, Death Cab predictably sucked ass but made all the little girls happy and Franz was probably the best show I've seen in years. They completely rocked and were fantastic live.

 

2: The Format/Straylight Run/Matt Pond PA: The Format put one an amazing near 2 hour live show. Just awesome. I never heard of Straylight Run before this but they were pretty decent live. I came home to found out that it's what's left of Taking Back Sunday and their CD is pretty emo but they were decent live.

 

3. The Strokes: They were ok but nothing special

 

That's about it. Not too much in my area this year that I wanted to see.

[Corey_Lazarus 0]

American Nightmare/Dillinger Escape Plan/AFI

 

I don't know how these bands got together but I'm pretty sure there were 3 different audiences packed into Avalon that night. American Nightmare was pretty lame, I wasn't into the, I had heard of DEP but never heard them, my buddy who I went with is really into them. They are loud. I don't like Math Rock but I can appreciate the complexity. I don't like jacked up lead singers though its weird. At one point he grabbed a speaker, stood it up, and kicked over for no reason.

Wow...I think it's kinda funny how the one band on the show you didn't care for at all, American Nightmare, is the only band on that bill I wouldn't mind seeing.

[Garth 0]

1)Dick Valentine - Cardiff Barfly

2)Art Brut - Bristol Fleece

3)Hot Chip - Secret Gig: Bristol Grammer School

4)Eagles Of Death Metal - Reading Festival

5)Gogol Bordello - Reading Festival

6)Peaches - Reading Festival

7)Dresdan Dolls - Reading Festival

8)Queens of the Stone Age - Hyde Park

9)Juliete and the Licks - Cardiff Solus

10)Kanye West - Cardiff CIA

[Henry Spencer 0]

Joanna Newsom gets slotted up to number one. Holy fuck.

[Alro 0]

I only went to two shows this year, featuring 5 acts, so here are those 5 in order of show quality.

 

1. Pearl Jam - 6/24 - Cincinnati, OH - Probably the best concert I've ever seen and definitely the loudest crowd I've ever been a part of. Their 2003 show was flooded out, so the were making up for lost time.

 

2. Counting Crows - 7/12 - Cincinnati, OH - 5th time seeing them and they were much better than the 4 time I saw them 3 years ago. I wish a recording would surface of this.

 

3. Augustana - 7/12 - Cincinnati, OH - They opened for CC/GGD and were pretty good. I'd heard their stuff before and they did a good job considering they were playing in from of people walking in and in the daylight.

 

4. Robert Pollard - 6/24 - Cincinnati, OH - Opening for Pearl Jam. I didn't like him at first, but as his set went on, I warmed up. He won me over with the last song he did, "Love is Stronger Than Witchcraft".

 

5. Goo Goo Dolls - 7/12 - Cincinnati, OH - If you ever have any desire to see them (and I would hope that you wouldn't), take your Goo Goo Dolls CD collection, load them into your CD player and hit random play. Them playing live sounds exactly like them playing on a CD. No variation at all. No solos, no covers, nothing. Blah.

[Edwin MacPhisto 0]

Joanna Newsom gets slotted up to number one. Holy fuck.

Does she look hot or weird live? Or...both?

[Henry Spencer 0]

She's absolutely adorable in both appearance and mannerism. This probably played an unfairly large part in my enjoyment of the concert, but what can I say, I'm a man of simple tastes.

[Carnival 0]

My #1 - Atmosphere

[Frosty 0]

I'm suprised nobody mentioned Guns and Roses. They were one of the best shows I've seen this year. That, along with 2 nights of Pearl Jam, Stones playing with Alice Cooper and Kanye West in Halifax. Alice Cooper was good when I seen him play as a headliner as well.

[snuffbox 0]

GnR probably would have made my list had I felt like paying $90 to see them and Sebastian Bach.

[Corey_Lazarus 0]

Nobody in their right mind would pay $90 to see a show featuring Sebastian Bach without Skid Row.

[Rendclaw 0]

My thoughts exactly, Corey. Sebastian and the band are nowhere near as good apart as they are together.

 

 

I only saw two concerts this year, so this will be brief.

 

2 - Nickelback/Hinder/Hoobastank/some other band: The tickets were given by my GF's sister-in-law, which is just as well. Nickelback was pretty damn good live, and they get the fact that a concert should be more an event, and they went old school with plenty of pyro and a nice little Dimebag tribute. It almost wasn;t worth sitting through the other three bands, though.

 

1 - Iron Maiden/Bullet For My Valentine: I know, I know... big surprise, right? Given the fact that Maiden is my favorite band, I hadn;t seen them in ten years, I got floor tix, and I gave my digital camera one hell of a workout all added up to a great night. They were tight and in the pocket, and the new material sounded good even though I was a little disappointed by the lack of playing their classic music. I know why they did that however, and I look forward to seeing them again in 2007.

[snuffbox 0]

I wouldnt pay $0.90 to see Sebastian Bach with or without Skid Row.