Top ten live of 2013

What are the ten best live you saw this year?

The Darkness
The Animen (swiss band, sounds like the Kinks meeting the Babyshambles)
The Tallest Man on Earth
Hardcore Superstar
Wednesday 13
Japandroids
Metz
Frank Turner
Daughter
Freakshow (a tiny festival)

Ghost were fucking GREAT, no less because I was a bit intoxicated when I saw them.


I wasn't expecting too much from our boys, but they were playing the same festival as Ghost so obviously I had to go see them. They were brilliant and they played The queen of lower Chelsea to my great joy, unfortunately though I was drinking beer with my mates and forgot about the show so I missed the first 15 or so minutes.


Rammstein. Again, same festival. Bråvalla festival in Norrköping, I might add. Just amazing.


Macklemore & Ryan Lewis. These guys killed it. Great music, great energy, and you can tell Macklemore really cares about his songs the way he talks about them.


Isarel Nash Gripka. Saw this guy a few weeks ago with two friends of mine. We were moderately drunk and stood about two feet from the guy, so it was a very intimate show. Great songs, great fun. You guys should listen to his song Evening.


They pretty much played only the songs you'd expect them to, and the show wasn't really anything out of the ordinary either, but no matter what it was just so much fun. Lots of energy.


In Flames were great too.

I saw Bruce Springsteen as well, twice, but honestly his shows were so boring that it's not even worth a mention. To his credit he did pour his heart into everything as he always does, so perhaps it's a matter of the setlist being boring or the crowd sucking balls, but either way I just didn't have that much fun.

@Harbortown ..so till one week ago i have never heard of GHOST - no you're the second guy telling me that their show is amazing so i may have to get into these guys now haha :Dand i think i'll never understand why Rammstein is so popular all over the world - i totally hate these boys   

..anyway

I think the best show i've been to this year was Archive. Totally dope music plus the secondbest light show i have ever experienced. also the crowd was a bit weak that evening


Yodelice is a badass live musician too. doing loop pedal stuff, great singalong tracks, perfect and looong solo/improvisation parts and the BEST lightshow i have ever seen.


"Our Boys" were pretty good too i just was expecting too much for my first gig haha :Dbut i got to start a 3 people moshpit with some strange girl behind me and my bud, totally died of the heat in the venue and the crowd was really into it so i had a good time


saw Ben Howard and Lumineers too but both of these concerts were reaaly underwhelming    big/ lame crowd and way too much space between artist and us.

This year I saw:
Cloud Nothings and Japandroids at Velvet Jones in Santa Barbara. I love both of these bands so it was great to see them together in such an intimate venue.

Our boys in Ventura in April. First Gaslight show I've been to. It was so great. I was trembling like a fucking teenage girl from the 60s waiting to see the Beatles, it was a little ridiculous.
Side note: If this is what they sounded like during their struggling period, I'm wondering how I'll make it out of a show when they're on their A-game without my head exploding. Then again, I feel like this show might have been an anomaly because they really seemed to be enjoying themselves and played a very satisfying set, with Refugee and Senor and the Queen to name a couple of surprises.

I also saw Arctic Monkeys perform their first show of the "AM" era at the Ventura Theater. Also a great show, they debuted Do I Wanna Know that night

I saw the lad Jake Bugg at the Fonda Theater in Hollywood, which was cool. I might just be a psycho but I thought he kept looking at me, like he was glad to see a dude his age at the show. Only God knows. This picture was approximately my vantage point for the show.

In October I saw Arcade Fire on Hollywood Blvd as part of a free show thing and that was super cool and definitely worth the price of admission   


I think that's it! Looking back this is definitely the best year of shows I've had and I've enjoyed all of them a lot. I feel real lucky to be able to see all these great bands so relatively closeby in the Santa Barbara/LA area

Top Ten live bands that I've seen this year:

1. Japandroids
2. The Temperance Movement
3. The Black Crowes
4. Frank Turner
5. Chuck Ragan
6. Tame Impala
7. NIN
8. Biffy Clyro
9. Joshua James
10. Bruce Springsteen: Sorry Habortown, the crowd around me was great and Jungleland was played. That is all.

You Europeans are lucky, getting Bruce over there this year. He was the best I've seen him when he brought the Wrecking Ball tour to San Jose last year, compared to the other three times I saw him (twice on the Magic tour, once during Working on a Dream)

I think my big hopes for the near future are to catch a Revival Tour, as well as checking out Frank Turner, Pearl Jam (I dropped the ball on these two this year), Counting Crows and Tom Petty and the HBs.
To me, these are the great live bands I love which I've yet to see. Menzingers would be cool too.

2013 was the best year ever for me as far as live music goes. Favorites: Gaslight, Revival Tour, Afghan Whigs, HWM, Lucero, Menzingers, and Frank Turner. As much as I love Gaslight live, they didn't compare to Revival and Frank. I saw Gaslight at a very difficult time and it unfortunately took a lot away. Plus, I couldn't see the stage well. The Frank shows and Revival tour dates were unlike anything I have ever seen. I honestly feel they changed my life. Nothing else like it. The Revival show I saw in Nashville had Dave and Tim that night as well as Cory.

@Harbortown, what on earth Springsteen shows did you go to that were boring? You poor unlucky soul. That like never happens.  

My list:

1. Brian Fallon with The Bouncing Souls
2. Frank Turner
3. Gaslight (certain performances were great, others wouldn't make the list)
4. Dave Hause
5. The Revival Tour

I only have a top 5 because I didn't really get to any other shows this year. Nobody comes to CT and it's too expensive to leave the state all the time. But all these shows were amazing, it wasn't easy putting them in an order or greatness.

StitchesOnTheRadio wrote:

@Harbortown, what on earth Springsteen shows did you go to that were boring? You poor unlucky soul. That like never happens.  

Any show you don't attend is lifeless, unharmonic and dull, you sparkly eyed wonderful person *swoon*

Seriously though I saw him last year in Gothenburg and that was one of the best shows of my life, like crazy good. I think most of this year's disappointment has got to do with the crowd, most of 'em were people in their 40s or 50s it seemed and basically just stood around. Didn't even sing.

The Last Jukebox Romeo wrote:

10. Bruce Springsteen: Sorry Habortown, the crowd around me was great and Jungleland was played. That is all.

yeah he played all of Darkness on the edge of town and Born to run for us but unfortunately that didn't help

Harbortown wrote:

StitchesOnTheRadio wrote:

@Harbortown, what on earth Springsteen shows did you go to that were boring? You poor unlucky soul. That like never happens.  

Any show you don't attend is lifeless, unharmonic and dull, you sparkly eyed wonderful person *swoon*

Seriously though I saw him last year in Gothenburg and that was one of the best shows of my life, like crazy good. I think most of this year's disappointment has got to do with the crowd, most of 'em were people in their 40s or 50s it seemed and basically just stood around. Didn't even sing.

Hahaha. Yeah, it's true for any performer, crowd quality is like 60% of the show. Sucks when it's like that. I usually go with my parents and a friend or two and we have a ball so we don't notice the lousy people around us, but when I saw him by myself in Anaheim,CA last year I had a similar experience.

Harbortown wrote:

Isarel Nash Gripka. Saw this guy a few weeks ago with two friends of mine. We were moderately drunk and stood about two feet from the guy, so it was a very intimate show. Great songs, great fun. You guys should listen to his song Evening.

Saw this guy play twice this year! The first time he played solo and the time he was accompanied by a band. Got to say his solo show was better. The second show he played his new album, which I'm not too fond of, completely. His first two albums are great and he deserves a bigger crowd .

My top 5 shows of this year:

Israel Nash Gripka (solo)
The Talles Man On Earth
Alabama Shakes
Frank Turner
Queens Of The Stone Age