Happy Birthday am/fm!: 10 cool shows in 2007
(Growing up, on our birthdays, my dad used to wake my sisters and I up with this song on full blast.)
So today is the first anniversary of am/fm. We've had our ups and downs, stylistic changes, musical awakenings; features were created and abandoned; we tried out live blogging and video production (of which there will be more of in 2008). Basically, it was like any first year of blog life.
As the anniversary falls conveniently in December, I'm going to use this space for a little reflection on the year that was. First up: best live shows. This is, of course, not definitive — it's the best shows from this year that I saw and blogged about.
10. Justin Timberlake: Way more fun than I was expecting.
9. Wainwright Family and Friends Holiday Show: This was my very first post. You can tell that I hadn't yet developed my signature rambling live review style.
8. Duran Duran: I expected this show to be awesomely filled with nostalgia, but the absolutely kick-ass time I had was bonus.
7. One Ring Zero: Dork rock that's even better in person.
6. Vampire Weekend: This local band is getting a dangerous amount of hype; Their first album doesn't even come out until the end of January, and they're already a critical favorite. But their "Graceland"-inspired world pop is GOOD.
5. CMJ Seven Band Extravaganza: A chronicle of my own personal musical odyssey. I didn't like every band I saw, but I had a lot of fun going venue to venue. And Spinto Band was a nice cap to the night.
4. Rocketship Park/Two-Man Gentleman Band: Another CMJ show. I chose these two bands at random because I liked their names, and it happened to work out for me.
3. John Vanderslice: I can't get enough of this man. You'll be seeing more of him later today.
2. Albert Hammond Jr.: My true love of 2007.
1. White Stripes: Jack and Meg totally owned MSG. This was really a magical night.
eh.www.amNY.com
Comments (1)
I think one of the shows not mentioned here ( I don't know if you saw it or not) would be "The Young, Wild Things Tour" at Madison Square Garden in November. It featured the rising hot bands of: Cute Is What We Aim For, Plain White Tee's, Gym Class Heroes, and Fall Out Boy.