Editor's Note: As part of our best of 2013 coverage, we asked our writers to break down their favorite live shows of 2013. Shows did not have to take place in Buffalo to be included on this list. Part 1 of this list can be found here.
Joe Speranza
Grace Potter & The Nocturnals @ Town Ballroom in Buffalo, NY, September 11th
Circumstances, execution and expectations. Those are key aspects of a show; I won't say they are the key aspects of a show, but if circumstances are favorable, execution is solid and expectations are exceeded, the result is a fucking blast. Take the first Tragically Hip concert this summer: my expectations were outrageously high, the circumstances (summer, water, friends, beer tents) were just about perfect, and everything was going well until that deluge of rain almost washed us all into Lake Erie. The execution – while nobody's fault – really sucked; what could have been Woodstock '13 turned out to be a long, wet walk to our cars. But during that failed show, a new set of expectations arrived as they announced an upcoming show: Grace Potter & The Nocturnals at Town Ballroom.
I've attended some gems this year. The Black Keys. Limp Bizkit (I know). Sleigh Bells. But Grace Potter at Town Ballroom could not have been improved upon. I was with some of my favorite people in the world. They played awesome music for almost two and a half hours. They exceeded my soaring expectations. It's a great feeling to blindly attend a show and walk away amazed (I see you, Portugal. The Man), but when you want so badly for a show to be great and then it goes and becomes legendary, well, that's what keeps us coming back. We all like going to see shows. But we go for more than the music; we go to feel a connection. Sometimes, it happens.
Michael Torsell
My Bloody Valentine @ Kool Haus in Toronto, ON, November 5th
Buffalo saw a lot of great shows this year and winnowing it down have proven to be a difficult task. The Mallwalkers' album release party at the Polish Library was epic and a real reminder, along with The Vault’s final night, of the awesome community we have in Western New York. In terms of national acts, getting to see DIIV, Wild Nothing, Beach Fossils, and Melt Banana was great and a nice reminder that one can see great live music in Buffalo throughout the year.
Personally however, my favorite show was My Bloody Valentine in Toronto. This was a band I never expected to see live, but then again, I never expected a follow up to Loveless to be released this year, and I certainly would have never thought it would have been so good. Loveless has been constant presence on stereo for the last 12 years, so the opportunity to see them felt almost sacred. The group did not disappoint, quickly establishing that they were tighter than ever and my hair stood on end for most of the show, even during the seemingly eternal barrage of noise at the end. It was a great reminder that noise and feedback can become beautiful in the right hands and it brought me to all of the private moments I had enjoying their music. I really cannot ask for much more from a live performance.
Jon Krol
FLAG @ Town Ballroom in Buffalo, NY, June 13th
I grew up listening to Black Flag and my favorite incarnation by far was the pre-Rollins, pre-Reyes, pre-Cadena (on vocals) era; the Keith Morris era. Morris, before leaving to form the Circle Jerks, was angry, passionate, and arguably their best singer, although I’m sure many will disagree with that statement. Tracks like “Fix Me” and “Nervous Breakdown” are as much a part of my youth as any other band. Hell, my favorite skateboard section of all time is Jim Greco’s part in Misled Youth and he skated to “Fix Me.”
Until a few years ago, the idea of a Black Flag reunion was preposterous, let alone that the band would re-form as two separate entities; the Ginn-Reyes collaboration which took on the Black Flag name and the FLAG collaborative featuring Keith Morris, Dez Cadena and Chuck Dukowski. While I did not get to see Black Flag, I was able to see FLAG, in all their primordial glory.
My expectations were high and I kind of approached the show with nervous trepidation. I didn’t really expect them to deliver to be honest. What I got was more than I could have ever asked for. Morris was fierce and played with his heart on fire, as did the other members of the band. Their energy and excitement was palpable and spread like a wild, contagious fire. They didn’t play the tracks of yesteryear. They blitzed them. They destroyed them. They HURT those songs.
And Dez even got to sing! And they even played some of the Rollins and Reyes tracks! And it was one of the best shows I’ve ever seen! Simply put, it was a special night to be a fan of punk rock and a special night for those of us who finally got to see a band that defined our youth and inspired us all. They secured their place in the punk pantheon of greats. They lived up to the hype.
Mac McGuire
Mohawk Place's Last Waltz: Night 2 @ Mohawk Place in Buffalo, NY, January 12th
Any other year, seeing Spiritualized, a bucket list band of mine every since hearing "Ladies and Getlemen...," would have topped my list. They were devastatingly good at the Waiting Room. But Mohawk Place doesn't close every year. I won't rehash my memories of the place (its been done enough), but the venue's final night was a special experience like nothing I will ever be a part of again. All of my Buffalo music heroes were in one room, drinking every last drop of booze that old bar had, shedding tears that I didn't know were in a few of them, and recalling years of memories that could never be replicated.
And the music just never ended. I stepped foot in Mohawk around 7pm to the sounds of disbanded Buffalo greats the Thermidors and left just after 5am with my ears ringing from the Mark Norris led power pop heroes Girlpope. Between an Old Sweethearts reunion I never thought I would get, my first experience with Semi-Tough(!), and sets from Chylde, Failures' Union and other relics of Mohawk's past, the night was as close to perfect as you can get in Buffalo.
Tom Dennis
Captured Tracks Showcase @ The Parish(SXSW) in Austin, TX, March 16th
On the last night of SXSW, I saw a tour de force showcase put on by Captured Tracks at The Parish in Austin. With sets from Naomi Punk, The Soft Moon, Chris Cohen, Mac DeMarco, Widowspeak, DIIV, and Beach Fossils, the show was the ideal finale to an exhausting week of music. Chris Cohen brought each track from Overgrown Path into its cool blue light, Mac DeMarco was slightly less of a knucklehead than I’d imaged he would be live, and Beach Fossils sparked a hiccuping dance-pit, which they kept stoked ’til 2am. Extracted from the rock club, I hummed "Home" by DIIV in an attempt to drown out the waning madness of Sixth Street as I navigated my way to the nearest bus stop.
Scott Mancuso
Okkervil River @ The Haunt in Ithaca, NY, September 27th
We rode our bikes from the motel on the edge of town to the middle of Ithaca. There were no "sharrows." We went to a bar and ordered beers and then we went to another bar and ordered more beers. It was a Friday night and there were a lot of professors and a lot of students. We went to a dive bar with a rooster logo where a middle-aged ex-military bartender appeared ten minutes after we walked in. She served us more beers. We rode our bikes over the train tracks to the Haunt and drank more beers. Okkervil River played their instruments very well and Will Sheff sang very well. It made me happy. It made a man in front of us with a green shirt that said "Paddy's" on it even happier. "Paddy" drank a lot of beers. Sometimes he drank half-empty beers that were just sitting on the edge of the stage. Sometimes he put his arm around girls that he didn't know, and they didn't like it at all, but that didn't slow Paddy down. I went to the bathroom after the show and Paddy was there and he asked me, "so what's your deal." I think he meant it to be friendly but I didn't know what to say, and I didn't have a deal, so I just shrugged and left. We rode our bikes back into town and I realized that my back tire was flat. We stopped. We drank whiskey in a bar in a basement and then we tried to go back to the rooster bar and then we learned that, in Ithaca, bars close at 1 in the morning. That's why they all had to drink so fast and so early and ask what the deal was because they were running out of time.
Tom Etu
buffaBLOG Summer Party @ Duke's in Buffalo, NY, August 10th
Some people remembered bits and pieces the next day. Others needed verbal cues and a bit of shoving before it all came swimming back into their recollection. Jack Topht enraged, elated, irritated and enlightened us. A beach ball and other inflatables were passed around in a massive game of "keep it up!" Some in attendance probably played their own version of 'keep it up' that night, but that's irrelevant. The Malones killed it, and bass player Elliot Douglas was feeling it so hard that he jumped offstage. A fellow blogger guarded one of the band's lead singers (name undisclosed) while he urinated into a garbage can outside DBGB's. Shit got weird at the buffaBLOG Summer Party.
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