J.'s Top of the Year 2011

I always struggle with top of the year lists. I tend to forget many concerts I went to, many records I listened to, and I'm way to lazy to keep an ongoing list of things during the year. I also don't even find it that important, but somehow it was interesting to think about where I went and what I liked. Browsing through the things I posted here really helped me with that and it also helped me to get a different perspective on the shows in retrospect. I really saw a lot of shows this year, many of them being good, some of them also being bad. And there were so many more shows that I ended up not going to, maybe I should keep track of these as well next year.

I'm not even going to try to reduce this to a top ten, so you have to deal with a "slightly" larger list. This is also absolutely in no particular order...

• Oneida at Festsaal Kreuzberg: they saved Puschenfest for me! Awesome band, I hope they come back really soon!
• Low at Lido: everything went right, support band had to cancel, so Low simply played two sets. Another great show from one of my favorite bands.
• Liturgy at Levée: Mi Ami were disappointing but Liturgy were great. Also one of my favorite records of the year.
• Anika at Festsaal Kreuzberg: this was just good. I love the Anika record and I loved that show.
• Former Ghosts at Levée: it was much much better than their previous show at Festsaal Kreuzberg.
• Chris Corsano with Clayton Thomas at Festsaal Kreuzberg: my third Corsano concert and they were getting better and better.
• Schnaak at bei Roy: Schnaak are just plain awesome. Such nice guys and such a great band! 
• Datashock at bei Roy: Good music and seeing some friends again, this was nice.
• Distraction + Maxime Bobo + Hai Noon at Altes Finanzamt: such a big surprise! I had no expectations at all and went home totally euphoric.
• Monopeople at bei Roy: they saved a totally messed up weekend for me. 
• Zs at West-Germany: This was also just really good. Nice one.
• Batalj at bei Roy: Another nice surprise, no expectations, been blown away.
• Super Seaweed Duo and Vocuhila at bei Roy: awesome people and great show(s). Hope they'll be back soon.
• the Ex at Marie Antoinette: this also turned out fun, even though the evening started with me not really being in concert mood. So they most probably did something right there.
• Sewn Leather at bei Roy: destroyed everything, it was fun!
• Digger Barnes at bei Roy: hands down, best live visual stuff I have ever seen at a concert. Amazing.
• Sissters somewhere...: I saw them a lot this year and they were always good.