- The last concert I saw in 2020 was in February - an 80's-themed throwback show in downtown Los Angeles, featuring a dozen or so retro bands like Flock of Seagulls and Wang Chung and even MC Hammer. It was a fun night, but little did I realize at the time that, in about a month's time ... the whole world was about to shut down. It was a long year and a half of quarantine, anxiety, and no live performances.
But luckily, vaccines helped to pave the way for the return of live shows this past summer. For a moment at least, things seemed to be getting better. Since the summer, I've seen some amazing live shows. Green Day/Weezer/Fall Out Boy at Dodger Stadium and Alanis Morissette/Garbage at the Hollywood Bowl were both incredible concerts, and hugely cathartic after a year of being mostly trapped indoors. It's funny (and a bit sad) how so many of Green Day's Bush-era American Idiot anthems took on new resonance in the here and now. And, the show was this long-time Weezer fan's first *ever* time seeing the band live. In any case, hearing the stadium-shaking rock songs from those bands as well as Fall Out Boy quite simply hit different given that we were all freshly-emerged from months of the stay-at-home blues. As for Alanis, she's been one of my favorites forever, but I'd never seen her in concert until now. She absolutely killed it and put on a show for the ages. If anything, the show reinforced just how incredible of an album Jagged Little Pill was (and is, 26 years in) - just one iconic song after another.
I also returned to the theater to see some musicals, thanks to strict proof-of-vax and masking requirements in the City of LA. I *finally* saw Hamilton live for the first time ever (it was great!), at the Pantages theater, after having had tickets for April 2020 and that show obviously getting canceled as the pandemic raged. I also saw a great musical called The Band's Visit, which was really interesting - an Israel-set musical with some great songs and fun characters.
Will we still be able to go to concerts and live shows in 2022? Here's hoping. It's one of my favorite things to do, and in normal times there's so many great venues and shows to check out here in LA - it's one of the best parts of living in this city.
Now, as for new music in 2021 - there were some killer new releases, and some of my favorite new albums in a while. Many long-delayed projects finally released, and some of my favorite bands finally came out with new stuff, a lot of it excellent. So without further ado ... here are my picks for the best of the year.
DANNY'S TOP ROCK SONGS OF 2021:
1.) Dead Sara - "Heroes"
- Dead Sara has been one of my favorite modern rock bands for a long time now, and their latest album Ain't It Tragic is both a kickass return to form and an interesting evolution of their sound. "Heroes" is my favorite track from the new release - a soulful rocker that takes full advantage of singer Emily Armstrong's husky yet powerful vocals. The song's lyrics seem to lament the state of the world in a way that I found poignant and powerful. But ultimately, this is just an awesome rock song - one of the band's best ever.
2.) Iron Maiden - "Writing on the Wall"
- Iron Maiden returned this year with an absolutely incredible double album, Senjutsu - an epic rock adventure that runs of the gamut from fast-paced head-bangers to slow-build metal ballads. For me, the album's lead single "Writing on the Wall" was my favorite - a straightforward rocker tinged with Western and medieval sounds, a killer chorus, and even an awesome animated music video that's like Heavy Metal meets Mad Max: Fury Road. Iron Maiden in peak form, baby.
3.) The Offspring - "Let the Bad Times Roll"
- Punk rockers The Offspring returned with a new album this year after a lengthy hiatus, and it was worth the wait if only for some legit great new songs like "Let the Bad Times Roll" - a vintage Offspring pop-punk rocker with lyrics that speak to the modern era of darkest-timeline insanity. So good.
4.) Weezer - "I Need Some of That"
- Weezer's album of 80's-style rock songs, Van Weezer, was delayed so many times that I kind of wondered if it would ever release (the band even did a whole other album in between Van Weezer's announcement and eventual 2021 release, and the first single off the album, "The End of the Game," made my Best of 2019 list!). But ultimately, this was worth the wait, as in my opinion this was Weezer's best overall album in many years - especially, if, like me, you're more a fan of their vintage pop-punk sound vs. their forays into mellower emo fare. "I Need Some of That" is about as pop-punk as you can get, an upbeat rocker that still contains bursts of Weezer quirk. And it references Aerosmith to boot, so you *know* I'm going to dig it.
5.) The Dropkick Murphys - "Lee Boy"
- The Murphys released a new album this year, and it was a comfort-food pleasure to get another dose of the band's trademark Irish-flavored punk rock. Boston's favorite sons almost always deliver solid albums, and this one was no exception. One standout track is Lee Boy - a fist-pumper of the vintage DKM variety, a feel-good ode to a friend of the band who seems to be, well, just a pretty solid dude. And in this day and age, that's something well worth celebrating.
6.) The Pretty Reckless - "Only Love Can Save Me Now"
- The Pretty Reckless returned this year with more of their soulful, goth-tinged hard rock - and it's tracks like this one that remind why they're such a welcome throwback to the rock n' roll glory days when guitar gods reigned supreme. This one's got some badass riffs and, of course, singer Taylor Momsen's deep-voiced growl. "The sound, the sound, the world is spinnin' out ...". Yeah, that tracks.
7.) Iron Maiden - "Death of the Celts"
- I had to throw in one more track from Iron Maiden's latest album. Whereas "The Writing on the Wall" is the standout straight-up rocker, "Death of the Celts" is an epic ballad that take some time before it can really sink its hooks into you. It's an Iron Maiden oddity for sure, but the almost medieval-like balladry combined with Bruce Dickinson's ever-operatic voice make for a new Maiden classic.
8.) The Darkness - "Motorheart"
- The Darkness' new album Motorheart gives us more of the UK band's vintage glam-rock stylings, with their usual mix of earnest rocking and tongue-in-cheek absurdity. The title track is the perfect emblem of the band's style - it legit rocks, but it also tells a crazy, over-the-top tale of finding love in all the wrong, robotic places.
9.) The Linda Lindas - "Racist, Sexist Boy"
- This out-of-nowhere viral punk rock hit warmed the heart - a couple of teenage girls raging against the machine ... or, in this case, a racist sexist boy who was, seemingly, racist and sexist and absolutely deserving of the verbal smackdown laid upon him in this anthem for the ages. The punk rock of it all is only heightened by the fact that the original viral video featured the band performing ad hoc in, of all places, their school library. Now that's badass.
10.) Dead Sara - "Hypnotic"
- Okay, fine, one more from Dead Sara. They had such an awesome new album this year that they deserve it. And "Hypnotic" is one of those risky departures from the band's usual sound that totally pays off - it's a banger ... a bouncy techno-rock song that makes you want to throw your hands up and get down. Do I want this to be the new direction of the band? Not really. But hey, it's always cool when an old favorite can surprise you.
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