There’s nothing like a New Year’s Eve run. There’s that big anticipation of multiple extended sets coupled with the family reunion vibe driven by the fact that there are often multiple shows in the same city. It’s also a fine opportunity to kick back, look back and plan ahead (from my perspective the NYE run is only rivaled by that first outdoor festival of the year, and the Jammys- more on the latter to be revealed next month). All of which reminds me, if you’re out there (and if you are you’re likely not reading this- unless you’re hanging with friends pre-show, scanning for setlists and the like) pay close attention to what goes down as we are encouraging our readers to send in 500 words or less on their favorite show of the year- we’ll select a number of them to run in January.
As for 2003 in Review, we’re starting out with a look at our monthly Charts as we have distilled and collected our Top 50 Editors’ Selections and top 25 Radio Tracks. So who took top honors? Check it out yourself. I will point out though that Keller Williams has no less than three songs on the Radio Tracks chart including the Number One (oops, but as I said check it out). Beyond that, Jeff Waful speaks with Bill Nershi, Mick Skidmore raps with Paul Barrere, Mike Greenhaus hangs with a Pod and there’s plenty more as well. Oh yes, and speaking of Mike, this month we debut his new column The Greenhaus Effect (given his CD reviews and show reviews here as well as all he does for Relix, he may soon rival Warren Haynes and James Brown for Hardest Working Man status).
So enjoy, relax, recover (and send us your thoughts on the best show that you saw in 2003). We’ll run many of the essays next month.
Later days and peace,
Dean