As we gear up for the start of fall tour, Phish has just announced their plans for New Year’s. The band will play two shows at the DCU Center (formerly
For the uninitiated, simply seeing one’s favorite bands or musicians in the live setting might be enough, but around these parts – where our average reader sees upwards of 50 shows per year – we’re pretty picky about our venues. Our staff and our readers like to see our favorite acts, but we like to see them in an ideal setting, with the perfect acoustics, unobstructed views and ample room – all while washing down some frosty craft brews. Over the next year we aim to detail the best venues in San Francisco, Denver, Chicago and New York City. We’ve started at home here in NYC.
In order to tackle this highly subjective topic, we asked our NYC-area staff members and a few local residents who see upwards of 100 shows a year to rank every venue we could think up – over 60 in total – from 1 to 20. Once we got the scores in from everybody, we utilized a highly complex algorithm called “averaging,” whereby we churned out our aggregated list of Hidden Track’s Best New York City Music Venues, fifteen to be exact.
1) Brooklyn Bowl – 61 Wythe Avenue, Williamsburg, NY 11211
History – Make no mistake, while it seems pretty New Yorky of us to pick the new kid on the block as the top venue, it’s not the novelty of newness that makes Brooklyn Bowl our favorite. True, the venue did just open July 7th, 2009, but the “for us, by us” nature of the venue – which comes from the same bloodlines as former NYC jam mecca, the Wetlands Preserve – assures that this place will hold court for many of the great NYC concerts for years to come. READ ON for more on our top NYC venues…
Missed last week’s Phish shows at MSG or just want to relive the action once again? You’re in luck as a YouTube user by the name of HarpuaFSB has uploaded some of the highest quality fan-shot video footage to the site as we’ve seen. The folks at YEMblog saved us some time and effort by organizing the clips into three separate playlists – one for each show.
Night One (12/2):
[via YEMblog]
READ ON for playlists of MSG Nights Two and Three…
Phish returns to Madison Square Garden for the second of three shows this evening. I’ll be sharing my commentary live from The Garden @YEMblog.
After a spectacular two-night stand in Albany, Phish returns to Madison Square Garden tonight for the first time since December 31, 2002. Our friend SuperDee will be tweeting about tonight’s show @YEMblog starting immediately. Other options for experiencing the concerts from home include Phishtwit and Hoodstream. We’ll have a full report tomorrow.
READ ON for the setlist once the show starts [via Phish.net]
While Yo La Tengo is taking the year off from their regular run of Hannukah shows, New Yorkers will still be able to celebrate the holiday with music as Matisyahu
Eric Clapton & Steve Winwood – After Midnight (Live At MSG)
We’ll be updating this list of New Year’s Eve Concert downloads throughout the week and converting some of the FLACs to MP3 files for your iPod…
Bonerama – City Limits – Delray Beach, FL
Brothers Past – The Note – West Chester, PA
Clutch – The Orbit Room – Grand Rapids, MI
Deep Banana Blackout – Stage One – Fairfield, CT
Derek Trucks & Susan Tedeschi’s Soul Stew Revival – Fox Theatre – Atlanta, GA
READ ON for New Year’s Eve concert downloads from Widespread Panic, My Morning Jacket, Gov’t Mule, New Mastersounds and over 20 other artists…
Among all the surprises that My Morning Jacket unleashed at their instantly epic New Year’s show at Madison Square Garden was a pair of duets that lead singer Jim James
