Everyone's been seeing them, practically every website and magazine out there is naming off the "best of" 2011. So, I decided to jump on that band bus (not band wagon, bus) and do the same. This year has been completely amazing for me, so much has happened.
Let's recap: This year I have seen (in this order), The Dead Masquerade tour (Drive A, Get Scared, Motionless In White, Alesana, headlined by Escape The Fate), the Welcome To The Family tour (Bullet For My Valentine, Three Days Grace, and Avenged Sevenfold), The Noise tour (The Make, There For Tomorrow, You Me At Six, We Are The In Crowd, and Mayday Parade), The Buried Alive tour (Black Veil Brides, Asking Alexandria, Hollywood Undead and Avenged Sevenfold) and Adelita's Way with Art Of Dying and Emphatic as support.
I have gotten the honor meeting Drive A, Nick Matthews (now out of Get Scared), Max Green (now out of Escape The Fate), Bullet For My Valentine, Mayday Parade, Sarah Ann and Jeff from The Make, Josh of You Me At Six, Taylor from We Are The In Crowd, Makia from There For Tomorrow, Emphatic, Art Of Dying, and Rick DeJesus from Adelita's Way.
Just this year, I have realized my true passion is music, and have begun doing interviews. My first ever happened in March with Drive A's Jason Nott. Even though they are not broken up, they can guarentee I will never ever forget them. Not only were they the first band I actually really got to talk to, but your first interview is a big deal. I discovered the amazing person that is Bryan Stars, and got to actually talk to him, which was amazing. He's such an inspirational persom, who I admire a lot, just souly because he is helpful and is doing the exact job I want. I hope one day to do an interview side by side with him, that'd be one true honor. I also got to the major honor of getting to do my first in person interview with Cale Gontier of Art Of Dying, and their manager TJ.
Its been one hell of a year, with some up's and down's, but right now, I am focusing on the up's.
Below are some of the BEST things (musically) that have happened to me this year, and then a bit further down, I'll talk about my favorite songs and bands that have sprouted up this year.
Best Concert: Welcome To The Family tour.
Even though now, for very personal reasons, I no longer listen to Bullet For My Valentine, and some memories of that night sting I have to say musically that was probably one of the best shows I've ever seen. At the time, Bullet For My Valentine and Three Days Grace were two of my favorite bands, and Avenged Sevenfold is my mothers. I remember freaking out when I discovered the tour, and getting even more excited when a local radio station gave away tickets. We got insanely lucky and won tickets on our first try, only about a week before the concert. Just two days before the show, one of the DJ's called and said we were also getting to go back stage. While meeting Bullet was dissapointing, it was still amazing to get to say I have met them, what was even greater is I got to meet them and see them with my best friend. Yeah, it hurts now, because the very next day some shit went down and our friendship shattered into pieces, but I am still really happy I got to do that with him. It ment the world to him, as Bullet is his favorite band, and Matt Tuck is his idol, and it ment the world to me because I got to see him with his idol, and see two of my favorite bands with my best friend. Plus, they all did great, and Avenged Sevenfold had the best stage set up I have ever seen for that tour. It was all in honor of their late drummer, The Rev, and they had a very elebaorate grave yard set up on the stage, as well as they hid the drummer so it was more like a memorial for the Rev. M. Shadows actually had the entire audience in tears or nearly in tears as he gave a beautiful speech about his dear friend. I am not big on Avenged but I love how they still show their love for the Rev so greatly and are contiuning on in his honor. That's true friendship.
Best experience: The best experience was getting to actually hang out with Art Of Dying, mostly Cale Gontier. We saw them play at a bar called Porky's Roadhouse, and that night was seriously a dream come true. Litterally, people usually can only dream about stuff like that. That night I got to go on stage with Emphatic, met all of them, got pictures with a couple of them, was leaning on the stage for all three bands (there was no barricade), got two interviews in one night, and got to hang out with Art Of Dying after the show. It was the coolest thing ever! I often go back on forth on which is really my first in person interview, whether its the Art Of Dying one or Adelita's Way. I started the Art Of Dying one first, because their manager TJ was a sweetheart and helped me as much as he could, but I finished my interview with Rick DeJesus befoer I finished the Art Of Dying one. That was something else that was amazing to me. I met Rick before the show started at all, and all I did was mention I had questions for Adelita's Way. Without hesitating, he said after the show he'd do it. I was even more surprised when he saw me standing near him and he said, "I needed to talk to you, didn't I?" I was really surprised he remembered. Then getting to just hang out with Cale Gontier was amazing. I got to just talk to him for like two hours, we stood there singing "Fuck You", actually the whole bar did, but I mostly heard Cale. It was amazing, a real dream come true. You know they're normal people, but you do not fully believe it until you see it. I actually saw him dancing with his friend and manager, making look like he was raping him, and then get slapped on the butt by TJ. It was funny, and awesome to just hang out. I'll never forget that.
I'd also have to say that the Mayday Parade concert was a huge deal to me, because I only got to go because the manager was really sweet, and gave me a meet and greet pass, tickets, and a photo pass. It was one of the best experiences ever just because it was the first time I went to a show and felt like more than just a fan. I felt like a professional that night, which was a dream come true.
Best album of 2011: Its kind of a toss up between several, but I think I have to go with the debut, self-titled album for Destroy Rebuild Until God Shows, D.R.U.G.S. Runners up were Set The World On Fire by Black Veil Brides, The Drug In Me Is You by Falling In Reverse, Dirty Work by All Time Low, and Goodbye Lullaby by Avril Lavigne.
Best song of 2011: I don't know how to even judge this. There's far too many good ones that were released this year. Some of the ones that come to mind are, "I'm Here To Take The Sky" by D.R.U.G.S, "The Chain" -Three Days Grace (Fleetwood Mac cover), "That Girl" -All Time Low, "Heroes" -All Time Low, "God Bless You" by Black Veil Brides, "What The Hell" by Avril Lavigne, "Don't Forget About Me" by Emphatic, and so many more. So I honestly can't decide!!
Best COVER song of 2011: There's been plenty of covers this year, including the fourth installment of the Punk Goes Pop series was released. The best, I'd have to say is the Sleeping With Sirens cover of Cee-Lo Green's "Fuck You". That song is overly catchy, and I might add -slightly addictive! I also considered Artist Vs Poet's cover of the Taylor Swift song, "Mean." and their cover of "Super Bass." As well as the Three Days Grace cover of "The Chain." It was pretty amazing, but "Fuck You" got stuck in several people's heads, and it got stuck in mine for about three weeks straight.
Best band of 2011: This was a really hard choice, but I think I'll have to go with D.R.U.G.S. They just began this year, but have already gotten so far. I'm very proud of them, and can't wait to see where all they go in their lifetime as a band.
WORST album of 2011: Thank You, Happy Birthday by Cage The Elephant! That album sucked..it only had one good song, and it also won the worst video ever. Their video for "Aberdeen" is AWFUL. Go watch it, they kill the poor dragon monster thingy.. All it wanted was a friend and they go and kill it. It pissed me off so much, I saw it once -the day it was released- and I still to this day get pissed when I think about it. Its just horrid.
I also want to say I think the worst mistake made this year in music was Escape The Fate kicking out Max Green. That seriously was not right, I have to say. Escape The Fate will not be the same wtihout him, and I will never think Craig had the right to do that. Since Max was the last remaining original member I feel like he should have been the one who could decide who was in and who was out, not Craig.
Over all though, its been one hell of a year, and I wonder what 2012 has in store for me and everyone else. It is Christmas Eve 2011 right now, so I would like to wish you all a Merry Christmas. :)
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