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27 live acts seen in 2018. Not too shabby for a 47 year old, father of 3 (thank you, Lisa). That’s down from 33 last year. Almost half of that 27 came from the LOCKN’ music festival, which I don’t go for the music anymore. LOCKN is too much jam, not enough rock for me, but it’s a fun time hanging out with old and new friends every year down at Oak Ridge farm.
Speaking of old friends, I did catch Phish again for the 45th time. That number is pretty small compared to many, but those 45 shows have occurred over a 22 year period. I’ve managed to catch Phish every year (they’ve toured) since my first with one exception in 2012. This year’s show took me back to the mothership, Hampton Coliseum, where I caught them in 1997, 2003, 2004, and 2009. The show I caught on 10/19 was the best Hampton Phish show I’ve seen since those legendary shows in ’97.
Even though it was great, that Phish show was not my favorite of the year. That award goes to Dr. Dog. Actually that entire evening was fantastic. It began with a free private show at The Southern sponsored by New Belgium Brewing who were promoting their new Hemperor HPA. Willie Watson performed and several Hemperors were sampled. The night ended with the sold out Dr. Dog show at the nearby Jefferson Theater. It had been at least 10 years since I saw Dr. Dog last and I left that show underwhelmed. I don’t listen to Dr. Dog as much as I did when I saw them last, so I came in with low expectations. That resulted in a really fun show with tons of energy and solid musicianship (or maybe I had just the right number of HPAs).
Unfortunately, I did not catch a show out of state or in a new venue. That’s certainly not normal for me and I’ve already made plans to correct this in 2019 by clearing my calendar on the first weekend in May to attend Jazz Fest.
Below is a list of the musicians that I saw live in 2018 with favorites in bold and first-timers in italics.
