MUSIC 2022: TOP 13 live shows

I've already chosen my TOP 7 favorite live albums of 2022, so now it's time for the even more live thing, being performances I witnessed in the flesh! And the winner is... *drumroll*... Jo Quail, who made it onto both of the following lists!

Ok seriously: Isn't it fantastic that live music is back to normal? - No, it's not, because it actually still isn't back. On the surface much has returned to how it was before 2020, I've only been to two shows, which still required special covid measures - and one of those still took the first place in the following ranking. But there are still many canceled or shortened tours, an overabundance of shows leading to smaller audiences, because you just cannot go everywhere - especially during a time of crisis and inflation. But what can I do about it? I just try to enjoy as much of it as I can, I guess. If enough of us do, live music beyond the Ticketmaster monopoly giants might survive after all.

Of course many more concerts would have deserved to be mentioned here, but I'm trying not to go too far overboard with these things this year, which is quite a hard exercise. I think a top 7 for club and solo shows and a top 6 for festival appearances seem like a reasonable ratio to the total of live music I've been enjoying in 2022. 

TOP 7 CLUB/SOLO SHOWS 2022:

1. LAIBACH "Wir sind das Volk" - Kampnagel, Hamburg
   
   
   
   Halfway between a regular Laibach show (whatever that means by now) and a theater play "We Are The People" was a dark kaleidoscopic revue of memory fragments circling around German identity in the wake of Third Reich and WWII, featuring songs and text passages interpreted in stellar performances by professional actors and backed up by an especially sinister version of the band, including iconic frontman and "Angel of Desperation" Milan Fras and extended with the drummer boy duo The Stroj. It's a shame that I only took pictures of Peter Mlakar's following speech about love on this special night to remember, yet in my head this deeply thought-provoking is still present in vivid imagery.
   
   
2. BJÖRK + RUNDFUNK-SINFONIEORCHESTER BERLIN - Waldbühne Berlin
   
   
   
   Admittedly I prefer my events to take place in tinier locations where you can for example actually see what kind of extravagant dress the singer is wearing. But of course I've just waited a couple of decades too long for my first live encounter with Björk, so a first row club show was unlikely and this distanced experience among many thousand other seated fans had to suffice. And "suffice" still translates to the memory of an absolutely magical night. What Björk's ageless voice and the strings-only orchestra conjured under the perfect Berlin summer sky cannot be put into adequate words. 
   
   
3. IMPERIAL TRIUMPHANT - Hafenklang, Hamburg
   
   
   
   It remains unfathomable how a black metal band can not only unleash such a tornado of cataclysmic destruction, but also be so deeply rooted and knowledgable in everything jazz while doing it. With its unique avantgarde extremism sound, the stoic masks putting a face to the Metropolitan moloch from which they draw their inspiration, and of course insane, jaw-dropping performances the New York trio left no doubt that they are rampaging on the forefront of defining the future of metal. Or at least of the corner of metal which is relevant.
    
4. ORANSSI PAZUZU - headCRASH, Hamburg
   
   
   
   There is a reason why one of my favorite fashion combinations of this year is to wear my Imperial Triumphant hoodie together with the Oranssi Pazuzu longsleeve. Labyrinthian, clearly geometric yet hardly decipherable, structures within structures over a lovecraftiapocalyptic backdrop - there has seldom been a piece of merch depicting the actual music so accurately.  Oranssi's blackened psychedelic polyrhythm prog trip is one of the most singular and hypnotic experiences metal has to offer right now. And the insane package with Deafkids and Sturle Dagsland made this night even more memorable.
   
   
5. VOIVOD - Indra Musikclub, Hamburg
   
   
   
   It shouldn't surprise anyone that every Voivod show I attend will always reappear in these end of the year rankings. Nothing against Opeth, but Hamburg got really lucky that they took a day off, which their support band used for this steamy, sweaty, smelly demolition of a headlining show. As always the new material didn't have to hide from the classics one bit and the energy level didn't betray that they (well, at least half of them) are doing this since the early 1980's. SciFiProgThrashParty excellence!
   
   
6. EMMA RUTH RUNDLE "Engine of Hell" + JO QUAIL - Uebel & Gefährlich, Hamburg
   
   
   
   I'm not crying, you're crying! No, seriously, I wasn't crying. But like the rest of the audience I was silently spellbound by the exhaustless emotional power Emma Ruth Rundle set free just with her voice and piano or acoustic guitar. Having missed the live premiere of "Engine of Hell" at Roadburn it was a blessing to experience this performance in a more intimate setting now. Touring together with Jo Quail, who played a mostly rather delicate set this night and also kept Emma company for one song, was a congenial choice.
   
   
7. KIKAGAKU MOYO - Festsaal Kreuzberg, Berlin
   
   
   
   What a happy sad farewell! Japanese kraut magicians Kikagaku Moyo have achieved far more than they would have ever dreamed of with their band that they once started as a jam collective on the streets of Tokyo, and they decided to go at the pinnacle of their popularity. As bummed out as I was not to have a final chance to see them in Northern Germany, as excited I got when I discovered that their Berlin show was just one night before I was in town to see Björk anyway. In front of a packed house and supported by Mong Tong this show was an ecstatic psych rock superlative if I ever saw one. Dōmo arigatō! It might take a long while until we'll see a band like this again.
   

TOP 6 FESTIVAL SHOWS 2022:

1. GGGOLDDD "This Shame Should Not be Mine" - Roadburn Festival
   
   
   
   Profoundly emotional, meaningful and real. Milena Eva working through her much too common personal trauma on the big 013 stage was as brave as it was a beautiful and connecting experience.
   Seldom have I seen an artist being welcomed by such an air of respect. Surrounded by a band plus string ensemble who more than lived up to the gravity of the moment, she thanked the audience with an unforgetable performance, which came very close to moving me to tears.
   
   
   
   
2. SENYAWA - Roadburn Festival
   
   
   
   There is no other band which sounds even close to the unexpectedly heavy experimental mix of tribalistic traditions, drone, noise and industrial of the Javanese duo Senyawa. While Wukir Suryadi's performance on his self-made instruments was already worth its own show, it were the completely out of this world wailing, shouting, snarling, screeching, grunting, throat-singing, whistling and animal-noising vocals of Rully Shabara which made the crowd speechless in enthusiastic disbelief.   
   
   
   
3. LILI REFRAIN - Roadburn Festival
   
   
   
   How can one single person on a stage evoke so much mystical energy? Lili Refrain seemingly stepped outside another dimension which is made purely of the magic and communion of music and put the whole Hall of Fame under her spell. Over gigantic looped walls of percussion, electronics and guitar her voice ascended to transcendent heights which easily rival the planes Anna von Hauswolff, Heilung's Maria Franz or Amalie Bruun aka Myrkur call their heavenly home.
   
   
   
4. JO QUAIL "The Cartographer" - Roadburn Festival
   
   
   
   On a festival edition stacked with commissioned projects "The Cartographer" certainly was the most ambitious and musically atypical one. With the blessing of absolute artistic autonomy Jo Quail composed a captivating classical suite with metal influences for her electric cello plus electric violin, piano, two orchestral percussionists, eight trombones and two vocalists. The perfectly nailed performance of this outstanding piece, which any fan of Bear McCreary's soundtrack work should embrace and which has also been released as a studio recording, was an overwhelming triumph. 
   
   
   
5. MARTINA VERHOEVEN QUINTET - Roadburn Festival
   
   
   
   A state of almost hallucinatory exhaustion, which elevated the intensity of this free jazz tohubohu to an experience beyond regular perception might have helped to bump this show up a couple of ranks on this list. Yet as proven on the already released live album this fifty minute eruption of improvisation by pianist Martina Verhoeven and her brilliantly cast ensemble of guitar, saxophone, upright bass and drums really was a world-class gathering of incredible musical momentum.
   
   
   
6. SOLAR TEMPLE x DEAD NEANDERTHALS "Embers Beget The Divine" - Right On Mountain Festival
   
   
   
   Wow, finally an entry on this list not from Roadburn! Sorry, I've only been to three festivals this year and two of those were just one-nighters... And this joint performance too was actually premiered at Roadburn, but clashes forced me to omit most of the show. Luckily its repeat in Nijmegen gave me a second chance to fully indulge in its cathartic blast of unstoppable brutal majesty.
   After almost equally fantastic performances of both Neptunian Maximalism and Temple Fang I was actually surprised that this one still ended up flooring me the most at the Right On Mountain Festival.