An eccentric night of Sly soul and Hendrix rock, led by a guy who is equal parts shaman and showman. ChestnuTT and his band vamped during an impromptu poetry slam starring a few audience volunteers, and the whole thing ended with Cody in the middle of the room, surrounded by a dancing crowd as he sang "Look Good in Leather." Unpredictable and exhilArating.
Runners-up: Simon & Garfunkel at MCI Center, Andrew W.K. at the 9:30 club, the Afro-Cuban All Stars at Lisner, Avril Lavigne at Nation.
Liam Lynch came out with "Fake Songs" and the mimicked songs are captivating.
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Worst Concert: Godspeed You! Black Emperor at the 9:30. What do you expect from a band that once compared rock venues to concentration camps? They're glum, pretentious and hate their audience -- or pretend to, anyway. Long and predictable dirges, minus vocals. Oh, and it went on for hours.
Best Box Set: "No Thanks: The 70s Punk Rebellion"
Punk gets the Rhino treatment on this four-CD set, which skims the curdled cream of the Buzzcocks, the Dead Kennedys, X, the New York Dolls and the Ramones, as well as dozens of others. Neglected greats like Stiff Little Fingers and Johnny Thunders get salutes, and the track-by-track commentary, by Ira Robbins and Dave Schulps, sums up the story and the characters in succinct and colorful detail. Notably absent are the Sex Pistols -- a deal with whoever owns their catalogue never panned out -- but everyone else who matters is present and accounted for, and anyway, as it candidly says in the liner notes, you ought to buy the Pistols' "Never Mind the Bollocks" before you spend more than $60 for this set.
Runner-up: Talking Heads, "Once in a Lifetime"
The songs that Brian Eno produced hold up best, but the lesson you take away from this overview of the protean career of Talking Heads is that leader David Byrne did droll, deadpan humor better than just about anyone else in rock.
Best DVD: "Led Zeppelin"
A double disc of shows, starting with the Royal Albert Hall appearance in 1970 (with Jimmy Page in an argyle sweater) and ending in Knebworth in 1979, the year before drummer John Bonham's death. A TV screen and a set of home speakers can't do justice to the thermonuclear experience of Zep live, but if you never caught them live, this is as close as you'll get to the hammer of these gods. They are still your overlords, only now you can watch them in slow motion.
Runner-up: "The Four Complete Historic Ed Sullivan Shows, Featuring the Beatles"
Four hours of a TV variety show that inspired more rockers than you can count. The band's performances are familiar, but the freak show of vaudeville magicians, singers and slapstick comedians that took the stage before and after the lads is riveting. Pity poor Soupy Sales, who flaps up and down the aisle singing "Do the Mouse" while impatient fans await the Beatles, who perform "Ticket to Ride."
Most baffling critical swoon: Neil Young's "Greendale"
A droning mess of a concept album inexplicably hailed as ingenious. Young says he wrote it during morning drives to the studio, an attempt to re-create the draft-it-on-the-fly work habits of his novelist father. It might have worked for Young the elder, but it failed Young the younger, who ended up with dull, meandering and overwrought songs that tell a dull, meandering and overwrought story. Yes, this emperor of rock has earned a bit of critical slack, but what if he shows up without any clothes?
Runner-up: 50 Cent, "Get Rich or Die Tryin' "
Dude can take a bullet. Doesn't mean dude can rap.
Weirdest reissue: Jack Palance, "Palance"
This country album, recorded in 1969, is the fault of Kris Kristofferson, who was boozing it up in Nashville with actor Jack Palance when he was hit by an insane idea: Palance could be the next Johnny Cash! As it happens, the glowering actor wasn't even the next Kris Kristofferson. The lowlight here is "The Meanest Guy That Ever Lived," which Palance wrote and which he doesn't so much sing as painstakingly enunciate, as if the words have been spelled out for him phonetically. Was there a Jack Palance revival that I missed?
