I can’t believe the Earth has made another journey around the sun and it’s already December and time for our annual, year-end, “Best Of” lists. It seems just like yesterday I was sitting around the B&V labs, dreading January – which thankfully wasn’t dry this year – researching music from 1973 for a playlist. When I started this blog, as I stated in my Mission Statement, I intended to focus on older artists making new music. I was probably deluding myself as my focus was never going to be that narrow. I wasn’t thinking about all the great vault releases/reissues that come out every year. That’s the stuff the artist kept in the can over the years. And while I have to say, in 2023, there wasn’t a ton of new music from our classic rock heroes, what little there was released was of amazingly high quality.

I have started my year-end post a number of times with a quote from Don Henley, “It was a pretty good year for fashion, a lousy year for rock n’ roll.” I really can’t say that about 2023. I could never complain about the year that the Stones, after 18 years, finally decided to put out an album of original material. There was so much great stuff put out in the universe, including an amazing slate of concerts this year. It’s always nice to have a show to look forward to. My first show this year was Bush, a band I’d kinda given up on until their last LP came out, The Art Of Survival. Bush tore the roof of the joint and for bonus points, one of my favorite new bands, Starcrawler opened up. The Rock Chick talked me into seeing Springsteen again and man, am I happy she did. It was one of the best, if not the best concert I’ve ever seen from the E Street Band… of course I didn’t get to go to The River tour show in ’79…(bygones Brewster). I also traveled to Vegas to see U2 at the Sphere and Billy Idol two days later. Believe it or not, I saw ex Traffic guitarist Dave Mason on Martha’s Vineyard this summer… but that’s a long story. Closer to home I saw 311 and the Struts this year in small venues and both were fabulous. Guns N Roses at a local baseball park was pretty epic as well. I certainly did my part to support live music this year. Buy the ticket, see the show, people.

Of course, raucous evenings at live shows weren’t the only story of rock n roll in 2023. We lost a lot of great ones this year. In the span of about a week we lost Tony Bennett, Sinead O’Connor and ex-Eagle Randy Meisner. That was a tough stretch. We’d started off the year losing guitar virtuoso Jeff Beck and ex-Byrd, ex CSNY member David Crosby. Croz was in the midst of a great late career renaissance so that stung. It was also quite the gut punch to lose songwriter/guitarist Robbie Robertson from the Band. It started to feel like legends were dropping left and right. We also lost Jimmy Buffett and Tina Turner. I wasn’t a huge fan of those last two artists, but their influence and cultural impact can not be overstated. Man, tough year, indeed.

Some artists went old school and only released a stray single, like artists used to do in the 70s. Back then it was common for a band to issue a single and not put it on the next album. Of course we all still collected 45s back then. The Faces, McCartney, the Who and so many others used to do that. I guess everything old is new again and we had a handful of great non-album singles this year. Beck released the heartbreakingly beautiful “Thinking About You.” Lenny Kravitz is ready to sex you up on “TK421.” Guns N Roses continued their string of releasing Axl Rose’s old songs from the Chinese Democracy sessions as new material with the release of “Perhaps,” a track I actually really like. In a surreal collision of two worlds Al Green covered Lou Reed’s “Perfect Day,” a song I used to play for the Rock Chick and the daughter when they were collectively pissing me off… and Al’s version is sublime. Best of all, Paul McCartney went in and used some high tech to finish “Now And Then,” the Beatles’ final song. Oh my, how I love that song. It’s so easy to miss a great single when it comes out… check out each of these tracks, I think you’ll dig them.

Without further adieu, here are our favorites from 2023… If you haven’t checked these albums out, I urge you to do so while you’re trying to drowned out relatives over the next week or so… These lists are in no particular order and do not imply a stack ranking. The links to our original reviews are embedded.

Best New Albums 2023

• Iggy Pop, Every Loser – Right out of the chute 2023 exploded with a rock n roll banger from Iggy. This album was produced by the white-hot Andrew Watt who will appear a couple times on this list. This is Iggy’s most Stooges sounding album in years.
• Depeche Mode, Momento Mori – Depeche Mode’s (Dave Gahan, vocals; Martin Gore, guitar/keyboards/vocal) first album since the death of founding, longtime member Andy Fletcher. While he didn’t play on the record, Fletch’s presence is all over this dark, intense record. It’s a grower, it takes a few spins to get into it, but that doesn’t mean Momento Mori isn’t superb Depeche. “Ghosts Again,” for me, ranks amongst their best songs.
• Metallica, 72 Seasons – Metallica do one thing but they do it very well. This hard ass metal album is one of their best. These guys are on the harder end of the B&V spectrum but they’re so genius it’s worth the hearing loss.
• John Mellencamp, Orpheus Descending – The best album of protest music that you’re ever going to hear. “Hey God” is one of the best tracks Mellencamp has ever done. We’re not a political blog here, I’m a lover not a fighter, but this music is topical, rousing and just kick ass.
• Queens Of The Stone Age, In Times New Roman… – After some almost funky LPs, Queens return to their harder, earlier sound. I really dug this record.
• Greta Van Fleet, Starcatcher – After the somewhat tenuous second album, The Battle At the Garden Gate, GVF returned with a great third record. Never underestimate the “sophomore slump”… it’s hard to overcome but GVF are back on the right track. “Meeting The Master” is an epic tune that deserves to be cranked up to 11.
• Pretenders, Relentless – Chrissie Hynde and the gang follow up the great Hate For Sale with another great album, Relentless. It’s nice to see these guys on a roll. “Let The Sun Come In” was my summer jam.
• The Rolling Stones, Hackney Diamonds – I can’t believe it took 18 years for the Stones to follow up A Bigger Bang, but what a glorious way to return. With spectacular tunes like “Angry” and “Sweet Sounds Of Heaven,” this Andrew Watt-helmed album is a latter day Stones’ classic.
• Peter Gabriel, i/o – Speaking of long waits between albums… Peter waited 21 years between records but this is another triumphant return. i/o is much like Momento Mori in that it’s a grower… you’ll need a few spins on this record before it clicks, but when it does, man what a great record. This is truly a work of genius.

Best Vault/Reissues/Live LPs of 2023

This is such a delightful mixed bag of box sets, live LPs, stuff from the vaults and even an EP… it was a delightful year for rock n roll.

• Starcrawler, Acoustic Sessions EP – Starcrawler strip down several songs from their last LP, She Said, for a groovy 70s, country rock vibe. This band continues to impress me.
• Pink Floyd, Dark Side of the Moon – 50th Anniversary – The Live At Wembley ’74 concert where they performed Dark Side in it’s entirety for one of the first times, finally sees official release after being bootlegged for… well, almost 50 years.
• The White Stripes, Elephant – Deluxe Edition – The White Stripes’ classic album with a complete concert from that tour. Fabulous stuff. This was the first tour I saw these guys… ah, memories.
• The Who, The Who With Orchestra: Live At Wembley – I just loved this combination – The Who with a big orchestra – and with so many live records already out there, what a nice twist. This album boasted some surprisingly powerful performances.
• Stephen Stills, Live At Berkeley ’71 – A wonderful snapshot of Stills at the peak of his powers. A nice cameo from David Crosby for a few tracks. Great live album that I’m stunned he left in the vaults all these  years.
• Bob Dylan, Shadow Kingdom – The great soundtrack from a Covid-era streaming thing he did. Even with no drummer these songs come off as urgent and fresh. Dylan did once say, when praising a drummer, “He’s almost as good as no drummer at all.” The man is constantly reinventing his music.
• Neil Young, Chrome Dreams – The legendary, oft bootlegged, unreleased LP from ’77 finally sees official release. I also have to give Neil some honorable mention for releasing the additional four songs from Ragged Glory which were all epic tracks!
• Talking Heads, Stop Making Sense (Deluxe Edition) – The legendary live album expanded to include all the songs from the movie on it’s 40th anniversary. One of the best live albums/movies ever.
• Stevie Nicks, Complete Studio Albums & Rarities – The title is a little misleading… this isn’t the complete set of her “rarities” and unreleased stuff, but there are enough here to make this a very intriguing listen. It even includes her great cover of the Buffalo Springfield’s “For What It’s Worth.” Stevie has been so great for so long, check this box out.
• Fleetwood Mac, Rumours Live – Speaking of Stevie Nicks, her erstwhile band Fleetwood Mac dug into the vaults and released a complete concert documenting the tour for their legendary 1977 album. This complete show from L.A.’s Forum is like traveling back in time.

There it is folks, our favorite list of new albums and our list of vault, live LPs, EPs and reissues with bonus material. Did we miss anything? If you’ve got an album or a single you think we should have mentioned, by all means share it with us in the comments. I’d love to hear your thoughts on 2023’s rock n roll.

I hope everybody has a happy and sane holiday season over the next week or so. Stay safe out there and don’t drive drunk. There’s no upside in that. Hopefully you’ll all wake up on Xmas morning – if you celebrate Xmas – and Santa will have put all your rock n roll wishes under your tree in nicely wrapped packages… When I wrap a package it looks like the cat wrapped them… oh well. My skills lie elsewhere. I am looking forward to 2024 with possible LPs from Lenny Kravitz, Social Distortion and Billy Idol. The Stones have announced they’re touring… don’t be surprised if I wander into a stadium or two on that one!

Cheers and Happy Holidays!