If you have heard Bob Dylan’s Like A Rolling Stone or The Man in Me or You Can’t Always Get What You Want with the Rolling Stones, you have heard Al Kooper’s organ. And these songs are but a few of the songs Al Kooper has played on, written or produced during his 50 year run since he started out in the early 60’s. February 5th he is 70 years old.
Ung Pike Forsvunnet is a Norwegian band that was active in Norway in the 80’s. Their musical style was hard and funky, and all their lyrics were in Norwegian, a somewhat unusual phenomenon at that time. Thirty years later they started to play again, if not as actively as before, and last night they held a concert, this year’s first.
The Norwegian award show for the best music releases from 2013, Spellemannprisen, was broadcast on Norwegian TV, NRK1, yesterday night. More than 80 artists composers, bands and orchestras were nominated in 23 different categories, some of them with more than one nominations. Here are pictures of some of the winners. Picture above: (Ole Paus who won the award for Spellemann of the year. Photo: Bamble kommune under a CC license.)
I have summarized my 30 best concerts from 2013 in two articles. But sometimes I don’t get the best photos from these concerts, and other times I get good pictures from concerts that are not particularly good. Here are my personal favorites from 2013, in no particular order, and without reviewing if the concerts from where they are taken were good or not. (Picture above: Carolyn Wonderland at the Blues In Hell festival)
Here are my 15 best concert experiences during 2013. My criteria are both that I like the concert as such, but also the visual part of it and how I was able to photograph them. The concerts are from festivals and venues in Norway, Austin, Tx and Denmark. (Picture above: the audience of Karpe Diem at the Slottsfjell festival)
2013 has been a good year for live music. At least it has been great for me. I have been to fourteen festivals, I have seen somewhere between 150 and 200 concerts this year, and I have enjoyed most of them. For some of them I have seen only part of it, but many I have seen the whole concert. Here are 15 of my best 30 concert experiences this year. (Picture above: the audience at Kvelertak’s concert at the Slottsfjell festival)
John Mayall is 80 years on November 29th. During 50 of these years he has been one of the driving forces in British Blues, and altogether he is one of the most important figures in modern blues. His main importance lies in the way he has found and developed new talents, mainly guitarists. (Picture above: John Mayall at Notodden in 2004).
Sigur Rós is one of the most distinguished bands from Iceland. Their style is highly personal, like no other band, and they have no contenders. Since 1994 they have spread their epic soundscapes through 7 CDs so far, and tonight they played at Oslo Spektrum.
Thomas Dybdahl is one of a few Norwegian artists with an international following. He is also one of our best songwriters, and without writing typical hits. His most popular songs have become hits because of their inherent quality and complexity, not because of their obvious hit potential. In my book that gives many extra points. Combine this with a live performance that closely mimics the qualities from his recordings, and you have a recipe for a great experience. Last night he played at Sentrum Scene in Oslo.
Lars Winnerbäck is one of the most exciting Swedish artists. His singer songwriter skills are surpassed by few, and he has been poring out songs for more than 15 years. During this period his music has evolved, through one man and his guitar, through Irish inspired recordings until his present organic rock based music. Tonight he visited Oslo on his Scandinavian tour and played for an enthusiastic crowd at Oslo Spektrum.
Artist Pictures Blog 
