A new year has begun! So this is the time for ‘best of’ year lists. I joined my fellow team members at JaME for my favorite Japanese artist and releases, but I thought my last.fm stats from the last 12 months give a better overview.

Most listened artists of 2011:

1. Birdy

I’ve been listening almost non-stop to Birdy since her album came out in November, otherwise she wouldn’t have ended up as the #1 in 12 months time. I’m totally in love with the way she covers all those indie songs, her fragile voice and the beautiful piano arrangements.

2. Mohombi

Ok this is getting a little embarrassing, lol. I had honestly not expected him to rank so high. But yeah, I like his rhythms!

3. A.R. Rahman

Rahman makes the best Bollywood soundtracks! I got interested in his music through the soundtrack of Slumdog Millionaire and also found some of his other soundtrack albums.

4. The Baseballs

After seeing The Baseballs live in concert in October, I fell even more in love with them (their music, of course XD). Looking forward to new music and new gigs from the boys this year!

5. Ed Harcourt

An excellent singer-songwriter. I guess I’ve been listening a lot to his music in the first part of the year before I went to his gig in Utrecht. His 2011 album Lustre is pretty great.

6. Usher

Haaa I seriously can’t believe the artist I listen to sometimes. Uh, I believe I had this obsession with one of his albums earlier this year but right now I don’t care much for Usher.

7. Adele

Following the rest of the world, listened a lot to Adele as well. She’s got a gorgeous voice and I’m addicted to Rolling in the Deep and Set Fire to the Rain.

8. Lil Eddie

Ok ok I admit being into cheesy R&B sometimes!

9. PUSHIM

I’ve barely listened to Japanese music this year… The only one remaining was the Queen of Reggae, whose newest album Milestone I love to pieces.

10. Belle and Sebastian

Indie music like Belle and Sebastian’s music is good for listening to when writing, makes the words flow much easier!

Favorite concerts of 2011:

1. The Baseballs on 5/10 in Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
2. Stamatis Spanoudakis on 9/9 at the Odeon of Herodes Atticus in Athens, Greece.
3. Ed Harcourt on 4/3 in Utrecht, the Netherlands
4. Matthew and the Atlas on 20/5 in Leeuwarden, the Netherlands
5. LUNA SEA on 22/10 at Saitama, Tokyo, Japan

This week I went to a gig of the The Baseballs in Amsterdam with my friend. For the ones that don’t know the band, it’s basically a German three-man band that cover popular hits in a rock’n'roll fashion. Their most well-known song so far is their edition of Rihanna’s Umbrella, which was also the song that got me interested in them.

I was a tiny bit sceptical before going to the concert, wondering if they could pull of those vocals live too, but there was definitely no need. The three guys sing AWESOME live, they have a great band and there was a lot of humour in the show as well. For example with one of the songs they threw bottles of bubble blowers into the audience, telling them not to put it in their pockets but to make bubbles, and said, with a horrible pun: “don’t stop blowing until I say so.” They also invited a few girls up on stage to sing one line in Katy Perry’s Hot’n'Cold. Unfortunately a large part of the audience surrounding us seemed rather dead for most of the gig. Actually I think it’s a quite a feat to stay still on their music!

Anyway, here’s some music for my friend Cynthia who has no idea who they are, maybe the US has something against German copy-cats of ‘their’ music?

First is Chasing Cars, original by Snow Patrol (original here) and the second one is a live clip from their rendition of the song Torn, it’s one of their gentlest songs. I know it mostly as a song by Natalie Imbruglia but I just discovered that her version is a cover too, so here‘s a link to the original-original.

Conclusion: next time they come near I’ll definitely go and see The Baseballs live again!

Here’s a list of the concerts I’ve been to since 2003 (or at least the ones I can remember 8D). The links lead to live reports I’ve written for JaME, 3voor12 Friesland (Dutch) or my blog.

I’m afraid my list of bands I want to see live is even longer…

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School excursion/exchange in Trakai, Lithuania. Sorry for the crap quality of the photos, I only had this little disposable camera and had to scan the photos.