Remember December: The Top Posts of 2019

Breathe deep and exhale: We, as a people, have survived another run around the sun. I may or may not reflect on the year writ large in the next week, but suffice it to say that 2019 has had its share of good and bad times, and plenty of moments that fell somewhere in-between. We’ve all weathered days not with smiles or frowns, after all, but a stoic determination to get the job – whatever it may be – done. We soldier on.

That said, I posted less often over the past 12 months than the past few years – about 75 percent of what I managed last year, which was curtailed by preparations for our move, and a little more than half of what I shared in 2017, when life was groovy. The main reason? As David Crosby sang on a now decades-old song of his, “time is the final currency/not money, not power/the time will come/when you will give/anything for one more hour.” Life’s demands took a toll, in other words.

(Hopefully, the Year of Visual Acuity – aka 2020 – will see me return to frequent postings.)

Yet, despite the steep drop-off in my posts, traffic actually ticked up by a bit more than 15 percent; it was my best year, stats-wise, since resurrecting The Old Grey Cat back in 2014. Thank you to everyone reading this for that.

Below are the top 20 posts (old and new) for the past 12 months, along with the published date and links to each.

1. Neil Young: The Best of the Unofficial Canon (9/27/2015)
2. Shelby Lynne: Here I Am (Movie Soundtrack) – The Review (8/12/2018)
3. The Natalie Merchant Collection – The Review (7/4/2017)
4. Today’s Top 5: Linda Ronstadt’s Rare TV Appearances (1/21/2019)
5. The Essentials: Stephen Stills – Manassas (9/23/2017)
6. The Essentials: Maria McKee’s Life Is Sweet (6/23/2018)
7. Blinded by the Light: A Fan Is Born (8/17/2019)
8. The Essentials: Natalie Merchant’s Live in Concert (7/4/2019)
9. Of Concerts Past: Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band in Philadelphia, 9/24/1999 (7/6/2019)
10. Today’s Top 5: The Paisley Underground (3/9/2019)
11. Today’s Top 5: March 21, 1966 (via Newsweek) (12/17/2016)
12. Linda Ronstadt: Live in Hollywood (2/2/2019)
13. First Impressions: Juliana Hatfield’s Weird (1/6/2019)
14. Neil Young’s 1973, Part I (4/24/2018)
15. The Essentials: Psychedelic Pill by Neil Young & Crazy Horse (9/7/2019)
16. First Impressions: 3×4 – The Bangles, The Three O’Clock, The Dream Syndicate, Rain Parade (2/24/2019)
17. First Impressions: Neil Young & Crazy Horse – Colorado (10/27/2019)
18. Melody Gardot: Live in Europe – The Review (2/11/2018)
19. Neil Young & the Santa Monica Flyers – ROXY: Tonight’s the Night Live – The Review (4/28/2018)
20. Stone Foundation: Everybody, Anyone – The Review (9/2/2018)