Steve Connelly
Some guitarists just have a way of playing solos that make the hair on your neck stand up and add a vital dose of energy to any song. Steve Connelly’s been delivering that juice for decades. He is unequivocally a Bay area legend, most notably as a founding member of The Headlights, a lodestar of the local scene from the early 1980s to the mid-’90s. (The band did a stint backing up ex-Byrd Roger McGuinn on tour and played “The Tonight Show” in ‘91). Connelly, who has owned and run Zen Recording in Pinellas Park for more than 20 years, is also a sharp-eared producer and engineer, and does some credible singing. But it’s his guitar work—played with a profound inner ecstasy—that has left the biggest mark on the Tampa Bay music scene. zenrecording.com —Eric Snider
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Best of the Bay 2020 Music: Our readers and critics pick the best songwriters, rock and rollers, clubs, DJs and more.
Music Critics' Picks
Best Coronavirus Concert Livestream
Best Coronavirus Concert Livestream That Landed A Local Band On Forbes
Best COVID-19 Concert Scene Cage Rattler
Best Dojo Where There’s No Karate
Best Eerily Relevant Concept Album
Best Guitarist (Senior Division)
Best Guitarist (Youngblood Division)
Best Last Music Festival Before It All Went To Shit
Best Local Music Gear Transition
Best Local Who Technically Won A Grammy This Year
Best On-Air Celebration of Local Music
Best Pandemic-Induced Exit-Entrance
Best Place To Get Irreparable Ear Damage And See A WMNF-er Twerk
Best Pube-y Product Placement
Best Rapper-Turned Ally For The Working Class
Best That Was Great While It Lasted
Best Tribute To An Adopted Local Legend
Best Unlikely Venue That Got Saved By Its Community
Music Readers' Picks
Best Concert in the Last 12 Months
Best Large Concert Venue (2,000-plus capacity)
Best Metal/Hardcore Band (Original)
Best Music School (Institutional/academic)
Best Music School (Non-Academic)
Best Roots/Alt-Country Act (Original)
Best Small Concert Venue (Under 2,000 capacity)
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Winner: The Wandering Hours @thewanderinghours on Facebook.
Second Place: Derrick Williams & The Gospel Voice Band derrickwilliamsvocalist.com
Runner Up: The Black Honkeys theblackhonkeys.com
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Winner: The Applebutter Express @TheApplebutterExpress on Facebook.
Second Place: The Wandering Hours @thewanderinghours on Facebook.
Runner Up: The Florida Mountain Boys @The-Florida-Mountain-Boys on Facebook.
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Winner: Stephen P Brown stephenpbrown.com
Second Place: Colleen Schmitt linkedin.com/in/colleen-schmitt
Runner Up: Mark Sforzini marksforzini.com
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Winner: DJ Mike Sklarz @djmikesklarz on Instagram.
Second Place: DJ Paul Santana djsantana.com
Runner Up: DJ Austen Van Der Bleek avbleek.com
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Winner: Gasparilla Music Festival gasparillamusic.com
Second Place: 97x Next Big Thing 97xonline.com
Runner Up: Billy Joel at AMALIE Arena cltampa.com
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Winner: Brokenmold Entertainment brokenmoldentertainment.com
Second Place: FWDThinkers fwdthinkersmusic.com
Runner Up: TampaBayNightLife.TV tampabaynightlife.tv
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Kitty Daniels
Kitty Daniels is an octogenarian matriarch of the Tampa Bay jazz scene and the last person I expected to see jump on the coronavirus livestream bandwagon, but her sessions—bare bones with just a piano and whatever light was in the room—were some of the most heartwarming of those early shutdown days. Her love of the Great American Songbook shone through, and if you tuned in for even just five minutes, your day could be transformed. kittydaniels.com —Ray Roa
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'Underoath: Observatory'
COVID-19 still has the national touring industry in a chokehold. Across the country, venues are closing and musicians are having to quit their craft to keep food on the table (streaming services virtually eliminated income from album sales, remember?). Everywhere, artists at every level started livestreaming. Some of it was cringeworthy, but all of it was—and still is—a chance for the community to support its creative class. One local band, however, went all out. Granted, Underoath (which was supposed to open for Slipknot in arenas this summer) is in a different league when it comes to fanbase (the Grammy-nominated rock outfit sold-out Yuengling Center for chrissake), but it was able to use its resources to turn its ambitions into reality with a series of cinematically-shot, live full-album performances staged at an off-the-record soundstage in Tampa. The band sold exclusive online access to fans—and ask local venues to sell discounted tickets and make some money for themselves—but bundled a lot of it with merch to help the bottom line. On the day of the first show, Forbes reported that revenue from the band’s “Observatory” concerts was on pace to “compensate for all the touring revenue lost this year,” adding that when sales started for the concerts, there was “a conversion rate of $800 per email,” which led to the band passing “the six-figure threshold in the first two days of sales.” That’s a lot of money for crew, support staff and the band itself—and if other bands can pull it off, it looks like a model that could save bands with equally devoted and widespread fanbases. underoath777.com —Ray Roa
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Big Baby Scumbag
There are plenty of reasons to be more like Big Baby Scumbag right now, and the foremost is hygiene. The Tampa rapper born Tyrell Williams hasn’t changed his routine too much in the face of the coronavirus because he was pretty damn tidy to begin with. “Honestly, man,I wash my hands all the time. I’m not saying a lot of people are dirty, but people aren’t as clean as they need to be,” Scumbag, 25, told CL in April. Plus, the Town ‘N’ Country product is having a hell of a year. In January, Pitchfork gave his Big Baby Earnhardt mixtape a 7.1, adding that “The tracks on the Florida rapper’s latest tape overflow with jubilant maximalism and have a proudly Southern bounce.” A follow up (www.flexedupshawty.com), released in August) is a Windows 98-style throwdown, but our favorite single is March’s “Fuck Coronavirus 2020”—a full-blown trap rager where a masked Scumbag passes on dapping people or shaking hands all while spraying them down with Lysol and drinking Bud Light instead of White Claw. In the hook, Scumbag joyously sings, “Fuck coronavirus. I’ll punch him in his jaw.” If he was in office instead of DeSantis, we might have this thing under control by now. @bigbabyscumbag on Instagram —Ray Roa
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