Best of 2011 by Veronica Ortuño

1. Dreams realized:
The opening of Las Cruxes' storefront....pouring my heart and sweat.
Support with Cease to Exist! and the amazing artists/musicians I get to study. — Special thanks to M'ladys Records for hosting it for me.

2. Records + such:
Sonskull - Wiped Clean EP
Rene Hell - Terminal Symphony
Factory Floor 12"; Hysterics 7"
Total Abuse - Prison Sweat
Earn - A Following Shadow
Broken Water - Peripheral Star EP
Demos: Livid + Nose Dive

3. Revisited:
Black Sabbath - Sabotage
Nick Garrie - The Nightmare of J.B. Stanislas
Leonard Cohen; Grace Slick & The Great Society; Robbie Basho
Martin Dupont - Just Because LP + Sleep Is A Luxury LP
Master's Apprentices - Hands of Time
The Index - LP

4. Shows (Music):
Weird TV at Club 1808
Fielded at Trailer Space
Rene Hell, Earn, & Pedestrian Deposit at Dem Passwords
Cold Girls; OBN III's
Everyone who helped make Night of Rage III possible

5. Shows (Art):
Alexander McQueen retrospective at the MoMA in New York
Dream House in Tribeca
A Hung Garden by Mikaylah Bowman at Youth Group Gallery

6. Books:
Sobrero Fallout + In Watermelon Sugar by Richard Brautigan
Christiane F. by Christiane F.
Helter Skelter by Vincent Bugliosi
Stranger Music by Leonard Cohen

7. Zines:
NUTS! fanzine by Ben Trogdon
I Strangled Mine by Rusty Kelley
Shotgun Seamstress by Osa Atoe
Making Waves by Mary Jane Regalado and Camille Lan

8. Honorable mention:
Labels: M'lady's Records; Fast Weapons; Perennial Records
Podcasts: Gunilla Mixtapes + TV Dinner
Movies: Depeche Mode: 101; Drive; Interiors; The Double Life of Véronique

9. Others:
Versus coming to fruition
Nights of solitude with a Micro Korg + a drum machine
Meditation and Chinese cupping therapy
Life-altering card readings from Kate Curtis and Sarah Adams
My sabbatical to the Pacific Northwest and California
Mini Chateau Marmont vacation with good friends
Rose Garden on N. Albina in Portland

10. PASSION….KEEP ON PUSHING.