Whee, this is a long list.
I saw Clutch on new years, who played for about 1.5 - 1.75 hours, and got very drunk both during and even more so afterwards. Their opening bands were... unspectacular. One of the bands singers kinda sounded like Lemmy, if he was from the south? I dunno, I went for Clutch, and was happy with the set. (although they didnt play "Drink to the Dead" which made me sad, but Neil did play a cowbell, which was awsome) They played a good variety of songs, of course they played Electric Worry, but surprisingly didnt play Burning Beard. I think the addition of a harmonica player and an organ player has only made the band sound even better, although it is still a bit odd to me to hear some of the older songs with added organ and harmonica bits, it does fit and blend well.
Last wednesday, I got to see Wu-Tang Clan, for the price of a single beer. I wouldnt have gone otherwise, because while I enjoy the Wu, I wouldnt have enjoyed paying $50 odd bucks to see them, and only them (as their "opener" was just a DJ spinning rap singles), especially while broke. However, they put on an amazing show playing for about an hour and fifteen, but the stand out performer had to be Method Man doing flying leaps into the crowd, a front flip into the crowd, and even standing on the audience for part of one song. (My opinion is also helped by the fact that Method Man and a few others stayed on stage for a full 20-30 minutes after the set to sign peoples stuff and him throwing Ravens gear (two different hats and a Ray Lewis jersey) into the crowd. Also, I didnt realize how BIG method man is until I was standing next to him when I was moving gear.
In the past few months, bands I have seen that impressed me:
Amon Amarth put on an amazing offdate (non headlining) show here in baltimore, which they were amazing. Their show in Philly was quite nice as well.
Lamb of God has always impressed, seeing them once in baltimore, once in Pittsburgh (Ozzfest) and once in Reading, PA (with Killswitch Engage, Devildriver and Soilwork supporting, all of whom did well, but the pits were terrible, stupid PA)
Behemoths headlining show was absolutely amazing, after some sound issues when they were here with LoG, their show was just amazing. And having Gojira to support, well, that just makes the show even better (and Gojira's tour manager was incredibly nice)
3inches of Blood, the multitude of times that I have seen them in the past six months (with LoG, Ozzfest, GWAR, etc) have never failed to impress, they are very good showman, and also a bunch of nice canadians.
GWAR, on the Viva La Bam tour with Cradle was rather bleh, mainly because of issues I probably shouldnt get in to, but the short version is that they werent able to do their full show (and even without their full show, god damn they have a lot of gear to load up, more than CoF and CKY combined) they made up for it with an excellent "home" show at the 9:30 club in DC.
An Ozzfest stand out: Cthonic, a taiwanese (sp?) black metal group, was incredible, flawless execution on stage, I had never heard of them, and didnt expect to be impressed as much as I was.
Also, Ozzy seriously needs to just retire and give Ozzfest to Black Label Society. His voice was terrible for the first half of the show, and even after he had warmed up, it still wasnt what I had seen in years past.
I unfortunantly missed seeing Arch Enemy and Aesop Rock (seperate dates of course)
Shows I am currently looking forward to:
Black Dahlia Murder plays this thursday, woo!
Exodus plays northern VA next month.
In march I go broke from seeing Soilwork, Today is the Day, and Devildriver all in less than 10 days.
In april I go extra broke from seeing Nile, Ministry and Paganfest (featuring TYR)
Then at the end of may is Maryland Death Fest, which should be good.