I'm guessing you've never been to New York.

If your talking about live music and the club scene both cities are awesome. I'd rather be in New York during the summer because large number of free outdoor music concerts sponsored by the city. On almost every night during the summer there's free concert in some park in Manhatthan or Brooklyn and the bands playing are usually nationally known recording artists or the cream of the crop of the latest local bands.

London may have a slight advantage over New York on the nightclubbing scene. It's been a long time since I've visited London but there seemed to be quite a few more dance clubs. It's probably because the UK has a long tradition of people going out and visiting pubs in the evening while Americans stay at home and pass out on the sofa.

In the United States the economic recession has had a big impact on the live music club scene. Nearly all the great live music venues I used to patronize on the East Coast like CBGB's and the Cafeteria in New York & the Rat, the Channel and Cantone's in Boston have been closed down usually to make way for upscale real estate development plans. Since the heyday of punk scene, many of larger Americian cities have passed zoning laws that make it very difficult for rock music clubs to get a cabaret and/or a liquior license.

I'm not sure I'd pin those closings on the recession. The Rat closed 15 years ago and the Channel was even longer ago than that.

In terms of genre spanning and influential bands I would plump for NYC no problem, despite it's population as Gavin B said London is more of a hub for live music and although some great bands have of course come from London, Bristol and Manchester could be argued as being better than London in terms of creativity and influential artists. London probably has a few more bands with longevity than NYC but NYC still wins for me.

The majority of bands that I like or have liked are British, and a lot of them are from London. So its London for me, but in all fairness, I dont listen to many American bands, so maybe if I tried some, I'd choose NY.

But for now, London.