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Blasts from the past...

31 MAY 2008
From Maximo to Emo

I've had a pretty good run of gigs this past week starting off with Maximo Park at the Forum in north London on the 28th. I guess, Maximo Park will always be a band I want to shoot when they come to town. After all, I'm still trying to get the ultimate jump shot of lead singer Paul Smith. I came pretty close to getting one at Wednesday's show but I reckon I can do better... Check out the gallery of the gig to see my set from the shoot.
View the 'Maximo Park' gallery


On Thursday I headed north again to shoot the Futureheads at the Electric Ballroom - one of the most horrendous venues I've ever shot at. It's not so much the lighting or the location of the venue that's the problem. It's that the entrance to the photo pit is on the left hand side whereas when you come in you're on the right hand side so you have to make your way diagonally across through the crowd. It's bad enough when you arrive but getting back out after the first three songs when the show is in full swing is a total fucking nightmare. Anyway, I got some decent shots of the band - funnily enough the ones taken from the left hand side in the pit turned out better than the ones I took on the right hand side. It seems the Electric Ballroom is just a very odd venue when it comes to sides...
View the 'Futureheads' gallery


After two weekday shoots I was ready for some serious weekend photo action - and what better way to do this than by shooting Bruce Springsteen at the Emirates Stadium in north London - the first ever gig to be staged at that stadium. We were told in advance to bring a long lens since we'd be shooting from a 50 metre distance, i.e. the toilets. It was then that I decided it was time for my D200 to come out of retirement. Due to the 1.5x magnification of the sensor, my 70-200mm lens gave me a focal length of 105-300mm which I thought would be sufficient for this shoot. I've got used to the D3 over the past 4 months so it was strange going back to the D200 - it felt almost like a compact camera in comparison to the D3 (that's how much lighter it is). I got some decent shots but would've done a much better job with my D3.
View the 'Bruce Springsteen' gallery


This weekend has also seen me do my first reportage job. I was asked to cover an EMO/anti Daily Mail protest in Marble Arch organised by fans of My Chemical Romance. To cut a long story short, the paper has accused the band of being some sort of suicide cult so their fans staged a protest to prove the opposite. I supose any anti Daily Mail protest is a good one so I quite enjoyed this job. Things even got a bit rowdy at one point when a group of fans set fire to a copy of the Daily Mail. Very rock 'n roll!


26 MAY 2008
Ding Dong...it's the Ting Tongs

It's been over a week since my last update so it's about time I posted some new photos here. Whitest Boy Alive at Koko on 21 May and The Ting Tings at the Astoria from 22 May. A proper update to follow soon...
View the 'Whitest Boy Alive' gallery
View 'The Ting Tings' gallery



18 MAY 2008
51 down, xx to go

On Friday night I shot my 51st gig of the year. I decided at the end of last year that it would be easier to keep a constant track of how many shows I shoot, rather than counting them all up later on. OK, I sound like a geek now. Anyway, Friday night I headed to Koko to shoot the Delays. It was a rather...interesting...performance - not sure if that's the right choice of word. The lighting was über-shit and at one point I just stood in the pit, shaking my head because I wasn't getting any shots that I would deem good enough. I suppose it's times like these that you decide you've got nothing to lose and try something different. I started playing around with the settings on my camera and was pleasently surprised with the results. I mean, there's only so much you can do when the lead singer keeps jumping around on stage and you have no decent lighting to capture the action but check out the photos anyway by clicking on the link below.
View the 'Delays' gallery



14 May 2008
So what's new?

After a quiet weekend it was time to take some photos again. First up was One Republic at the Shepherd's Bush Empire on Monday - a venue which for the last few months has been a complete bitch to get to due to the temporary closure of one of the Tube stations there. One Republic don't strike me as particularly wild rockers which is why I was amazed to see that the lead was on crutches after (presumably) breaking his foot. I managed to get some nice shots of him but didn't fare quite so well with the other band members as there was hardly any light on them.
View 'One Republic' gallery


Last night I headed to the Electric Ballroom in Camden to shoot New York band Vampire Weekend. They came on just before 10pm which was quite late but at least I didn't have to worry about getting my photos to my agency the minute I got home as most newspapers would've been about to go to print by the time the gig finished. Photowise I did pretty well - even though the lighting was pretty shit for most of the first three songs. I think I got one shot of the keyboard player - but other than that the singer was really the only one to have any light on him.
View 'Vampire Weekend' gallery



9 May 2008
Something for the weekend

It's always nice when you see one of your own photos in print - and it's even better when it's totally unexpected. After shooting Adele and Sam Sparro on Wednesday, I was suprised that the shows didn't get any coverage in the press. Last night Sam played a small show at Proud Galleries in Camden and the London Paper decided to review the gig and use one of my shots from the Shepherd's Bush Empire performance. I was on the Tube looking through the paper when I saw the shot - it certainly made the journey home even better.



8 May 2008
Click click click

It's been a relatively quiet week so I was really looking forward to last night's shoot. I'd applied for a pass to shoot Adele at the Shepherd's Bush Empire and was told in the afternoon that Sam Sparro was opening for her at her two London shows. I'd missed out on shooting Sam when he played a couple of shows at the Camden Crawl so in a way I was more looking forward to shooting him than the main act, Adele. The shoot was fun and I sat in the pit for Sam's entire performance - but only took photos during the first three, of course. Best seat in the house - a nice perk of being a photographer.

Next up was Adele and I have to admit I wasn't really that excited about shooting her but she pleasently surprised me! What's more I managed to get some nice shots of her - largely due to the colourful stage backdrop - so last night was what I'd call a bit of a success.

I'm a little bit behind on putting up galleries so here are a few shots from my most recent shows, including photos from last week's Air Traffic gig at the Shepherd's Bush Empire.
View the 'Adele' gallery
View the 'Sam Sparro' gallery



3 May 2008
Well at least my luggage didn't get lost in Terminal 5...

Earlier this week I was hired to shoot Air Traffic performing at the Shepherd's Bush Empire. Initially, I was asked to do a photoshoot with the band outside the venue followed by a live shoot but the photo shoot got cancelled at the last minute as the band wanted to watch the football. The live shoot was fun but hard work. I'm a one-lens kind of guy and absolutely HATE changing lenses during a shoot; I'm always way too psyched up when I'm covering a gig to fiddle around with them. Fortunately, I had the entire show to get my shots, so after shooting the first three songs from the pit with my 24-70mm lens, I decided I had enough time to calmly mount my brand new 70-200mm glass, headed upstairs to take a few shots from the balcony and then headed back down to the stage to shoot from the side and behind the amps - there's something very cool about being on stage during a performance.

In other news, I was supposed to do a shoot in New York on Tuesday but unfortunately, it got cancelled at the last minute. I keep telling myself that at least I didn't have to become another victim of Terminal 5...

Lastly, yesterday one of my Portishead shots from their recent show at the Apollo was printed in the Guardian. Nice one!



Continue: April 2008 archive