Next Tuesday my photograph Energy will be featured in a new show of the same name with fellow photographer buds Vincent Li and Bill Shouldis. The exhibit focuses on "the communal relationship between musicians and their fans in a live setting." While the exhibit runs from February 13th to May 15th, we're throwing an opening reception the night of Tuesday, February 12th from 8-10pm.
Come down to Sage on Graham Ave for drinks, food, music and awesome photos. In addition to Energy, I've a couple more photos featuring The Bouncing Souls & Tim Barry. Hope to see ya there!
ENERGY: The Photographs of Vincent Li, Eric Van't Zelfden, & Bill Shouldis
I wasn't shooting for Japandroids show at Webster Hall back in December but had my little Leica D'lux 6 on me and snapped some shots. Found these hiding on a hard drive the other day. These guys put out one of the best albums of the year and their live show is all about energy. Check them out as soon as you can.
These are a little overdue but here's some pics from Dave Hause's recent performance at The Asbury Lanes with Mikey Erg and Ian Graham from the band Cheap Girls.
I hadn't heard about Ian Graham or Cheap Girls before but wow Graham's performance was great and Cheap Girl's albums are even better. Check out two songs from them at the end of the post and go buy both their albums My Roaring 20's and Find Me A Drink Home now. Asbury favorite Mikey Erg followed with a collection of Ergs songs delivered via solo electric guitar and true to character repeatedly asked "What am I doing? Billy Bragg already did this and much better."
Despite the miserable weather, a full crowd made it down to the Lanes for Dave Hause. Rounded out by Pete Steinkopf on guitar, his sister on piano, and his best friend on drums, Hause delivered a great performance with a set drawing heavily from his solo record. The solo material easily worked in the live setting and the full band arrangements refreshed older songs "Come On Kid" and "Melanin" while newer tunes "Time Will Tell" and "Years From Now" had everyone singing along.
Hause voiced frustration with record label Paper & Plastick's long and continuing delay on delivering his new record to customers despite the fact it was "released" in February. Full disclosure, I ordered the record from Paper & Plastick back in February and have yet to receive it. When I contacted the label in March about the delay I received a response which curtly reminded me of the definition of a pre-order which now apparently includes when the pressing plant messes up, multiple times.
Anyway, it was good to know that Hause was aware of the situation and shared many of his fans feelings on the situation. In response, Hause has been selling vinyl copies of his new album with limited edition hand screened sleeves. If you're going to buy the album, I suggest grabbing one of these very cool records at the shows.
"Meet Me At The Lanes" was played in honor of its namesake and made for a memorable moment. Spotting a teenage fan in the crowd rocking a Replacements t-shirt Hause quipped "Wow if I was a girl you're age I would totally give you sex for wearing that shirt" and launched into a fantastic cover of "Can't Hardly Wait" featuring some help from Ian Graham and Mikey Erg. I'm not sure there could have been a better way to close the show.
Miserable weather can't stop us record nerds! Generation Records hosted another great Record Store Day celebration this year with performances by Spa Castles, I Hate Our Freedom, The Jay Vons, and The Obits. I scored some sweet records including the Off! seven inch, The Bouncing Souls acoustic show, some Springsteen and Bob Dylan releases. No pics from the Obits set though as I got pulled to help film a video for them.
Last month I enrolled in a B&W photography class at NYU's SCPS to brush up on my darkroom skills. The class ended up being cancelled before it even started due to low enrollment. The lone registrant? You guessed it me. So I got bumped into a digital B&W photography class. It's turned out to be very interesting. We've explored different methods of shooting in digital color and converting to black & white in post production as well as shooting black & white in camera via a monochrome picture profile.
I have to admit I was surprised by the quality of the digital black & white images both converted from camera or shot in monochrome. They do look great and I'm looking for to experimenting further. But to be honest, it seems much faster and easier to just shoot a black & white film stock that you are already familiar with. I will resist! Film for life!
The class has also forced me to shoot things I would normally have no interest in hence the bird pics above. What was really just an assignment to demonstrate shutter speed yielded some good photos. So which ones do you think were shot digitally?
This past Sunday I rounded up the kids in our house for a portrait shoot. It's been awhile since I've set up lights and properly lit someone, usually I'm just using what ever available light there is. These came out pretty good. We're lucky to be in a place where all our neighbors are friends and we can all hang out from time to time.
I'm shipping up to Boston today for our annual St. Pattie's Day weekend trip. If all goes well, I should have some Dropkick Murphys photos next week. If all doesn't go well, then I'll have a bunch of photos of my drunk ass friends. We'll see what happens.
Against Me played a secret surprise show at NYC's Mercury Lounge on Saturday and I was lucky enough to be there. I haven't seen Against Me since their Searching For A Former Clarity tour, so I was looking forward to seeing how their show has progressed since those days. There are enough people debating over what Against Me was or has become since Reinventing Axl Rose. I'd rather focus on what Against Me is, an amazing live band that day in and day out turns in performances that leave even the naysayers in awe.
Saturday's show was a perfectly balanced set of favorites from the bands early full lengths like "Pints of Guinness..." "Walking Is Still Honest" and "Cliche Guevara" along with the more recent standouts "Thrash Unreal," "I Was A Teenage Anarchist," and "High Pressure Low." I was holding out for anything from Tom Gabel's highly underrated and in my opinion fucking awesome solo album Heart Burns, but alas no dice.
A decidedly older crowd, there was however no shortage of energy and that may be in large part be due to new drummer Jay Weinberg. Regardless of who his father is, Weinberg is a uniquely powerful and exciting drummer that is breath of fresh air for the band. Bassist Andrew Seward works the crowd like the band's personal cheerleader and guitarist James Bowman throws out blistering off the cuff fills like dinner mints.
On tour with the band was photographer Ryan Russell. If you haven't seen Russell's work check it out now. From what I've read Russel only shoots on film and that alone would make me a fan but Russell has a great eye and is pumping out beautiful images on a consistent basis. I'm looking forward to seeing what he captured of the performance.
All in all, it was a fucking amazing show and it definitely won't be such a long gap between the next time I catch an Against Me show.
