A week or so I ago was lucky enough to cover two New Orleans artists for the Washington Post – I asked my editor if he gave me the assignments because I’m from Louisiana, but no, total coincidence! The first was Trombone Shorty at 9:30 Club, who I wasn’t particularly familiar with before going in, but I figured it was going to be fun since he started the set with “As the Saints Go Marching In”… it was a pretty energetic show, Trombone Shorty has an almost unbelievable amount of energy and he got the crowd worked up to a level I haven’t seen in a long time at the 9:30.
Leo Nocentelli’s The Meters Experience (at Blues Alley) was alot more relaxed, focused more on a chiller mood that fit in with the dark atmosphere at Blues Alley, a dinner club I had never attended before. Actually, before going there, I had spent years wondering if the dinner clubs you see in old movies, where a big band plays to people dining even still existed… it does! This show was a lot less intense then the one at the 9:30, but it was chock full of stories and anecdotes about the early days of the Meters and how they came up with their songs, and so forth. Pretty interesting stuff.
I am not a huge Paramore fan, but man… they were totally in control of their crowd. Especially Hayley Williams, the lead singer – she had the whole arena in the palm of her hand. As big as Paramore are now, I would be really suprised if she/they wasn’t a much bigger star in a few years…
Tegan and Sara are a band I used to like a bit, but hadn’t listen to them in a few years… they had a much calmer, but also more friendly and affable relationship with the crowd, and their set was way more pro/rock and less indie/intimate than I would have expected. Good set though.
The photos of the Pumpkins aren’t that great because the band wanted everyone to shoot from VERY far back (which is not normal), so I had to do the best I could. Ah well. It was a weird show, basically half diehard Smashing Pumpkins fans who love even their recent material, and half people there for a nostalgia fix. The two sides didn’t mesh well and Corgan seemed annoyed by requests to play hits that were 17 years old. Ah well. The new stuff, for the record, still sounds pretty good even though I don’t know the songs.
Last week, I shot Of Montreal and James Husband’s tour kick off in Baltimore. It was a fun show, though I was SO SICK. I apologize to anyone I spoke to at that show, I was totally delirious with fever and probably made no sense. This was one of the most grueling photo editing sessions ever, since I had to file the photos by 9am. Somehow I managed it between fever dreams and dry heaves.
Check out the full Of Montreal photo set here.
I did still photography for the first Mz Streamz video ("Tear It Up"). They shot this the summer of 2008 and I wasn’t supposed to post these until after the video debuted, but I forgot to go back and post them after the video debuted! So here they are…
Hot Iron Press and their New Orleans gallery, the Front were profiled in the current issue of Readymade. My show happens to be featured in the photo from the gallery!
I provided the cover, splash page, and an additional photo for today’s Baltimore Citypaper feature story on the new crop of rock bands making waves here in town. You can read the story here. Vincent Black Shadow and Sick Weapons are featured above. Double Dagger, Dope Body, the Art Department, and bunch of other good bands are featured as well.
Also shown is another photo of VBS from a story earlier in the year that I never posted, also from Citypaper.
Click on either flyer for a larger version. The opening is on 9/12/2009 and runs until 10/04/2009. I will be showing live music photos, as well as portraits of musicians and fans, all from the last few years. Come out if you happen to be in NOLA then!
This month in XLR8R (#125, the March issue), I have a 8-page spread about Dan Deacon, a photo of Dutch dubstep artist Martyn, and then a contributor profile of myself (featuring a photo of me by my Dad!). Should be on newstands now! Pick it up.
