Taken on the street in Hampden, outside of the Golden West. Sprayer is Rjyan Kidwell, perhaps better known as CEX + Jeremy Hyman (formerly of Ponytail). Since it’s Rjyan, it’s not quite a “rock band”, exactly, but still a live experience with instruments, and one that I think is pretty interesting. Click here to see more of my photos of SPRAYER.
A few weeks back, I was lucky enough to sit in the studio with my friends, grindcore band Pig Destroyer as they were recording their new album, their first with new drummer Adam Jarvis. It was, as expected, AWESOME! And Adam sounds great… everything I heard is making me really look forward to the new record, whatever it may be called. See more shots of Adam (and others from Pig Destroyer history) here.
Yesterday I attended a fashion show by Lindsay of Monster Lou. I liveblogged shots of the models and some of the prep via my Instagram and Twitter accounts. Follow me at @joshsisk to get in on future liveblogs, and if you wanna see all the instagrammed shots click here. I’ll post edited versions later in the week.
Photos from the peaceful Trayvon Martin rally at the steps of Baltimore City Hall. This event took the city by surprise, but they treated everyone well, at least from what I heard. This happened right as the national outcry over the handling of the case was peaking.
I liveblogged some of these photos previously, but here are the real deal photos.
The other week I spent an afternoon with Thaddeus Logan, author of the book Hey Cabbie! and it’s upcoming sequel. A cabbie in Baltimore City for more than 30 years, his books tell stories about the city, his experiences, and some of the more notable experiences he’s had behind the wheel – some sad, some exciting, some scary.
Thaddeus and I drove around to locations he talks about in the book, taking his photo for a City Paper article about him and his books. The image above is what ran, but click here to see other photos from our shoot.
Eyehategod crowd shot from 2010.
Reunited in 2011, with City Paper cover.
For the last near-decade, Maryland Death Fest has been a Baltimore Institution, bringing the best current and historic extreme metal bands to Sonar in Baltimore to play for thousands of fans. It’s literally the best and most interesting metal related event in the US. Spanning over several days (4 this year), dozens of bands play to a crowd of thousands, who travel from all over the world to be there. Because of it’s prominence, many bands choose to reunite to play it, or have their last show there, or play for the first/last/only time in the US there. Basically, it’s an amazing event. And this year’s, the TENTH Annual, starts thursday and last til sunday. For a list of bands and set times, click here. Here are some of my favorite shots from the last several years: Continue reading
Reliably a great time, the Spring 2012 MICA Fashion show, Milquetoast (hosted at the 2640 Space) was no exception. One of my favorite assignments every season, and always very different… it’s really fun to see what they come up with each year. This time, it was more of a group of themed performance art pieces than a traditional fashion show, but each piece served to highlight the student’s works, of course. I really recommend checking this out next time, if you live in Baltimore!
Last weekend, checked out the Sweetlife Fest at Merriweather Post Pavilion for the Baltimore Sun… a rainy, dreary day but the kids in attendance could not be deterred… lots of smiling youths who were partying HARD. Also, some pretty great food courtesy of local vendors (I had a Toki Underground pho dog, myself… yum!) Weird to see Kid Cudi rocking a huge stage at an arena, last time I saw him was a little more intimate…
Check all my photos from Sweetlife! (there are alot more than above, including other bands like Delta Spirit & Explosions In The Sky).
Another fun Unregistered Nurse show at the Golden West! i didn’t take too many of Quintron though, it was too crazy during his set… him and Miss Pussycat are always so fun to see!
May is one of the most CULTURAL months of the year in Baltimore, with both Maryland Death Fest AND Maryland Film Fest… this year I will be attending both. I always end up missing alot, so this year I decided to make a little cheat sheet for myself with the films and events I wanna attend at the Film Fest. I figured I’d share it with the Internet, why not. Post a comment if you think I missed something!
ALSO: Once the Film Fest starts, check out my Liveblog & my Twitter. I’ll be posting pictures & commentary from the fest!
Here goes: Continue reading
This was a great show… to celebrate the release of Ed Schrader’s Music Beat’s new album JAZZ MIND, out now on Load Records (it is great, you should get it!).
Black Pus is Brian Chippendale (Lightning Bolt, Mindflayer, drawing comic books)’s one man drums+electronics band, and it was really fun… the crowd went crazy for him and his wall of sound, constantly stage-diving and dancing. One girl next to me went up easily 12 times in a row… pretty fun. Even Chester got into the action!
Ed and Devin’s set was energetic and awesome… everyone singing along, dancing, the crowd spill forward onto the stage over and over… there was an amazing moment when the power died and Ed led the crowd in a capella version of Air Show, which was just awesome to have happen.
See all the Black Pus & Ed Schrader photos from Floristree here!
Wow. I had never heard of this band before, though I realized once I was there that I had heard their hit single “Tonight Tonight”, but WOW. This was the first show I have been to where the crowd (comprised mostly of teenage girls) was louder than the music… much louder. A sold out 9:30, all screaming in unison, without much pause! Pretty wild.
Always a blast to see live, New Orleans’ own Queen Diva Big Freedia graced Baltimore with her presence a few weeks back and it was a sweaty, azz-filled evening. I’ve seen her show many times, but never get tired of it. Don’t miss Freedia if she comes to your town!
Trying to get all these SXSW photos out the door… but I keep taking more photos. It’s a never ending cycle… anyway, I saw Lower Dens play a day show at SXSW for the Sun. One of my favorite new Baltimore bands, really looking forward to their next record. The out of crowd town seemed to love them too, based on the response from the large crowd at this early show.
I had never even heard of this band when I shot them the other day for the Post, but they had a good sound and the singer/guitarist Brittany Howard has a great voice and really strong stage presence… this was fun.
See the rest of the Alabama Shakes photos (and others) in my APRIL SHOWS set.
This was a pretty great time. No openers, just Bruce & the band. I can’t say I am a deep cuts-style Springsteen fan, but I of course like many of his songs and he is an icon… it was great to get to shoot this for the Post. And the (sold out) crowd loved him, as you would expect.
Friday me and Jenn Mizgata did a photo booth thing at the Hippo for Deep In The Game/Cullen’s Birthday. It was a LOT of fun and I got to see DDM live, finally, which was a treat – so wild and frenetic. Really good time. Happy birthday Cullen!
I did a couple of photo sessions with Baltimore band Arboretum to help promote their record on Thrill Jockey. Great guys, we had a lot of fun. See all the photos (or most of them) here on flickr!
This was a fun show. Everyone was in good form, DLR looked and sounded good (maybe a bit less acrobatics than the old days, but what can ya do), Eddie seemed healthy, Alex was a machine and… well, then there’s Wolfgang. He seemed to be having fun, at least.
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