Royal Standard Weekend

Tonight begins the first of two nights shooting at The Royal Standard in Sheffield.  Tonight’s bands are Galleon, Severance and one of my local favourites Coyote Mad Seeds.  The first two bands are great!  They’re heavy and rock n roll all suitable for opening for a band like CMS.  They’re pretty damn good as well.  Coyote Mad Seeds play a great show tonight and have the presence of an inflatable sheep onstage, a possible mascot for future shows like Iron Maiden’s infamous Eddie mascot.  One way to wrap up this gig was Chris’ bass string breaking after a song but it doesn’t stop the gig.  A few of us decide to invade the stage, so all in all wraps up yet another good CMS gig.

The Verals are another quality Sheffield band that just get better and better every time I see them.  I really hope they make it big on the music scene.  Tonight sees them releasing their EP and they also have new songs to show which sound great.  There’s a great turnout for them as well with lots of people turning up on this gorgeous sunny day!  After them are acoustic band The Velcro Teddy Bears.  A great band that just look like they’re having great fun onstage as they play their music with the people dancing away to the songs.  A great fun evening to conclude the weekend, I’d happily do these kind of nights as much as I can.

New Model Army, The Plug, Sheffield 11-05-13

The only things I’ve heard about New Model Army are from my dad who used to play their music in the car on journeys.  After a shaky start to the night with getting into the venue I was finally sorted out with a pass and got to see what NMA are like and it has to be said they put on a fantastic show.  The music is great, nice rocky riffs, with great tribal sounding drumming and a great reaction from the audience, watching them move their arms in motion to the drumming is fantastic, people even standing on top of the audience.  They appear to do it on certain songs of NMAs.  It’s a great reaction from the audience and lots of good photographic opportunity.  For banter’s sake singer Justin Sulivan once recalls the story in the early days of coming up to Sheffield only to find that it was the wrong day!  Once again a great gig and a great way to hear music you haven’t really listened to.  Big thanks to Tour Manager Darren for sorting out the fiasco with photo passes on the door.

JD Roots Bank Holiday Monday 06-05-13

Tonight’s bank holiday event at the Octagon was headlined by Radio DJ Zane Lowe with an array of local Sheffield talent in support.  First band I came in to was Young Peculiar a band whose funky, acoustic, jazz sounds form catchy radio friendly sounding tunes and good stage presence.   Next up was a band called the Dead Sons who I have heard about from other bands I’ve covered.  What I’d heard was true they had a stage presence, good songs and they were LOUD! Very loud!  Great light show as well.  After them was Drenge a duo whose guitar and drum playing creates a heavy wall of good rock sounds!  Again a crazy light show.  Didn’t manage to get any pictures of Zane Lowe on the decks owing to the strobe lighting but the night was worth it as I had  pictures of some great bands.

For more information on the bands check out the links below.

https://www.facebook.com/youngpeculiar?fref=ts

https://www.facebook.com/deadsonsmusic

https://www.facebook.com/drengeboys

Walking Papers show, London, the Garage, 04-05-13

Tonight was an exciting gig for me.  In November I got myself the opportunity to cover Seattle band Walking Papers at The Ruby Lounge in Manchester.  It was probably the best intimate gig that I’d shot then and for them it may have been special as it was their first gig outside of Seattle in the UK.  Tonight was destined to be a good one and it was.  A friend of mine from school came up with me to the show as I told her I was around in London t that time.   She’d given the band a listen and she liked what she heard so she invited herself along.  I was told as I collected my photo pass that I was to only shoot the first three songs using no flash and that was it but I found out from the security at the barrier that there was no restriction and I could go into the barrier whenever I wanted to.  It was a music photographer’s ideal way of shooting there, no restriction meaning less stress on whether you’d have captured the perfect picture.

  First up was Buffalo Summer who were a great warm up for the Papers, a lot of energy, and good rock n’ roll songs!  Good lighting as well from the stage.  Walking Papers did a fantastic performance.  They played the first album in its entirety and some amazing new ones as well along with some great jams in between.  The whole band was full of energy and were clearly enjoying themselves.  Jeff Angell was interactive with the audience and it was great to see that!  The lighting however for their set was a difficult one thought, all the back lighting was on but there was a lack of front lighting thus making it hard to get some decent pictures but then again the best thing to do is wait for the right moment for a slight moment of front lighting, I just had to adapt or give up no giving up there. 

  First time for me was where a bottle hit me landing right on my legs as I sat on the barrier after the first song something which might have had something to do with the band knocking it across the stage and I happened to be the target!  Jackpot!  No offensive take hehehe.  A great night of music, great set form both bands and a signed poster, all in all a very good night!

 Walking Papers will play two sets over the Download Festival weekend.  Catch them on tour if you can, they’re brilliant.   

Quite late post from April 20th but ah well here it is!

Saturday night was photographing at the South Sea in Broomhill, Sheffield, for the organization Fourth City that works to promote the local music scene in Sheffield.  Some great bands once again tonight, Zodiac N Black and Goat Leaf who happen to be touring together where here tonight as well as Box Smash and The Verals.  Not really sure what to make of Box Smash at the moment, maybe its just first impressions.  The Verals are a great band.  The three lads aged 14-15 are incredibly talented citing influences such as Foo Fighters, Queens of The Stone Age, Red Hot Chili Peppers amongst a list of other great bands to perform some top tunes.  Tonight we got to hear a new one that wasn’t titled properly just called New Song.  Sounds brilliant lads! 

 Great performances as well from Goat Leaf and Zodiac N Black again.  Having heard Zodiac N Black again tonight they sounded better than  when I first heard them on the Thursday!  Got a free CD afterwards from them, will post up a review on it later this week.  Shot some candid stuff of some of the bands as well and seeing as Curt, Verals drummer started snapping pictures of me I tried getting pictures of the Verals back.  All in the name of laughs.  Until the next post see you then!

The Plug, 19-04-13

This Friday night had me going down to the Plug (a club in Sheffield) to shoot more local bands.  Main band I was there to shoot was the Jack Londons a band influenced by indie bands such as Arctic Monkeys, garage bands of the 60s and punk rock.  Add some great snappy catchy stuff in their songs.

Anyway tonight I got to go in their backstage room, good enough for me to take some snaps of some backstage mischief, like Jake the drummer unscrewing a light blub from the wall and going into a backroom which had boiler looking stuff in it.  Nice bunch of guys as well, Jake being particularly mad (great sense of humor mate), but then again drummers are stereotypically mad aren’t they ;o).  

  As well as shooting other bands it was great to be shooting in an environment that had great lighting in contrast to the Pit and Pendulum gig where lighting was dreadful.  So good that I went to the side of the stage to try and catch the bands basked in front lighting causing a bit of a silhouette effect.

 A good set from the Jack Londons tonight and a special one as well for them as the gig introduction new boy Alex Rolls on the guitar.  He’s only been with them 3 weeks and you couldn’t tell (well unless they told you which they did J).

  So once again tonight was another productive evening with the other bands, Ish-Brothers, The Outfits, The Loin Works and The Likely Lads.  Interesting selection again and probably may see some of them again at some point soon, guess we’ll find out!.