Photos Archives

Ah Monday. I did nothing over the weekend. Absolutely nothing. And it was good. I spent a majority of Saturday and Sunday lounging by the pool, reading my new copies of Q and MOJO and trying not to get too sunburned. So much awesome, especially after the hectic July I had.

I did, however, get my shit together long enough to go see the Silversun Pickups last night and I am glad I did. They were pretty amazing, especially given the venue. The Black Cat's backstage really isn't designed or configured to deal with a band like that. And that's not neccesarily a knock on the room as much as an observation wondering what a band as accomplished as this was doing in such a small room with its junior PA system. I knew we were in for a good show when the SSPU's wheeled their amps onstage. They were as big as the stage was.

Let me go on record now saying this band is going to be huge huge huge in a very short amount of time. They have a big sound made for large venues. They'll be blowing away the bands they're opening for soon enough. The set they played last nigth could have easily gone over like gangbusters at the 9:30 Club. The songs are fast, LOUD and tight, propelled by their drummer, a dead ringer stylistically for Dave Grohl. He was just punishing his snare drums. The band has tons of hits; "Kissing Families," "Lazy Eye," "Dream At Tempo 119," "Well Thought Out Twinkles," etc. I was most impressed with the lead singer's voice. On record it sounds uber-processed, but he has the live pipes to back it up. Bottom line: go see this band when they come through your town. And get ready for a big rock show, even if it's on a small scale. I still stand by my Smashing Pumpkins comparison, but I mean it in a good way. Gish-era Pumpkins, before Billy disappeared up his own ass. Sorry for the craptastic pictures, the light in that room is pretty much nonexistant.

Crackers United has better pictures and a smiliar review from their recent NYC show. Check Myspace for some SSPU sounds.

"I'd rather poo in my mum's Sunday roast than have Danger Mouse produce a Portishead record." I second that emotion.

Ah Monday. I did nothing over the weekend. Absolutely nothing. And it was good. I spent a majority of Saturday and Sunday lounging by the pool, reading my new copies of Q and MOJO and trying not to get too sunburned. So much awesome, especially after the hectic July I had.

I did, however, get my shit together long enough to go see the Silversun Pickups last night and I am glad I did. They were pretty amazing, especially given the venue. The Black Cat's backstage really isn't designed or configured to deal with a band like that. And that's not neccesarily a knock on the room as much as an observation wondering what a band as accomplished as this was doing in such a small room with its junior PA system. I knew we were in for a good show when the SSPU's wheeled their amps onstage. They were as big as the stage was.

Let me go on record now saying this band is going to be huge huge huge in a very short amount of time. They have a big sound made for large venues. They'll be blowing away the bands they're opening for soon enough. The set they played last nigth could have easily gone over like gangbusters at the 9:30 Club. The songs are fast, LOUD and tight, propelled by their drummer, a dead ringer stylistically for Dave Grohl. He was just punishing his snare drums. The band has tons of hits; "Kissing Families," "Lazy Eye," "Dream At Tempo 119," "Well Thought Out Twinkles," etc. I was most impressed with the lead singer's voice. On record it sounds uber-processed, but he has the live pipes to back it up. Bottom line: go see this band when they come through your town. And get ready for a big rock show, even if it's on a small scale. I still stand by my Smashing Pumpkins comparison, but I mean it in a good way. Gish-era Pumpkins, before Billy disappeared up his own ass. Sorry for the craptastic pictures, the light in that room is pretty much nonexistant.

Crackers United has better pictures and a smiliar review from their recent NYC show. Check Myspace for some SSPU sounds.

"I'd rather poo in my mum's Sunday roast than have Danger Mouse produce a Portishead record." I second that emotion.

We sucked it up and went out there early on Day Two. A storm front had moved in North of the city and it was surprisingly cool out when we left for lunch. So I made the executive decision to get out to the park in time to see The National. I felt like since I was the guy that started the “The National Hate Washington D.C.” rumor, I owed it to them to go see them. But only because the weather was cooperating.

We grabbed a taxi at 10 after two and made it out there in time to hear Jens Lekman’s last song(verdict: pretty damn good). I hustled up to the photo pit on the opposite stage and grabbed a prime spot before The National went on. Being from Ohio, the crowd was very vocal and restless while waiting for their (sort of) hometown heroes. The band soon took the stage and started “Secret Meeting,” and guess what? They were amazing. Just brilliant. I was shocked. Not that I expected them to suck but I wasn’t prepared for them to be so good. Perhaps Alligator doesn’t do a great job of getting all the little flourishes across that make their live show so compelling, but they sounded like a different band on stage. As a whole, their set was more upbeat than the record, which made a big difference. They were so good I almost got to the point where I would issue a formal apology for starting those nasty rumors, but fuck that, I’m even more pissed now. I want to see them again as soon as possible. Still, The National were my favorite band of the weekend.

Liars were up next and by the time they took the stage, the sun was out in full force, so it was appropriate that their first song had a chorus of "The weather is fierce." It was so hot in the photo pit that I only lasted up there about a song and a half. I don’t know how those kids that stayed up front all day made it. It had to be over 115 degrees up there with no shade whatsoever. Liars were surprisingly good, although they got a bit grating at times. Their industrial, tribal drum circle songs were great but their shouty, anarchistic screechy metal tunes left a lot to be desired.

After fleeing the photo pit, I grabbed a beer and headed back to our base camp in the shade by the main entrance. Ms. Smith and I learned a lot from Day One and spent most of Day Two lounging in the shade, people watching and just chilling while listening to the music from afar. The sound at the festival was brilliant, so you could clearly hear either main stage from pretty much anywhere on the site. So we saw no reason to move out into the sun. And we didn’t.

Mr. Lif and Aesop Rock were next and although the crowd was really into their set, I wasn’t. I found them too wordy and lacking the fat beats needed to keep my interest. I’m not really into indie hip-hop, so it wasn’t really my thing. But I got some good pictures. They were the most photgenic artist of the weekend.

I’m not all that familiar with punk veterans Mission of Burma outside of “Academy Fight Song” and “That’s When I Reach For My Revolver,” but I enjoyed their set. They seemed like they were a big hit, which is more than I can say for Devendra Barnhart. He was a total snoozefest. I don’t think his laid-back hippie vibe was a good fit after Mission of Burma tore it up. He almost put me to sleep. Ms. Smith was similarly unenthused so we used his set to wander around, grab some food and more beer.

Yo La Tengo was up next and I finally came to grips with the fact that I don’t really care for them. But I give them props for their first three songs. They were really long so I got to take a boatload of shots, mostly of Ira seemingly in pain. It was fun to watch the performers and see how long it took them to go from dry to completely drenched in sweat. In Ira’s case, approximately two minutes. Even less for the big guy.

It was around this time we tried to catch our first act of the weekend on the second stage but they were in the middle of a set change when we went over there. It turns out I didn’t see a single act over there. I was thinking it would be insanely hot in the tent, so that kept me away but the scheduling wasn’t exactly ideal. Spank Rock, Matthew Dear and Diplo all played at the same time as bands I wanted to (or thought I wanted to) see on the main stage, so picture taking took priority.

Spoon was next on the Connector stage, so Ms. Smith and I crossed the park on more time to go stake out our spot. Once we were settled, I went up front to grab a prime spot for photos. When I got up there, Britt was hanging out in the photo pit signing autographs and talking with the kids up front. He was really cool, signing everything that people shoved in his face, smiling and chatting the whole time. Right before he left one girl grabbed him with one arm, shoved her camera in my face with the other and commanded, “Take our picture!” So I complied. Britt walked over to me and said “Alright buddy,” slapped me on the back and headed back stage. What was my witty response to one of my favorite artists on the planet? “30 Gallon Tank,” I said, but it was not to be. Spoon’s set consisted almost exclusively of new songs and a mix of material from their last two albums. I was sad not to hear any Girls Can Tell material (especially "Chicago At Night"...hello!), but their insanely tight, catchy version of “Stay Don’t Go” (by no means my favorite Spoon song) almost made up for it. Being right in front during “The Two Sides Of Monsignor Valentine” was a big thrill.

After our allotted three songs in the photo pit, I headed back into the crowd to watch the rest of the set with Ms. Smith. During Spoon’s last song, I made my way over to the other stage one final time to get ready for Os Mutantes. They weren’t really my thing, too "Uncle John's Band" for me, so after a few songs, we made our way out the back exit and quickly hailed a cab back to the hotel, where air conditioning and cold showers awaited.

Overall I really enjoyed my experience at the Pitchfork Fest. Yes the writers on the site can be pretentious wankers at times (unlike the writer of this site), but they did a great job with this event. Everything there was super cheap, from the tickets ($30 for two days), food (most dishes under $5), beer ($4 for 12 oz.), and water ($1 for 20 oz.) The lines got a bit out of control at times, but most of them moved fast and everyone inside the gates was super friendly. I felt like I got a lot for my money.

I can’t say enough about the sound. There were some hiccups during Day Two (Most notably during Spoon and Os Mutantes) but overall it was crystal clear and loud as fuck. The heat was oppressive (and that’s understating it a bit) but we did better on Day Two by just hanging in the shade and not trying to over-extend ourselves by standing in the sun. That strategy worked wonders and we were able to enjoy everything to the fullest on Day Two. Chicago itself was great. I’ve been there twice and it already seems very familiar to me.

For the Day Two photoset on Flickr, click here.
Click here to see all my photos from the 2006 Pitchfork Music Festival.

(aka I survived Day One of Pitchforkfest and all you get is this lousy blog entry)

Greetings from hot and humid Chicago. I just went outside to get breakfast and it's already 85 degrees out. It's supposed to reach 98 today, with a heat index around 107, which is even worse than yesterday's 95 degrees.

Yesterday Ms. Smith and I got up fairly early(we skipped the GJ/Camera Obscura gig the night before due to my raging headache which turned out to be a good move because the gig was cancelled due to a power outage) and went on a boat tour that highlighted Chicago's skyline/architecture. It was really cool although we were both melting at the end of the hour long trip. We decided to lay low during the peak heat hours and just tooled around the city by our hotel. We eventually made our way down to Millennium Park and saw the Gehry Concert Hall and the Bean (photos later). We headed over to Union Park around 4 or so and caught the last bit of Destroyer (verdict: not my thing). Art Brut was next and Eddie and Co. ripped through the same set they've been playing in the US with the exception of one new song that has a killer guitar riff. He also added some new drinking partners in "I'm Considering A Move To LA", "drinking Stella with Paul Weller," "drinking gin with Vera Lynn," etc. They were great. As usual.

My man Ted Leo was next and I was super excited to see him since I've missed him the last few times he came through DC. He came out and straight rocked it, mixing old faves with new stuff, all of which was great. It was a real treat for me to finally get to take some photos of Ted. Longtime readers know I heart him the mostest and being in the photo pit during one of his sets was something that I've looked forward to doing for a long time. Ted played, in my opinion, the best set of the day.

The Walkmen were up after him and hit the ground running. They played a slowie first and then got down top business, pumping out "The Rat" with just the third song in their set. It was best. I got a great spot in the pit and got some amazing photos of them.

About halfway through The Walkmen, I hustled over to the other stage to plant myself in front of Barry's mic and waited for The Futureheads. Sunderland's finest played the kind of set I wanted them to play at their recent DC show, opening up with "Decent Days and Nights" and then quickly following up with "Area" and never letting up. It was a straight up ass-kicking.

As for the Festival itself, it was great, save for the heat. I am getting to old for this shit. Me, myself and my Scandinavian heritage can't handle triple digit heat and humidity. I really wanted to see Band of Horses yesterday but I had a rough time dealing with four and a half hours of heat, so there's no way I could have gone out there at 2:30 yesterday when they went on. I fear The National will suffer the same fate today. They play an early set but we're most likely going to wait until later in the day to make our way over.

Somehow I accidentally deleted my Art Brut photos from yesterday, which is a bummer, but at the same time I don't really feel like the interweb needs any more pictures of Art Brut. Anyways, more photos after the jump and over at Flickr.

w00t! w00t! w00t!

I just found out that I have a photo pass for PitchforkFest in Chicago this weekend. So. Excited. There's even a decent chance these photos might appear on a major online outlet in the near future. Sweetness!

So who else is going to PitchforkFest? Holler at me.

Before heading to Chi-town on Friday, I'm going to see Editors at the 9:30 Club on Thursday night. Back Room has garnered quite a few spins on leaftunes, and they had a great light show last time (i.e. pretty pictures), so it should be fun. And yesterday I found out local boys done good Cedars are opening the show! And they have a new EP coming out in August. They have new tracks available for streaming at their MySpace page. Check out "This Century," that might be the best thing they've ever done. It's straight fire! They better *ahem* have this in the set list on Thursday. *ahem*

But wait, I have news regarding D.C.'s other best band, my beloved Nethers. New D.C. show on August 10th and The Red & Black! And, listen up Seattle and NYC peeps, upcoming shows are coming your way.

NYC - Aug. 11th
Seaport Music Festival w/ Josh Ritter; South Street Seaport, Pier 1. This show is free.
Nethers go on at 7 pm. You were already going to this show, so go see Nethers and get a new favorite band out of this gig. You'll thank me later.

Aug. 23rd - Seattle, WA
Woodland Park Zoo w/ the Decemberists.
Nethers go on at 6 pm. Yes, you get to see my favorite band open for your favorite band. At a zoo. And no, I'm not jealous. Not at all. Thanks for asking. Hmph.

Completely not related: Republicans are pretty. And mostly white.

Will the next iPod have a none-touch interface? That would be sweet, especially if you bought one of these:

Thanks for the link Gl*mrocker!

Through means that I won't go into, yesterday I had the privilege to attend the services commemorating the 10 Year Anniversary of the crash of TWA Flight 800 at Smith Point Park in Shirley, NY. It was a taxing day, both emotionally and physically. Like every other place on the East Coast, Long Island was under a massive heat wave and being outside for most of the afternoon was none to pleasant.

To be honest I don't remember much about the crash of TWA Flight 800. I was in college and pretty much cocooned from the world when it happened. Later that summer I travelled to NYC to do my internship at Epic Records and I do remember the crash being a common topic of conversation, especially since one of the people I interned for lived on Long Island near the crash site. But other than that, it didn't really register with me.

All that changed yesterday. Seeing the families of the victims, the former TWA employees and the first responders all remembering that fateful day and learning about how they've coped in the time since then was enough to bring tears to anyone's eyes. Governor Pataki gave a nice speech as did a few others, but the best speech was made by the Coast Guard Captain (whose name I forget) when he talked about the recovery efforts by his men. He said he had a plaque in his office that says "The Coast Guard, We Make Heroes Everyday" but that after dealing with the families that went through this terrible ordeal it had new meaning for him. He came very close to breaking down in tears while he spoke and he got the biggest round of applause out of everyone when he was done speaking.

The people in charge of the memorial used yesterday as the occasion to unveil the newest part of the memorial, a sculpture called "The Light." It's an abstract take on a lighthouse that represents a beacon for everyone that lost their life in the tragedy to use to find their way home. It, like the rest of the memorial was very well done.

I took a bunch of pictures yesterday during the events, but I was a bit torn about doing it. I wanted to document what I saw and experienced but didn't want to intrude on anyone during their special day. I was but a spectator, not that much different from the press hordes covering the event. So I tired not to intrude too much.

You can see all my photos from yesterday over at Flickr. Much like they did 10 years ago, Newsday has comprehensive coverage that is so thorough it can keep you busy for hours on end. Their photos from yesterday are better than mine. They also have reports on yesterday's ceremonies and the victim's families. A fun fact I found out yesterday is that the crash of Flight 800 back in 1996 was the first time the Newsday website was ever updated with breaking news. Back then I guess they just used the site to post PDF's of the paper. It's crazy to think how young the internet actually is. But I digress...

Now that I don't live here anymore, visiting NYC keeps getting better and better. I'm able to do the things I want to do and avoid all the things I hate. This weekend's trip was alot of fun, despite the crazy heat. On Saturday we ventured out to Siren after walking down 5th Ave. in Park Slope (where I pointed out all the new establishments that have popped up since I left) and lunch at Bonnie's (my favorite place to eat in Brooklyn) and a few beers at The Gate (my favorite bar in Brooklyn). Siren was mostly "meh" but I was still glad we went. We caught 2 songs by The Cribs (boring), the last song by The Stills (better) and all of Art Brut. Eddie and Co. rocked despite the craptastic sound on the Stillwell Stage. Here are a few pics.

Stay tuned for some very special content tomorrow.

The sky looked ominous as I climbed up the escalator at the Stadium-Armory stop about an hour before kick off last night. It started raining not 2 minutes after I got to RFK. I was a bit down that the field access my photo pass gave me would all be for naught, but the skies eventually cleared up about 10 minutes into the game. Before that I was walking around with one hand holding my umbrella up and the other desperately trying to snap photos (fearing they may not even get the game in) with a hamburger bun sack wrapped around my camera as a barrier to the weather. It was pretty funny.

I'm sure the other photographers thought it was hilarious. Ever go somewhere knowing that everyone else there knows you don't belong? That was me last night, standing on the endline of the pitch at RFK with all the other photographers. They all had these very expensive cameras with humongous lenses while I stood there with my little pea shooter wrapped in a hamburger bun sack. Everyone was else was fully weather proofed. Parkas, shields for the cameras, the whole nine. It makes sense the Scottish media in attendance (there was alot of them) would be prepared for this, as would the AP and other national press there. Little ol' me? Not so much.

The equipment the other guys down there had was truly incredible. This guy's setup was bananas. He had three different cameras each with a different lense (all of them huge) and a little station for his Powerbook so he could upload his pics to his laptop while he was taking other shots. All of this in the rain. I was bit intimidated.

Honestly though, I did alright all theings considered. I still can't find my battery charger since the move and my memory card had about 300 photos from the Futureheads show last week, so I was a bit judicious in my snapping. Not so for the professionals there. They would snap off about 8 to 10 shots each time they hit the shutter button. It sounded like a machine gun fight down there on press row.

The game itself was great. United dominated from start to finish and wound up winning 4-0. Check out the write-up from the Scottish Herald. Good stuff. Freddy Adu was the best player on the field by far. He was slicing and dicing the Celtic defense all night. Watching the game from the end line of the pitch was great thrill. I could hear the players talk to each other during play and see blades of grass fly up with each slide tackle. United scored three times in the second half and all of those were right in front of me. I know it's "only" MLS, but see see professional athletes doing there thing as close as five feet in front of you is pretty cool. I saw DaMarcus Beasley and John Harkes milling about after the game. An no, I didn't say anything nasty to Beasely, although I wanted to.

Thanks much to the fine folk in the DC United front office. I'm going to approach them again and see if I can't do this a few more times before the season is out. I will, however, have to buy a lens with better reach than my current 28-75mm.

See all my pics from last night here.

Here are some pics taken while wandering around NYC. The top collage and the large pic in the middle were taken near Wall Street at night near the Spiderman shoot. They had all sorts of lights set up everywhere and it was as bright as day down there. Sadly, we couldn't get close enough to see what kind of scene they were shooting. And I have no idea what the hell this is.

The lower collage was taken on Sunday morning while we were killing time before heading home. VW was shooting an ad for the new Rabbit and the more we walked around, the more Spiderman cast trailers we saw. It was kinda weird walking around that area, as it was my old neighborhood and I hadn't been back there since moving to Brooklyn in early '02. I didn't even get pissed off at all the tourists at Ground Zero.

In other news, I am officially excited about the World Cup, mad for it even. Where is everyone watching the England v. Paraguay match at 9 a.m. on Saturday? Guinness before noon, people! Dceiver and I are taking suggestions on where to go, so if you want in, just holler. Also, I am putting together my World CUp fantasy team, Fishscale FC, so if there's a player I definitely need on my team, let me know. I'm fairly well versed in the European players, but that's about it.