Save the gear!!

That was my theme for the La Fouine show at Club Soda on October 6th. La Fouine is a french rapper of Morrocan origins, who is pretty popular on the other side of the ocean. And judging by the totally packed house, pretty popular here to!

You know the show is going to be packed when you are standing at the press table and the bouncers are outside trying to keep the crowd from getting in 20 minutes before the doors are scheduled to open. One poor kid was squashed up against the glass door. I decided to make my way to the front of the stage. The fun of being the house shooter is you get to go in the venue before the fans, giving you choice spot to shoot from. After my last show where I was up on the second floor, I decided to brave the front of the stage. This means that I have to be there through the opening acts, up front, there with the fans. It's actually pretty fun as you get to chat with some of the fans, learn about the artist, about them. I was about 1/4 way from the left side of the stage, giving me a decent viewing angle for when La Fouine gets on stage. The crowd kept piling in, and by 9:30pm (the show scheduled to start at 9:00pm), the front was packed about 20 deep. And when I say packed, I mean PACKED. Tighter than sardines. You get an idea of how full it was in the last image in the series below.

The crowd was getting wrestless and started pushing. Some people trying to get their latecomer friends in with them. It was a wave going from left to right. All the while, I'm trying to stick to my little spot in front of the stage, but now wondering how the hell I'm going to get out. While from of stage shots are great, I like to get at least 2 different shooting angles when there is no pit. Just getting out of the front of the stage, with my camera gear in tow, was going to be a challenge. But I'll deal with that when the time comes.

Security had to step in to break up a fight. Usually not a good sign of things to come. People kept shoving and I noticed that I was about a foot further away from where I had started. And the opener wasn't even on stage yet. So I decided to make a tactical retreat from the front of the stage before it got too chaotic. It's one thing being up front during a packed house, it's another to be up front with lenses and camera gear when the crowds are getting crazy. I made my way to beside the bar and got up on a stool. At least I'm out of the crowd and have a slightly higher shooting angle. And again, having done my visual research, I noticed that he more often holds the mic in his left hand, making the right side of the stage a better position if I am to be stuck in one place. It is always rolling the dice, but stackign the odds in your favour is a good thing.

Well, that was the idea. Just before La Fouine got on stage, the guy who was chatting with me at the front of the stage was all the way to the side and second in row. Happy to be out of the front area, when the show started, everyone got up on front of me and my once perfect view of the stage now became an exercise in shooting between heads and raised hands.

The guy is insane on stage. He came out with so much energy, I was having troubles freezing motion. In fact, many images came out with slight hand blur. The crowd was nuts, he was nuts. While he was late getting on stage, he definately made up for it with energy and intensity.

Most of the shots below were taken with the Canon 70-200 f/2.8 IS. I did break out the 24-70 f/2.8 to get some wider crowd shots. This is a mandate I get from the venue as they love to post up pictures of the crowd enjoying the artist. Shutter ranged from 1/200 - 1/400. Would of loved to be in the 1/400 when he first got on stage, but the lights were darker for the first song.

Lessons learned? Don't be afraid to back down from your spot if you really feel things are getting out of hand. Know the security guards at the venue. Arrive early to get a good spot. :)

More shows to come!
I have the 4 DJ quarter Birdy Nam Nam coming up next and also doing a Ska Festival in a few days. I'm learning to love variety in music.

I'm not a papparazzi, I'm a concert photographer!

I'll get straight to the point of this rant / post. The higher I climb on the concert photographer ladder here in town, the more and more I am faced with band management (and sometimes bands themselves) asking me to sign ridiculous contracts to allow me to shoot the shows. These contracts are what are referred to as a "rights grab".

Why ridiculous? Because these contracts make me sign away my rights and ownership of the images to the bands and management, at no charge, for ever and ever. They limit my own use of my images and even the use of the images for the media I am shooting for. It may not seem that big of a deal to most people, but think about it for a second.... my gear is mine, bought, paid for and insured. If I am not paid by the media I am working for, I still have rent and groceries to buy.

Why are they doing this? Because in today's digital photography world, everyone and their uncle has a digital camera. For every professional photographer trying to make it in the world by producing quality work and giving great customer service, there are 10 music fans that just want to get in the front row and shoot the show for free, just happy to get in the door. Bands and band management are clueing in on this and coming up with more ways to make money... ie exploiting concert photographers.

I get restrictions. First 3 songs. Only 1 song. Shoot from the soundboard. No back stage. No on stage. No flash. Everyone on the right. But trying to take away ownership and copyright?

All those pretty images that are on the web showing off a band live? All the images that make it into the magazines, in CDs, books, and posters that the fans just love to buy? Yeah, those have to come from somewhere. And they are usually not from uncle Bob with his digital camera.

I find it pretty damn ironic that these music artists, who are using us music photographers as puppets to get free professional images, are the first ones to bitch and complain when someone downloads their music for free off the web. Oh, the injustices of people not paying them for all their hard work, the depreciation on their gear, the creative and artistic vision they put forward, the long years spent in dirty clubs before making it to the bigger arenas, the late nights working on their passion while keeping a day job to pay the bills... oh wait, I just described my life...

I guess its ok to stop buying their art and find free ways of getting it as they don't want to pay for mine.

As the artists stood together to bring down Napster and other illegal music download sites, I hope that photographers can stand together and refuse to shoot any shows from artists trying to exploit them.

Who are some of the bands that have/had these highly restrictive and ridiculous contracts? One of the ones I was shocked at hearing are Foo Fighters. Add to them Stevie Wonder, Carlos Santana, Kiss, Kesha, Janet Jackson, Lady Gaga, Band of Horses, House of Blues, Maroon 5, Joan Jett and the Blackhearts, Def Leppard, Motley Crue, Rhianna, Seether,...

Let's hope the list starts to get shorter.

Crossing an Hasidic Jew and reggae...

....gives you one hell of a great artist.

I had the pleasure of shooting an artist I recently discovered called Matisyahu. As of 3-4 months ago, I actually had no idea who he was. I follow a photographer named Jared Polin (aka FroKnowsPhoto.com) who posted up some awesome concert and tour shots of Matisyahu and when I had the chance to shoot him in a show, I jumped on it! Nothing better than comparing your output with someone whose work you respect.

The show was at (surprise surprise) Club Soda! And it was sold out! Production Iris was great enough to get my accreditation done (these guys rock!). I was told that he would be coming on stage around 10:00pm, so after getting all set with my press credentials, I showed up around 8:45pm to make sure I could get a good setup for the pictures.

Man was I wrong. I should of just bucked up and stayed in front during the 2 opening acts. Getting in front was a chore. The floor was tight with bodies and people aren't too keen at letting someone walk in front. Although once they see the camera and lens, they are usually great at making space.

I ended up on the right side of the stage, behind a speaker that was hung from the ceiling. I picked this side for two reasons:

1- In looking at Matisyahu images, I saw that he holds the mic with his right hand. So shooting from the right side gives me more of the shots I like to take, where you can see the mic and his mouth. Compared to being on the left hand side where his arm would be blocking the mic and mouth most of the time

2- The left side of the stage leads to the backstage and has a bouncer. The right side is empty (although there is a door) but usually has 2-3 chairs along the wall, giving this photographer a little higher vantage point to shoot from! Oh yeah, I do think sometimes.

And that's what happened! After the 2nd opener left the stage, a few people cleared out and I was able to make my way to the chairs and stand on one. Half the stage was blocked by the speaker, but the front was clear! To my chagrin, Matisyahu likes to hang further back of the stage, where he does this funky dance routine. I unfortunately had no shooting angle to get any of that. I was stuck in one spot, no chance at moving anywhere else. You'll see in the first image posted how much to the side I was.

I was delighted at how Matisyahu blended some rock, alternative and reggae into a pretty unique sound.

At the end of the 3 songs, one of the bouncers was nice enough to let me leave from the door and I ended up right in the back alley. No trying to make my way through the ultra dense crowd back out! The crew at the Club Soda are seriously awesome.

I would of loved to be closer up to the stage and have more access to move around to get a variety of shots as he was pretty expressive on stage. But what can you do! Maybe next time :)

Here are a selection of images, 30-ish up in the Galleries on the website

Metal to the core @ Heavy MTL

I grew up listening to rock and metal. So when I got the OK to shoot the Heavy MTL 2 day festival, I was stoked! The organisers first said no photographers in the photo pit, but quickly changed their mind when many photographers refused to carry their gear into a mosh pit to get decent images. Good on you Evenko, thanks for making our lives easier (and safer!).

The 2 day line-up was intense. There were many great local bands such as Slaves on Dope and Blackguard, along with some pretty heavy weight headliners. Day 1 had In Flames, Godsmack, Disturbed while day 2 had Anthrax, Motorhead and Kiss. Many fans were wondering at the pertinence of having Kiss at a heavy metal festival, but when you think back to when Kiss was in their heyday, they set the stage for the heavy metal movement.

The festival had 3 stages, 2 main ones and one secondary one. The main stages were pretty high up and somewhat drab as the band was pretty far apart from each other. The secondary stage was my favourite. You could get up close to the bands and they had some lights going on making for interesting shots, like the one below from Blackguard.




























The typical 3 songs and out was in effect for most of the bands. Due to the number of photographers in the pit, we were limited to 1 song for Anthrax, Opeth and Motorhead. The only black mark of the day went to Kiss who limited the actual media present in the pit. Out of the 30 or so photographers, I believe 8 were the "chosen" to shoot Kiss. While I can appreciate that the band is in control of their image and in their right to do what they do, it is a piss off when you are a struggling photographer and a band, which was once a struggling band, wants to be so controlling of their image. It is in my best interest to take the best shots possible of all clients. And besides, how many freakin photos of Kiss are already out there? They presented a release form to all photographers shooting which basically sold the photographer's soul. The rights and ownership of the images are given to the band and the photographer isn't legally allowed to use the images taken for their own portfolio without approval of the band.

That's what we call a rights grab. The band, who makes way more money than I do, now have 8 top notch photographers taking images of them for free. Am I a bit pissed? Kinda. I'm pissed that more and more bands are doing things like this.

That venting aside, the festival was very well organised, I love how they treat the media and the staff...top notch. Music was awesome and I got to mix in being a pro photographer and being a fan at the same time!

You can check out the Heavy MTL Day 1 and Day 2 images in the Gallery section of my website.

Below are Day 1 images of Disturbed, Godsmack, Billy Talent and In Flames






























And here we have some Day 2 images of Motorhead, Morbid Angel, Anthrax, As I Lay Dying and Girlschool

All Warped-up (warped music, warped back, warped mind,...)

A little over a week after the end of the Jazz fest, The Vans Warped Tour was in town. Going over the schedule, there were 8 (I think, it's all a blur) stages and over 80 bands playing...all in one day! And here I thought that shooting 20 bands in 10 days was hectic.

The name of the game is scheduling your time. The first thing I did was grab the daily schedule (it can change any day, so grabbing it the day of almost guarantees the bands you want to shoot are playing), I went to the press tent, sat a picnic table, and spent 30 minutes planning my day. Nothing was set in stone, but there were a few bands on the list that were must shoots, so I had to plan the rest of my shooting around them. The last thing I wanted was to be wandering for an hour not really knowing where I was going and missing out on some of the awesome talent.

Typical 3 songs and out was in effect for all bands on all stages. Although some had less people watching so it allowed for some decent shots from the crowd. Pits on all stages except the smallest one, which was hosting an all day battle of the bands.

The venue was alright. It was at Parc Jean-Drapeau, and outdoor parc on an island. Little Montreal fact... the island is man made mostly from the dirt that was dug up while they were digging (dirt dug dig haha) the Montreal metro (aka subway) in the 60s. The parc has Montreal's 6 flags amusement parc, pool, beach, casino and F1 race track and a bunch of outdoor activities year round. The chosen site for the Warped tour was along the race track area. I prefer the other side of the parc where the other music festivals are held (Osheaga and such). It's greener and more open.

It was middle of July and it was hot!! The tour organizers were genius is setting up a free water refilling station (which ended up being a giant mud pit at the end of the day, but really, no one cared). It was around 36C (about 98F), under a scorching sun. The name of the game for the day was water and sunscreen. The stages are open air, so while part of the pit can be covered from the sun, getting to and from the stages has you in the direct sun.

All in all, I had a fun time shooting, made some great images, met some awesome photographers and didn't get sunburned!