Archive for August 2009
I will admit to be an occasional Pitchfork reader. I still hate the layout and the font size is still far too small and the wrong colour, but maybe once a week I’ll remember to go and have a look and read a few reviews.  If the physical act of reading reviews on their site wasn’t as painful as it is I might go there more often. Despite the fact that Pitchfork’s best songs of the 2000s seems to have countless pop, RnB and hip-hop tracks in it, they really are kidding anyone if they’re trying to cover up the fact that they’re anything other than the bastion of beard-stroking, white-boy indie. They have an unarguable authority when it comes to championing these bands and the high scores afforded the likes of Animal Collective, Grizzly Bear and Deerhunter have undoubtedly, for better or worse, helped bring these bands to a much wider audience. But listening to and watching Deerhunter it’s a bit of a mystery as to why they’re lauded so much. There’s a heavy early 90′s shoegaze influence but it’s so generic and unremarkable that they could easily be one of the lesser band from the Melody Maker-hyped ‘Scene That Celebrates Itself‘ . Ultimately Deerhunter are nowhere near as good as Pitchfork would let you believe; it’s akin to being told in 1991 that Moose or Revolver were one of the best bands in the world.  The Rational Academy more than hold their own against Deerhunter although, in typical fashion, the majority in attendance aren’t paying much attention to the support band.
By a pure stroke of luck I chose my usual side of The Zoo’s stage and end up right in front of singer/guitarist Bradford Cox, although the light isn’t great and he plays with his eyes shut for the most part. His Marfan’s Syndrome is more than obvious at close quarters, with his extremely gangly frame only emphasised by the jacket he’s wearing. After a few songs I move sides and take some shots through the gap between the speakers behind the front facade of the stage. It’s always been a favourite view at The Zoo as it gives you a good side-on aspect and allows you to play around with background/foreground focus as well as often being the best vantage point to try to photograph the drummers located at the back of the stage. Sadly, this is the last time I get to make use of this angle as the next time I’m here to photograph I find that there’s a new and bigger speaker in place and the gap has virtually gone. There’s still a bit of a gap but it’s not really big enough to photograph across the stage, which is a real shame.
Some more photos on Flickr.
Deerhunter
The Rational Academy
Tonight is a lesson in how not to photograph a gig.
As it’s a Friday, a Thursday night decision is made to take my camera gear to work and go straight out, first to the Bleeding Heart Gallery‘s Knock-Off Drinks before heading onto The Zoo. However, forgetting to take my 28-70mm and only realising at 5pm that all I’ve got with me is the 70-200mm doesn’t help my cause. Neither does drinking an awful lot of red wine. And then some cider.
A combination of taxi and walking to The Zoo means managing to get there towards the end of The Scare‘s set. There’s still a few songs left but I just can’t get my camera to focus and no amount of taking it apart and checking the settings is fixing the problem. Then I remember that I’d had right eye contact lens issues earlier in the day and had ended up taking it out, something I’d completely forgotten in the drunken haze. The camera was working fine, it was me that was having the focusing issues…Â
So I end up having to photograph using my left eye, something that is a lot harder than I would have expected, with the hand/eye coordination, just the seemingly simple act of looking through the viewfinder with my left eye, posing real problems and poking myself in my right eye with my thumb positioned on the shutter release button causing extreme discomfort every time I try and take a photo.
Wolf & Cub are the best I’ve seen them, but with singer/guitarist Joel much more animated than previous times, it only adds to tonight’s difficulties in trying to take some photos and it seems to take forever to finish off the 36-exposure roll of film.Â
And after all this, the photos end up being pretty rubbish. I decided to try out the Ilford 3200 film again after a long break but the images are very disappointing when compared to my usual choice of pushing Ilford HP5, with the images being very flat and with not much in the way of contrast, and needing Photoshop to tidy them up.
It was probably a good job that I was only photographing for myself tonight and not for any publications…
Six weeks after the opening of the Hi-Fi Brisbane to a generally less than impressed audience, Ladytron‘s second Brisbane show in less than nine months means a return to the venue. To be honest not a lot more progress seems to have been made in those six weeks; the paint smell might have gone but there’s a definite sense of unfinished building work, both exterior and inside, as well as not much improvement in the overall sound in the venue. And by all accounts the venue’s customer service management leaves a lot to be desired.
Melbourne’s Mission Control are already well into their support slot by the time I get. This is a bad thing as instead of focusing on taking photos I have to sit there and endure their set.   They are truly shocking and it’s hard to think of any redeeming features; electronic based dance music but without any memorable melodic hooks be it vocal or instrumental. It beggars belief that they’re signed to Modular and have toured with Bloc Party, Mystery Jets, played last year’s Nevereverland and are playing this year’s Parklife.  Â
My first Ladytron live experience is something of a disappointment as well.  They essentially have one song, which is a bit classic Krautrock, a bit 80s New Romantic and a bit Euro pop; it’s a pretty good song but still it’s only really one song. There’s also a coldness about the band and a sense of detachment from the audience, possibly not helped by it being a Sunday night (albeit with a public holiday on the Monday) and a half filled venue. Engagement is at a minimum; not much more than the usual pleasantries at the end of songs and some slightly awkward onstage dancing to distinguish it from five people hunched over their instruments in the dark for an hour and a bit.
Photographing is extremely difficult, with it being extremely dark throughout and so it becomes a case of studying the lighting patterns and trying to predict when there might be a quick flash of light in which to take a photo. Although it took a month or so to arrive, there is a photo pit barrier; the trouble is that it’s just been pushed right against the stage tonight and so I end up shooting from the audience, positioned at the top of the steps to try and get an unobstructed view. The place still has that feeling of claustrophobia, even though it’s not full tonight, and there seems to be a constant stream of people pushing past all night long as they move back and forth around the venue, which further hinders trying to get anything much decent from the photos.
A few more photos on Flickr.
Despite the ever-growing acclaim and apparent international record label interest, I will admit to be slightly disappointed by The Middle East‘s debut release, ‘The Recordings of The Middle East‘. However, much of this disappointment stems by placing ‘Blood‘ as the middle song on a 5-track EP, raising the bar to such a high level that it almost makes the last two songs superfluous. In isolation both ‘Fools’ Gold’ and ‘Beleriand’ are fine songs, but just not when they follow ‘Blood’. Even playing around with the ordering of the five songs (and I have experimented with the running order) doesn’t help solve the problem, with the counting in at the beginning of ‘The Darkest Side’ making it an obvious starting song and there is something so final about the end section of ‘Beleriand’ that the only sensible place for it to be is at the end.
There’s no doubting that ‘Blood’ is a phenomenal song, particularly the movement away from the depressing, fragility of the first half of the song – Â
grandfather, gentle soul, you’ll fly
over your life once more before you die
since our grandma passed away
you’ve waited for forever and a day
just to die
and someday soon
you will dieit was the only woman you ever loved
that got burnt by the sun too often when she was young
and the cancer spread and it ran into her body and her blood
and there’s nothing you can do about it now
- to the extraordinary celebratory outro. The words “vital” and “life affirming” get used far too readily in music reviews, but in the case of ‘Blood’ they ring true.Â
Obviously ‘Blood’ is tonight’s highlight. The question is asked, but no one’s answering. So why isn’t everyone dancing?
Some more photos on Flickr.
The Middle East
Little Scout
