Today’s gig is billed as a farewell show, I Heart Hiroshima‘s last before drummer Susie heads to Berlin, with the band playing both of their albums in full over two separate sets.  It’s a Sunday afternoon all-ages show at The Powerhouse, and unlike the venue’s more typical Sunday shows, this time you’ve got to pay to get in, with a black curtain surrounding the Turbine Hall stage and wrist bands being checked at the bottom of the stairs.

It’s a brave move for a band with only two albums to their name to play them both in full, but it highlights a strong catalogue of songs, and the change between the first and second albums, with the songs on latest album ‘The Rip‘ , being more complex and showing the band’s maturity when it comes to songwriting.  If there is one weakness (and to me there is) it’s that the overall sound and the make-up of the songs doesn’t really change; the guitar sounds are untreated and don’t really vary in sound from song-to-song, and the male/female call-and-response vovals are ever present, although I guess ultimately that’s the IHH sound.  Each song more than stands up on their own, it’s just when almost their whole back catalogue is played that it really becomes noticeable.

Whether today’s farewell show is just a temporary hiatus or something more permanent depends on who you talk to in Brisbane.  It would be a shame if this were to be the end; it would be intersting where album No.3 takes them.  But if it is to be the end then it’s been a few fun years and they will be missed.

From a photographic point of view they’ve thrilled and frustrated in almost equal measures over the years; Susie is a photographer’s dream, Matthew and Cameron are less so, a lot less.  Today I only photograph the first five or songs in the first set, choosing to sit back, relax and enjoy the band.  My decision is greatly helped by a girl who spills her drink all over my camera bag whilst I’m photographing the first few songs; why, if someone spills a drink over your bag, does it always have to be on the padded side, so that it soaks up all the liquid, instead of the other side where it’s designed to be vaguely waterproof.  Even by the end of the show it is still soaked through, and as I had cycled to the venue it also ends up soaking through into my T-shirt on the ride back.  And of course the following day I go to work with a bag that very unsubtely reaks of stale beer, hoping that no one thinks I’m a tramp…

A few more photos on Flickr.

Apparently this was a really good gig; it just completely passed me by as I was still in Soundwave euphoria and having already photographed 23 bands that day, by Number 24 I was very much in autopilot mode.  It sounded nice enough; very old school 1980′s twee British indie but I was too busy rehydrating after a day in the sun with a couple pints of lemon, lime and bitters to go with the very-bad-of-me Mighty Angus meal from McDonalds (my first meal since a bacon sandwich for breakfast) I’d had on the walk up to The Zoo.  Not sure why but there was no review either in Rave or on their website, so you’ll just have to ask someone who was there and hadn’t been to Soundwave what it was like.

A few more photos on Flickr.

It isn’t often that you get a “three songs, no flash” instruction at The Zoo, the only ones I can remember were for Amanda Palmer and We Are Scientists.  It didn’t really make much difference for WAS but was very annoying for Amanda Palmer, considering all the amazing theatrics throughout the show.  I think I can remember reading somewhere that Camera Obscura’s Traceyann Campbell doesn’t like being photographed, which is fair enough and tonight the restriction doesn’t really affect being able to get a photo to be used to accompany the review.  The more annoying and slightly insulting aspect of the media accreditation was finding out that the Tour Manager needed to see my camera before they’d give me a photo pass, although in the end this didn’t happen and no physical passes were actually given out.

The photos aren’t great and with no photo pit they’re almost all from the same position; I did run around to the other side during the third song, taking the long way around the back of the mixing desk, but only had time to take two shots before the song ended.

It’s the first time back at The Zoo since got back to Brisbane from the UK and another one of those hot, sweaty summer nights at the venue that I’d forgotten about.  The conditions seemed to take it out on both band and the audience, with a lack of energy from both sides.  The band look like they are dressed for a Scottish summer, which can’t have helped.   Although there a few good songs played tonight, a lot sound samey and there are no real peaks to their performance.  From the audience-side, it feels like they’re more causal and inquisitve rather than rabid fans, and although each and every song is greeted with polite applause, they never become fully animated and energised.

A few more photos on Flickr.

Friday was the last day of the conference.  No live music and just a half day (luckily the afternoon session) photographing the Master Classes, seminars and Keynote Interviews.  Was busy editing the photos first thing so unfortunately missed Glenn Wheatley‘s Keynote Address, which by all accounts was excellent.  The easy highlight of the day was the final sesssion; Time Off‘s Steve Bell’s ‘interview’ with Robert Schneider.  I say ‘interview’ as I think Steve managed to ask about two questions but that was more than enough for Robert to talk about for the 30 minutes long interview.  Hugely entertaining and inspiring; you’d be hard-pushed to find someone so passionate about making music.

The three day Big Sound conference was a complete blast and I’m already looking forward to the 2010 conference.

Thursday morning was another morning off from photographing the conference, when I again got to sit in and listen to the talks, with my stint starting in the afternoon session.  Again, the Keynote Interviews were the highlight, particularly Everett True‘s interview with Danny Goldberg.

Photographing the sessions was generally quite straightforward; a combination of wide-angle shots and changing to the zoom lens to get some more close up shots of the parcipitants.  The hardest sessions to photograph were the small Master Classes, where everyone was sat around a large table, with the smallness of the room making your presence a lot more noticeable and where a very wide-angle lens would have been very useful.

After one of  sessions, when there was a break for coffee I saw Van Dyke Parks and Robert Schneider chatting to each other and took a quick candid photo.  Having been caught in the process by one of the conference’s PR people, she asks  me if I can get a proper photo of the two of them together, with Van Dyke Parks then suggesting that I go up the stairs so that I’m above them and can get an overview shot of the two of them in the foreground with everyone else milling about in the back ground.  Being given creative direction by Van Dyke Parks is definitely one of highlights of my photographic ‘career’.  In retrospect I should have gotten the flash out and done a much better job, but for speed just decided to bump up the ISO, which wasn’t the cleverest of ideas given how dark it was where they were stood but how light it was behind them, thanks to the huge windows.  Still, there’s always next time, right?

Later on in the day I also get a request to take a couple of quick photo of Robert Schneider with Mike Haydon, the drummer from The Middle East, one of which later gets printed in Rolling Stone Australia.

Thursday night follows a similar pattern to Wednesday;  there’s a conference showcase at Artisan for soundslikebrisbane.com, featuring sets by Giants of Science (with Robert Schneider in front checking them out), Vegas Kings, My Fiction and Steve Grady and then another twelve bands across three venues over the evening.  Again it was a case of only staying to see each band for about 10 or so minutes, but the evening’s definite highlight was Hunz (whose excellent second album you can download for free from his website, with Emma-Louise also putting on a really good performance at X&Y.  Final band of the night was [Me], who were very perplexing and who I couldn’t work out if were really good or really terrible.

A selection of the best photos on Flickr and all the conference photos are on the Big Sound website.

[Me]

Belles Will Ring

Tomas Ford

Super Massive

Grand Atlantic

Elke

The Devoted Few

Hunz

We All Want To

Dan Parsons

Cloud Control

Emma-Louise

Giants of Science

Vegas Kings

My Fiction

Steve Grady

Soundwave 2010 Quick Round Up Part 3.  A gallery of my photos from the day is on The Vine.

Meshuggah

Anvil

Isis

Enter Shikari

The Aquabats

Gallows

Rolo Tomassi

Soundwave 2010 Quick Round Up Part 2.  A gallery of my photos from the day is on The Vine.

Eagles Of Death Metal

Taking Back Sunday

HIM

Escape The Fate

Reel Big Fish

Set Your Goals

Anthrax

I photographed Soundwave in Brisbane last weekend.  It was very much a last minute thing and at the start of the week I wasn’t expecting to be photographing, as much as I wanted to do it.  I will probably get around to blogging in a bit more detail sometime but it was a bit of a blur, what with photographing 23 bands over the course of the day.

A gallery of my photos from the day is on The Vine.

Faith No More

Jimmy Eat World

Jane’s Addiction

AFI

Placebo

Paramore

Alexisonfire

For a few days back in September I got to play at being a proper bona fide photographer for a few days when I was commissioned by the organisers to be part of a three-person team of photographers covering the Big Sound conference in Brisbane.  The work involved covering the panel discussions and also all the live music in the evenings.  The sessions were divided up between the photographers, meaning that we each had to cover two half-days at the conference.  The live music was roughly split up so that each photographer covered two of the six venues being used, with a bit of fine tuning to allow photographers to also choose some specific bands that they really wanted to photograph.  I wasn’t needed to photograph the conference on the first day, so instead got to relax and listen to some really interesting sessions, particularly Noel Mengel’s Keynote Interview with the very inspiring and very legendary Van Dyke Parks and the very lively ‘Blogging, Twittering & Online Publishing: Time Wasting or Tastemaking?’ panel discussion, obviously a subject very close to my heart.

The live music started early with the invite-only Dew Process/Universal Music Showcase at Alhambra Lounge, with sets by Matt Walters, Washington, Dew Process’s latest local signings Last Dinosaurs and Yves Klein Blue, who replaced the late-cancelling Bluejuice.  The showcase was the calm before the storm, with another ten acts photographed in three venues over the course of the evening.  It was very much a case of turning up a venue, photographing the first few songs and then moving on to shoot the next band, allowing a bit of time in the military precision planning to move between and to also get into the venues.  As such it was hard to properly check the bands out.  Based on sheer numbers, The Middle East at Family was the show to be at, although sadly, and in typical Brisbane fashion, most of the crowd disappeared before Robert Schneider played.

A selection of photos is on Flickr, with all the conference photos on Big Sound’s website.

Robert Schneider

The Middle East

Sola Rosa

Rocketsmiths

Ladi6

Philadelphia Grand Jury

The Optimen

Hungry Kids of Hungary

Romy

DZ

Yves Klein Blue

Washington

Last Dinosaurs

Matt Walters