Richmond Fontaine + Gentle Ben & His Sensitive Side @ The Troubadour, 29.05.2010

There’s an abundance of bands playing in the Valley tonight – with Texas Tea and Keep On Dancin’s at Ric’s and the R.I.P. Society Records Label Party in the Brunswick Street Mall with Dead Farmers, Royal Headache, Kitchen’s Floor and Bed Wettin’ Bad Boys – but I’m at The Troubadour again, the second of two nights in a row having been here for Taasha and Tristian from The Audreys the previous evening and it’s a transcendent moment and a bit of an epiphany.

I’d just about always photographed at The Troubadour from somewhere along the unofficial pathway down the venue and to the toilets, sometimes right up against the wall, sometimes standing in this pathway and trying not to block access. Us music photographers never/rarely ever get +1s to gigs so it makes it virtually impossible to claim a seat at a venue and hold on it for the duration of the night.  As such, I had hardly ever, if ever, photographed from the opposite side of the stage, up against the far wall.  But tonight I find myself at the venue early with a +1 and we manage to claim some seats on the far wall that we’re able to hold onto for the whole night.  Photographing from this position is so much easier than photographing from the other side.  For starters you’ve not got the never-ending procession of people making their way to and from the toilets but the main advantage is that the lighting seems so much better from this side.  I mean it’s still a horrible red and everything but the stage is better lit.  It’s probably really obvious thinking about it as the venue’s main source of stage light is on this side of the room and being nearer the source of light is obviously going to produce more light to work with; the inverse-square law and all that. It was just always easier to photograph from the other side which is why I’d never ventured over to this side much before tonight.

 Sadly it had only taken five years to realise this.

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