Tag Archive for "The Drones"
Back over at the Supertop and it’s time for Cold War Kids. Looking at the line-up for the weekend you can’t help but get the feeling that the organisers had their ears glued to their radios on the 26 January, when Triple J does it annual Hottest 100 run down, and then rushed out on the 27th January and booked as many bands as it could you had featured in the higher reaches of Triple J’s list. So many of the bands on this year’s bill seem to fit that category, and lacking a weighty back catalogue have the feeling of ‘one-hit wonder’. Cold War Kids with their third top billing on the main Supertop stage exemplify that theory. Whilst they put on an entertaining live show, complete with Joe Cocker influenced hand gestures, there’s not much of substance in the music that lies behind.
By now the sun has set and it’s gotten quite cold. Good job I have all those walks over to the GW McLennan stage to keep me warm. When Band of Horses’ singer Ben Bridwell greets the audience with ‘G’day ya facking cants’ it’s not much of a surprise to find that they’re friends with The Drones and being supported by The Gin Club on their East Coast tour. You can just see The Gin Club’s Ben Salter doling out the tequila backstage and telling him to say that if he wants to make an instant impression… But with the introductory pleasantries out the way it’s straight into ‘Is There A Ghost’ from last year’s excellent ‘Cease To Begin’ album. Although I can only stay for four songs they are one of the highlights of the day (but I do have a soft spot for alt-country in my old age…).
Australia’s very own Stray Cats tribute band, The Living End, are next up on the main stage. Although they’ve just released a new album, that they’re one of Dew Process’s latest signings made them a shoe-in for the festival. I’d seen them once before, at Homebake in 2005, watching their set in the midst of a sea of drunken, shirtless bogans. This time I’d managed to avoid that unpleasant experience somewhat by being in the photo pit but as last time there’s no great shakes about the band, not even from a photographic point of view as they play most of the first three songs under the glare of some very red lighting.
My final trip of the day back to the GW McLennan stage – my seventh for the day - is for the tent’s headliners, The Polyphonic Spree. Again a band I’d seen once before, at Glastonbury in 2003 and again a band that I hadn’t really been that impressed with, largely due to them not really being able to project their performance from the Glastonbury’s main Pyramid stage, despite the numbers in their ranks, in the middle of the afternoon. However, it’s a completely different scenario when they’re playing somewhere more intimate at night and you’re in the very front row. There’s something really overwhelming about suddenly being confronted by a twenty-something strong band right in front of you. With all the backlighting my poor camera was finding it difficult to focus quickly and, with the Spree starting late and the time lost thanks to The Fratellis not being made up, I only stay for one song, needing to make sure I get back to the Supertop in time for the day’s headline band, Devo, and I don’t get much good in the way of photos.
Somewhat strangely Devo are very big in Australia. Before the festival people seemed very excited to either be seeing them here or at one of their side-shows or, if they hadn’t got tickets, jealous that they were missing out, in contrast to my own ambivalence. Whilst they’re known in the UK, I think it’s more as a one/two hit wonder band (’Satisfaction‘ + ‘Whip It‘) from back in the day. As such, to me they weren’t major festival headlining material. I still don’t think they are major festival headlining material, but I really do enjoy what I see of their set, the first 4 or 5 songs. It’s fun, quirky, played with good humour and they sound really fresh and surprisingly contemporary for a largely electronic band from the 1970s consisting of a bunch of guys pushing 60. Fun to photograph as well, despite all the red light, as they give you something to work with.
With Devo starting late, by the time we get out of the photo pit it’s gone 11:10pm, with Tricky’s set due to start at 11pm. Anticipating that we’ve probably missed out first three song allocation to photograph him from the pit we don’t even try to add another act to a very long day. For me it’s a real shame as he was one of the acts that I was most looking forward to seeing and photographing. Bloody Fratellis… We walk past his show on the way out and it looks very dark so it doesn’t look the photographic experience would have been all that great. Or at least that’s what I keep telling myself…
Back to Ballina, everything is set to re-charge overnight and the photos are downloaded and quickly assessed. By 1:22am it’s a time for bed, and a time to dream of a 6am alarms and some proper editing of the 16 acts I photographed on the Saturday. After all, tomorrow is just another day…
Plenty more Saturday Splendour photos on Yahoo Music.
Saturday afternoon continues with The Music, who I might have seen before at Reading a few years back, although my memory of gigs and especially festivals is getting a bit fuzzy, even more so having recently celebrated the 21st anniversary of my first gig (U2 at Cardiff Arms Park, 25 July 1987). Either way they are pretty impressive, with the crowd really getting into it. The photo pit is very full for the first time, and with Rob Harvey’s mad dancing in amongst all the smoke it’s some what tricky to photograph.
Yet another walk over the to the GW McLennan stage and yet more security issues not letting me into the photo pit and meaning that I have to photograph The Gin Club from the crowd. It’s really annoying as I had hoped to make the most of having a photo pit to photo them and the rare benefit of having some ok-ish lighting. It is even more annoying when I find out later that a couple of other photographers had turned up after me and strolled into the pit with out any problems.
Next up, Gyroscope on the Supertop stage. Except a load of the photographers were waiting for the PR guy to escort us into the pit and because we aren’t stood exactly where he told us, but about 10m away he doesn’t check if we are wanting to photograph them. And that’s why they are only a handful of photographers in the pit for them.
But when The Drones are the next band to see and photograph, bands like Gyroscope are just meaningless, irrelevant and immaterial Oz Rock. The Drones are easily one of Australia’s best bands, if not the best. As with all the best Australian bands they’re much more appreciated in Europe and the UK and in another 30 years time will probably be looked back on and revered, much like The Triffids and The Go-Betweens are now. I stay for a few songs, the downside of photographing festivals, but it’s the typically astonishing brutal and ear-bleedingly beautiful set you expect from them. Totally awesome, and a real highlight of the day.
From the sublime to the ridiculous; next up it’s The Fratellis. Word on the street is that their gear hasn’t made it over from Perth and The Living End are going to play their slot, with The Fratellis playing the later slot if their gear arrives in time. But we get into the photo pit and the drum kit says ‘The Fratellis’ on the front so I guess the gear did turn up. Although it then takes an age to sort out bass amp issues, so that by the time the band start we’re 30 minutes behind schedule. And I could have been watching rest of The Drones’ set… And all that wait for that… DiS summed it up best when they reviewed their latest album - ‘It is appalling, the worst kind of revivalist Britpop shite that no band should be allowed to unleash unto the masses’. They do have one redeeming feature in that their drummer is absolutely fantastic (even if he is called Mince), so I spend most of the three songs trying to get good photos of him as he does his best Keith Moon impersonation. They play ‘Flathead’ and ‘Chelsea Dagger‘, the crowd go wild but it’s the aural equivalent of shooting fish in a barrel for the Triple J-listening punters.
Then it’s another walk across the festival site to the GW McLennan stage, via Govindas for curry and rose lassi, the first thing I’ve eaten since breakfast, to see Clare Bowditch. Thanks to The Fratellis the Supertop times and my plans for the day are all over the place so I only end up photographing her for a couple songs. It’s only in the cold, sober light of day, when I’m editing the photos that I realise what a mistake this was, and that I should have made the most of he time available, as she’s really quite stunningly beautiful. I only notice this during editing as it seems she was giving me the eye in just about every photo… And as she’s relocating to Berlin it’s going to be a while before I get to photograph her again. I can’t really remember what the music was like (although myspace is reminding me now), too busy photographing quickly and trying to update my shooting plan for the day in my head. Bloody Fratellis…
One day down, one to go. It was a long hard day. To bed at 1:20am last night, alarm at 6am to sort the photos to go to off for consideration for print and start editing and uploading a few to flickr.
The first batch of photos are here. Plenty more to come from yesterday plus all the photos from today. And I’ll also write some proper blogs in the next couple of days.
Devo
The Galvatrons
Hadouken!
The Fratellis
The Living End
The Music
Clare Bowditch
Lightspeed Champion
The Drones
Bluejuice
Polyphonic Spree
Photographed The Drones and Perth band Snowman a couple of weeks ago at The Zoo. First time seen The Drones since they played at The Columbian with Darling Downs last September (I think). Photos here. Good to see they’ve picked up a lot more fans since then. Fantastic gig, especially Dan Luscombe’s guitar playing, which was sublime. Not been to The Zoo for a while and they’ve got rid of the spotlights they had at the front of the stage, so the lighting was a lot worse than it has been recently. The spots weren’t great as as soon as anyone on stage took a step back they plunged into darkness, but whilst they were at the front it was ok.
Didn’t really get anything I really liked of The Drones. Think I prefer some of the photos I got of Snowman.
One of the difficulties with photographing for print is that you know they’re only going to use a photo of the lead singer, so it can make you focus on them to the detriment of the rest of the band, and make you lazy once you feel you have something of the singer. The Zoo doesn’t have a pit so unless you want to wait front middle against the stage for at least 30 minutes between bands it’s easier to go to the side. This usually gives you clear shots of at least half the band usually, but then you need to run around to the other side and try and squeeze in right at the side if you want to try and get photos of the remainder of the band. Not easy when it’s a busy night, and it’s much easier to grab a drink or three, relax and enjoy the band…
A few photos below and a few more on flickr.
The Drones
Snowman
One of my favourite photographers is Anton Corbijn
I bought his U2 and i book earlier in the year as a birthday present to myself and it’s been a great source of inspiration and envy in recent months.
(Note to bands: if any of you are planning on world domination please can you let me know so I can photograph you for the next 22 years. It’ll be really cool. kthxbai).
For a long while I’ve been fed up with so many venues in Brisbane only having red light and bored with how my photos look, having to convert them to black and white all the time. So I had been thinking of doing some alternative processing and toning à la Anton Corbijn. I tried lith and cyanotype printing properly in the dark room a few years back; it took forever and came out pretty crappy, so it’s a good job I can now cheat on a computer.
I tried out a few different things with the photos I took on Friday at The Columbian of The Drones and Darling Downs. Some things work better than others but I’m happy that they at least have some colour in them and look a bit different from what I normally come up with. I expect there will be more to come in the coming weeks… Feel free to let me know what you think of them.
Some below and stuck a few more on my Flickr account.
The Drones
