Bartolomy’s Diary

Jamie felt tired, and Del and Tim were feeling rough as they both had colds, add some sound probs and you have the perfect ingeredient for a mwah sorta gig. When I saw the lighting @ Bar Academy I feared the worst, however I returned home with a decent set of shots. The set was identical to Barfly; Lovers, Suffer (dedicated to yours truly), Big In Japan, Shame, Easy Smile and Come Clean. They are touring again in September and perhaps I will take a band shot somewhere in their ‘hood’ in August, we’ll see.

MEXICOLAS @ BAR ACADEMY

Back from a 6 day trip to Holland, hung out mostly in Vriezenveen where my mum lives, just LAZED about, shopped and did nada, and I mean nothing…
The flight to Rotterdam was bouncy to say the least the landing approach was the scariest, to me that is, ever witnessed…..pfew.
Did not bring a camera, and I felt guilty only twice when the sun shone nicely over the corn fields and also when I saw a few snoggers, but it also felt kinda cool not having to worry about “making” shots all the time…..I checked some of the magazines in Holland out and the majority is simply dire, I mean the peeps working there have a serious lack of imagination or simply are not resourcefull enough (probablyboth )
I will go back there soon me reckons to sort a few things out……there is a ton left to do…..and mom needs a hand

I made a million calls today and wrote a few dozen emails and my shoot this Thursday for Total Spec has been delayed again, and as a matter of fact I don’t know anymore whether it is happening or not.
I am shooting some great stories with Rebekah Roy over the next month and both are for WIG magazine, one of them is a massive story and should look very cool whereas the next will be a lot simpler in approach but all the more rewarding visually.

Next week I am shooting for Angel Magazine as well. It will be a 4 page story, inside the Brunswick Center and I will try and combine the model and the concrete surroundings…..should be a simple but very effective shoot.

Tonight Mexicolas @ BarAcademy

Terri and I left later than scheduled as the program in my opinion was not as interesting as the day before but we managed to catch The Rapture, B-52’s (first gig in god knows how many years), Groove Armada (groovy) and Good Shoes (interesting band, shame about the sound probs).
I will stick some shots up from both days, I also managed to catch a few snoggers which I will add on later on.

LOVEBOX WEEKENDER GALLERY

All in all a disapointing affair especially from the lay-out of the festival, the time keeping of the programm, the mess people just leave behind in the field (I mean the majority can not be arsed to walk 10 meters to drop their plates/cans/cups in a bin, hurray for Londoners…..), the sound problems in the Clash/Barfly tent etc etc etc…………..

I have found out that Sly did show up, be it after 6 songs. I had people from Resonate PR come up to me and the other photographers and tell us all Sly would not show, go figure these people stand between us and the artists and are supposed to accomodate us with our requests (and nothing got sorted during the day as well) and they tell us this shit when in fact he does show…… What do these jobsworths actually do for a living besides bullshitting their way through the day…..you tell me.
When I arrived on saturday to pick up my photopass they told me they had printed up and laminated 5 (!!!!) and they had run out so they gave me a business card of Resonate PR with ‘PHOTO’ written on it… I mean clubs nationwide have their passes system sorted out a lot better than this……
The next day wasn’t much better where they handed “Lovebox” paper headers out w. ‘photo’ written on it, so amateurish and laughable…..
I will scan this shit in……so everyone can see….

Yesterday I went to the Lovebox Weekender and shot a handful of bands, I was there early to catch Stateless (whoever planted them as the first band inside the Clash tent should have his head checked….).
Terri and I arrived late and thought we had missed them when they were just setting up only to play 4 songs. I thought it sounded alright but they surely deserved a 5 pm slot to have some more crowd to say the least.
I shot Patrick Wolfe, The Presets, Soul 2 Soul (good to see a full band instead of just the sound system although changing singers all the time sort of messed things up vibe wise then again it was great to see Karen Wheeler let it rip…), Blondie (good to watch), Blood Red Shoes (White Stripes style R&R, moody and very impressive), Who Made Who (funny but musically not very interesting), New Young Pony Club (saw one song and was impressed by them as well) and The Bees (mwah…). Sly and The Family Stone was supposed to headline, but decided not to come and let his band do it on their own instead. Go figure you pay money to see someone who just doesn’t care to show at all……no announcement or apology nada…..
when I arrived I was given a business card from the PR and it had “photo” written on it, it was supposed to serve as a photopass for the day, as they had only made up 5 laminate passes…..not one person twigging it and sorting this out, how hard can it be; a pc/printer and a laminate machine (every prod. office has one these days…)
The cues for the toilets are huge and @ the bar not much less, certain things that should be running smooth like never before especially when you have been doing it for 5 years in a row now…then again the majority does not care and is busy getting pissed.
What surprised me was that the majority of the crowd wasn’t “out of it” ok so there were a load of pissheads, but I mean pilled up I barely saw anyone…..
Ten years ago at a gig like this people would all be flopping like fish on the dry coz they were e-ed up to the hilt…….
The program inside the Clash tent offered the best stuff no doubt, some great bands. I really liked Blood Red Shoes and New Young Pony Club and I only saw a few songs coz the programming was fucked from the start and I had to switch between stages (which also happened to be the furthest apart) to get some shots done…..this is in my mind is a royal screw up.
The barriers inside the Clash tent were a health hazard, it is a miracle nothing happened and that is only coz the crowd is so well behaved….I have seen a similar setup go badly wrong with British Sea Power playing at the TDK Cross Central fest. in 2004……………….
I will plaster some shots on on Monday, so far I am quite happy with what I got.
I will try and shoot The Rapture, B-52’s and Groove Armada later on today.

Terri and I are of to Lovebox today, I am shooting, Terri is of dancing…..
Sunday as well, Monday I am doing a recce @ The Brunswick center a backdrop for a Angel Mag story to be shot in 2 weeks.
Furthermore I am doing two shoots for WIG Mag. which will happen in Sept. and I am also doing a spread for Total Spec mag which is on the 2nd of Aug.
First I am going to Holland, and I surely hope it wont be pissing down over there like it has been over here….

I shot The Rumble Strips (Charlie Waller – Lead Vocals and Guitar, Tom Gorbutt – Sax, Vocals and Bass , Henry Clark – Trumpet, Vocals and Piano, Matthew Wheeler - Drums ) for Notion Mag. yesterday afternoon, just around the corner from Curtain Rd. in Shoreditch. Nice bunch o’ lads, easy to shoot.

Not much later I went to the Barfly where Stateless did their album launch. I did a quick bandshot across the road and then shot them live after. Good show, good crowd response as well.

STATELESS @ BARFLY

On the way back towards Camden tube I caught this couple….

Here is the Mexicolas’ bandshot from Nambucca revised a tad, didn’t like it the way it was done earlier, so here is the “final” version.

Yesterday I was at the Design Museum to see Jonathan Barnbrook and take his portrait, of all that I have done I liked this the most, I must have as I shot 60 frames (something I never do normally…..) on him before the talk started, while we chatted during the session it sounded like his/mine interests are very similar.During the talk I catch him looking straight at me which is a first as well………….a bit odd heh.
The talk itself was good fun, and I stayed until the very end.
I am still playing about with the shot, the solarisations are not 100% so there prbably will be an updated version at some point.

Then I caught a couple of snoggers at Thames side, and it just looked too good to be true, some peeps will say this is staged, HA

I am in the middle of setting up some shoots for some mags in August and hope to finalize this by the end of the week.
I updated the MEXICOLAS page and added some shots from the Barfly show. And I am trying to figure out a bunchof flash stuff so I can have a new folio page as well, hopefully I will get this done in about a weeks time, it would be nice but I am not holding my breath. The slideshow thingy does look hella impressive and my pix will be a lot larger displayed.

Tiz been a while that I visited the Barfly in Camden, at least 7/8 years. Mexicolas were on last at about 10 pm, beforehand I had a brief chat with Jamie Evans and joined them in their “oversized” dressingroom and shot a few quick shots, Jamie can’t help himself and has to joke about, this time he puts his guitar picks in his mouth for a “dracula” effect.
They took to the stage and played an extremely tight set, they are well rehearsed and this gig with the Half Moon gig in Putney ranks as the best I have seen sofar.

Some shots………..

Mexicolas-Barfly-140707

I am in the planning stage of a lot of stuff, you’ll see.

Meanwhile I have put a gallery of Stateless @ 93 FT East-270607 and Lazenby @ Bloomsbury Bowling -020707 pix together.

I spent most of Saturday in Essex at Terri’s parents’ house as they were celebrating their 49th anniversary, it was good fun.

The next morning I left at about 11 to get back to London and time wise not a clever idea as everything was blocked off for the Tour De France and therefor yours truly had a nice walk ahead of him before I could grab the bus back home to pick my camera gear up to go back to practically the same place I just had arrived as I had to shoot Ben Wilson’s portrait. Ben does design and one of the things he has been known for is designing bikes, so I watched his talk for roughly 30 mins and took a few pix then as well. It was all relatively easy.

Shot for Notion Mag. yesetrday, only 8 were present and looking a tad hungover. Not one word of complaint though, then again they are Irish therefore PROS
Met them at the office in Shoreditch and then took ‘em for a brief walk outside where I shot them in a climbing rack and later on @ Arnold Circus, the whole thing took not even 20 mins, Afterwards I briefly joined them for coffee and then shot of to Covent Garden to have a brief chat with Alex Martin @ Curious Generation to get an update about what’s going on gigwise and just catch up really….

The journey back was a nightmare, someone gotten under a train @ Wood Green and the few stops I needed to go through took ages….

I like the 2nd one best.

I have also added more live shots of Lazenbym so scroll down to see them.

So Scouting for Girls played the Soho review Bar and for some reason i was led to believe it was their single launch party, but instead they had done that the week before, shows how well informed I am…………
A planned bandshot simply did not happen…..had I been on my own I would have walked before the show had started but with the missus along side who was keen to see them I did not have much choice and watch them play;).
I personally think they are ok, but for me the novelty has worn of, and this genre is just not my cuppa.
There were a lot of radio peeps there along with bands’ families and friends and the place was sort of packed.
Scouting for Girls did play a good gig and I took a few during the show.

I am shooting Republic Of Loose for Notion Magazine later on, this is a band from Ireland consisting of 10 members.

My work PC has given up big time, looks like a motherboard matter as it wont boot into/through anything at all.
Just what I need, and a motherboard giving up after just two years, a total joke.

Last night I went to see Lazenby at the Bloomsbury Bowling Hall, I never been there before and it is a great place to hang, to eat/drink, bowl and listen to a few bands play. Lazenby sounds more oompfy with electric guitar and the band is going through some transitional period, soundwise but also image-wise……
Some pix…………

When I arrived and aksed for my photopass my name was nowhere to be seen on the list, I was lucky coz I brought the email with me that said I was supposed to have one. One phonecall later and all hunky dorey, I only had three songs to do it with. The security at Shepherds Bush Empire also escort you out of the building after the 3 songs, you can only stay if you hand over your equipment and provided you have a ticket, which I did not have but the guy behind the desk helped out on that one.

Go figure, every swinging dick in the audience is armed with video and still cameras, quality-wise it could be more than adequate, and they can use flash and photograph the entire set….

I saw all three acts and Guapo were interesting to say the least. The lightshow was minimal (although not as minimal as Neurosis’) and I managed to fire of a few half decent shots.

Neurosis were closer to the front of the stage than at the Forum, maybe because of the projection screen which was huge this time. This meant us photographers were closer and also some of the front light of the projector “leaked” on Scott Kelly and Steve von Till, and with that we could count our blessings otherwise it would have been sheer impossible to shoot Neurosis.
Only the ground floor of the Shepherds Bush empire was filled (I’d say 600 peeps) and it looked less than @ The Forum, bit of a strange one especially as the band have a new album out and only play here once every 9 mths, you’d expect more peeps than less.

Soundwise it was all fine, although some more volume wouldn’t have hurt either, especially in the back where I was standing, most of the material played was of their new CD “Given To the Rising” something I did not have a problem with as their latest album is excellent.
A good show and despite the little time I was given a few decent shots to my liking…..imagine what it would be like if I had the entire set….