This year, I was lucky enough to get approved for a media/photo pass for the first weekend of Coachella. The photo pass allows me to take pictures from the photo pit of each stage, and being armed with an incredible lens, I’ve taken some pretty amazing pictures so far, and I can’t wait to sift through them all and post what I’ve been able to capture.
There were a few acts that I wish could have snapped pictures for (Muse, Queens of the Stone Age, Beck and Arcade Fire), but being a “newby” in the world of concert photography, I wasn’t selected to by artist management to have the privilege of taking pictures. Hopefully, the pics I post of the bands I saw here will help change their opinion of me for the future.
Each entry will contain a little bulb of my overall thoughts of what I was able to see, with a Instagram video post that I posted (my Instagram account is @Methodman13 … you may as well go there now while you’re waiting for the post to go up) and a photo slideshow. I hope you enjoy the moments I captured as much as I enjoyed shooting it. Click on the name of the artist you want to check out to see the blog entry I put up.
UPDATE: 5/9/14: It was a long, glorious, music-filled weekend of music. I think I may have ruined all of the future music festivals I attend because there really is nothing like being in the photo pit, even for only the first 3 songs, trying to capture “moments” of musicians practicing their craft and giving the audience all that they have. I will forever be grateful for the opportunity. Thank you, Goldenvoice. Thank you, Snoop. You made this music dweeb very, very happy.
Pearl Jam got me drunk my freshman year of high school. Well … not literally … let me explain.
I was a decently athletic kid back in the day. I played three sports and earned a varsity letter that year in Track & Field. To celebrate Spring break, the varsity letterman had a house party in the hills. A classmate of mine’s brother was a member of the club, and he invited a couple of other fellas to join in on the fun.
Being an underclassman, attending the privileged lettman party was a bit intimidating. My only point of reference of what parties of that ilk were like I gleaned from movies like “Sixteen Candles” and “House Party“. I was anticipating the latter, and I shuddered at the though that I could be that party’s Long Duk Dong.
When I got to the party, the varsity letterman and their upperclass female friends were already there boozing it up. The hot, unattainable upperclass females aside, I noticed the music playing the background. It was Pearl Jam’s “Ten”, and it was on repeat for the whole evening. At least, that what I remember.
With nervous anticipation, I stepped into the party and grabbed my first beer in a plastic, red cup … ever. In the kitchen, a crowd had amassed around willing participants beer bonging, and before I knew it, I was on my knees, taking tips from others about how to effectively take in the 4 beers in one incredibly large “shot”.
The rest of the evening, truth be told, is a bit of a blur. I remember hearing “Alive” and “Why Go” while I was babbling about how my parents would kick my ass if they found I was a drunk. I remember flirting with the sophomore I had a crush on in the backyard while “Black” was playing. I remember listening to “Release” while I was nibbling on tree leaves because some of the varsity letterman convinced me that it would freshen my breath so that my parents would never be able to tell.
I woke up the next morning with my first hangover ever, and with Pearl Jam melodies echoing in my head. Pearl Jam may not have actually gotten me drunk, but they were there with me, and I remember that vividly, and I’ve been a fan ever since.
Pearl Jam has been on my concert going bucket list for the longest time. When I heard they were playing two nights at the Los Angeles Sports Arena, I and a friend jumped at the chance to get tickets and tickets were purchased for their show on the 24th. Knowing that Pearl Jam never plays the same set twice, I kept my fingers crossed that Sunday would be the day they would play most of the tracks off of “Ten”.
Hours before the show on the 23rd, another friend of mine called to invite me to the show for that evening. WHAT?!?! Canceling the plans I had made for the evening, I accepted the gift that the music-gods offered, and thank the heavens that I did as they played almost all of the songs from “Ten” that left such a strong impression on me at that party.
I won’t wax poetic about the shows as they have been eloquently written about HERE and HERE. The set lists for the 23rd and 24th can be found HERE and HERE respectively.
Though I didn’t beer bong for either of those shows, I did have a couple beers and reminisced about those early days of my halcyon youth, watching them kill the stage with their musicianship and music. Cheers, Pearl Jam. Next round, or beer bong, is on me.
Highlights from November 23, 2013
Highlights from November 24, 2013
Unfortunately, the Flickr slideshow below is not currently available on mobile devices. If you are on a mobile device, please click THIS LINK to get redirected to the set of photos.
This year (2013), Snoop’s wife’s company, Boss Lady Entertainment, signed an artist from Poland named Iza Lach. I’m a huge fan of her sound/voice, so when I found out that she was slotted to perform several sets during Filter Magazine’s Culture Collide music festival, I was giddy. I was even more giddy when I saw the impressive number of foreign bands set to perform. I had a wedding in Santa Barbara to attend Saturday, October 12th, so I’d have to miss out on The Ravonettes, Alice Russell, Rhye, King Khan & The Shrings, and a handful of other lesser known acts, but I still managed to get a press pass (my first of the year!) to check out some of the bands playing Thursday and Friday.
Now, there are a lot a music festivals that go on throughout the year, all across the United States, but the Culture Collide festival is particularly unique in that it’s an extremely affordable way to see different kinds of bands from all over the world- 24 countries (including the United States) were represented this year. I sat next to a couple for Jacco Gardner who echoed that sentiment by telling me that they, “go to this festival every year. It’s only $30, and to get to hear great music from places I know I’ll never get to go? It’s totally worth it.”
Below are the bands that I was able to catch (click through the names of the bands to check out the entries that I wrote up). Hopefully this music festival has another go at it next year, as I certainly would attend, with or without a press pass.
I was washing my hands in one of the venues when I noticed the gentlemen next to me washing his hands wearing some really high-end ear plugs. Since I had recently looked into purchasing a pair of quality earplugs, I sparked up a conversation in the men’s room regarding the same.
The dude had a European accent, and after converting Krones to U.S. Dollars, we estimated that his ear plugs were between $800-$1,000. I thanked him for the insight, and applauded him for his dedication to concert going before heading off. Imagine my amusement when I noticed him behind the keys for Maya Vik.
From her Wikipedia page:
It was a fun, energetic set that really had the small club venue feeling funky. When they covered Ready For The World’sOh Sheilathe small venue got warm and musty with moving bodies. If I could have, I would have attended her gig on Saturday. There’s nothing better to get the funk flowing than a good looking woman, slapping out funky bass-lines.
Unfortunately, the Flickr slideshow below is not currently available on mobile devices. If you are on a mobile device, please click THIS LINK to get redirected to the set of photos.
Hollie Fullbrook, a folk singer-songwriter from New Zealand, is Tiny Ruins. She made some waves in 2011 when the BBC Wold Service programme The Strand named her album first full length album one of the top five albums of 2011. With such glowing reviews, I marked it down as a set that I wanted to check out.
It was an intimate set in a modestly sized church. With just her voice and guitar, she filled the churches’ architecture with a soft, mellow, etherial sound. The lighting was subdued and appropriate, and the only criticism I had of the venue was that they didn’t turn-off the buildings fans prior to the start of her performance. A video clip of Hollie performing one of her songs is below, and you’ll note the fan noise in the background.
As it was my first time listening to her music, I wasn’t as committed to her lyrics, for which she is known, so I suppose that I didn’t appreciate the music as much as I possibly could have. When I have some more time, I plan on listening toSome Were Meant For Seawith an open ear. I won’t be able to attend her upcoming gig at the Silverlake Lounge on October 23, but for $8, I definitely think it’s worth the cover.
Unfortunately, the Flickr slideshow below is not currently available on mobile devices. If you are on a mobile device, please click THIS LINK to get redirected to the set of photos.
The line-up for the 10th annual FYF Fest was stellar. For only $99, I was able to attend the two day festival, and though I had tried my darnedest to get a press-pass to no avail, I went guerrilla-style to catch those acts I wanted to see and take the best possible pictures I could. Links to the other acts I was able to catch will be posted when the pictures have been “corrected” and selected, but it’ll take some time going through the over 400 photos I snapped. It’ll take me at least a week to post everything I want to post, so keep an eye out for updates by following my twitter or instagram accounts (both have a @methodman13 handle).
Click through the name of the act to see the pictures and read the write up for the acts I was able to catch:
This is a three part blog entry. The link to the following day is at the bottom of the page.Oh, Coachella, how I’ve missed you. Though many expressed dissatisfaction with the line-up, I was ecstatic. In fact, I had circled more bands on the schedule than I could have possibly seen, so I was actually setting myself up with being disappointed based on the fact that I wouldn’t be able to see all of the acts I wanted to see. Kind of ironic now that I think about it…
I had work to finish up that Friday morning, so I knew that I was bound to miss a handful of acts that day. I picked up a friend in Santa Monica, and we began out trek out to the desert. I had prepared an iTunes playlist of all of the music of the bands I wanted to see, so our drive would at least have a good soundtrack.
As we got closer to venue, driving on the freeway, I started noticing billboards advertising the release dates of albums from bands performing at Coachella. I nearly swerved out of my lane when I saw a billboard for Daft Punks album release date. Umm … they weren’t scheduled to perform at Coachella… I told my friend that either this was an omen of a surprise set by one of the most demanded bands for Coachella, or it was the ultimate tease …
When we had parked and picked up our passes, we joined the mass of people on the festival grounds. Unfortunately, I had already missed the French turntable group C2C and the British rock quartet Alt-J, so I made my way to the Outdoor Stage to catch a few tunes by Of Monsters and Men. I have their album, and I their music, but at that time, I just wasn’t in the mood to listen mellow indie folk/pop. I think I was just a little too restless due to the long car ride. I’m thinking that Of Monsters and Men would have been the perfect band to see on a lazy Saturday or Sunday afternoon. Not Friday. Plus, I was way in the back, standing, when I would have much preferred laying on the lawn somewhere.
I listened to a few songs then decided to make my way to the merchandise booth. I brought a poster tube with me since last year I picked up a dope, limited edition, Black Keys, Coachella poster. Unfortunately, it appears, Coachella didn’t allow for bands to sell their personalized Coachella posters. That was a disappointment.
All of sudden I heard Passion Pit start playing “Carried Away” and I looked down at my watch. Doh! I had already seen Passion Pit at the Hollywood Bowl, and they were terrific, so I had to kick myself in the rear for not paying attention to the time to be there when they started.
As I walked toward the Main Stage area, they were wrapping up their second song, I decided to video record what was going on while I walked toward the stage. It was quite uplifting. Passion Pit’s music has always had an airy and energetic quality to it, and it always seems to make people dance. When I took a look at the video later in the evening, the one thing I could notice was all of the random people frolicking across the lawn. That made me happy.
Carried Away
The Reeling
Love Is Greed
I’ll Be Alright
It’s Not My Fault, I’m Happy
Constant Conversations
Talk a Walk
Cry Like A Ghost
Sleepyhead
Little Secrets
Having learned my lesson by missing the opening of their set, I decided to leave Passion Pit early to go see a relatively new band that I was particularly keen on: Palma Violets.
A mix of garage and psychedelic rock, these guys had quite a following in England. I got to the stage early enough to get pretty close to the front. That being said, I was keeping my fingers crossed that they had a good live show, otherwise I knew it was going to be tough fighting my way out of the tent to find something better. They did not disappoint. They were good, loud Brit Rock. They sounded live, like they sound on their records, and performed with the kind of swagger that becomes rock-and-roll. Can’t get much better than that. What I particularly liked about this band was that their two guitarists had two quite distinct vocal styles. The bassist was more Clash. The guitarist was more Doors. Check out the two video and see if you kind of agree with me.
Johnny Bagga Donuts
Rattlesnake Highway
All the Garden Birds
Tom the Drum
Chicken Dippers
Best of Friends
Step Up for the Cool Cats
Last of the Summer Wine
We Found Love
14
Brand New Song
After Palma Violet’s set ended, I made a b-line to get as close as I could to the front for Modest Mouse . Apparently, everybody else had the same idea.
The crowd for Modest Mouse was a lot younger than I had expected. I remember buying their albums back in the mid 90’s, so I was taken aback that I was standing in a crowd of kids in their early 20s. It was super crowded, squeezed into space like a pack of sardines. The set started a little rough, but I think that had more to do with the sound levels not being mixed properly.
Isaac Brock, the lead singer, seemed banter with the crowd for small stretches, perhaps giving the mixing board more time to adjust the levels. Honestly, his banter felt awkward, but after it seemed to do the trick, as the sound definitely picked up. The highlight of the set was when Modest Mouse powered, and jammed, through three songs in row later in their set.
What I loved about Modest Mouse’s set was that it hit popular songs from almost all of the albums in their catalog. Loved that they played “3rd Planet” and “Paper Thin Walls” from “The Moon and Antarctica”.
Dramamine (Life Like Weeds Interpolation)
Ocean Breathes Salty
3rd Planet
Be Brave
Satin in a Coffin
Paper Thin Walls
King Rat
Cowboy Dan
The View
Float On
After Modest Mouse had finished their set, I decided that I would stay where I was and push further up towards the stage. After all, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs were next, and since I had never seen them perform live, I decided not to venture to another stage. As people left, I kept meandering as far up as I could get, which was all the way up to the barricade that separated the general admission folk from the VIP folk. I had VIP last year through work, and bought a general admission ticket this year. I’m thinking that I may buy a VIP pass next year. I would have loved to get all the way up front for the Yeah Yeah Yeahs.
As I waited for the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, the Main Stage screens lit up and a video started playing. Here we go again … Daft Punk music started playing and the Daft Punk helmet lit up the screen … with a message that the album was coming out soon. Then the video vanished. Are you serious? Like, seriously? If Coachella or Daft Punk was a girl, she’d be the most devilish tease that ever lived. At this point, I was kind of over it.
Back to the Yeah Yeah Yeahs.
The Yeah Yeah Yeahs were my highlight from day one. As soon as Karen O took the stage with a gospel choir, in her white suit, cape and pope hat, to sing “Sacrilege”, I knew we were in for a treat. I sensed it was going to be a dazzling set, and dazzled it did from start to finish.
Karen O is a badass. Period. She rocked that fucking stage. Shoving the mic into her mouth to and going agro on “Pin” was amazing. Watching her strut her stuff all over the stage was the definition of “bad ass”.
She toned it down when she introduced “Maps”, as she should, and told us fans that the song was about love, and it was for us. “Maps” is seriously one of the best songs written in the 2000s, and the Yeah Yeah Yeahs killed it for me.
Sacrilege
Rich
Under the Earth
Slave
Zero
Subway
Soft Shock
Pin
Gold Lion
Maps
Heads Will Roll
After the Yeah Yeah Yeahs wrapped up, I started to head over to the Outdoor Stage to see if I could catch any of the Band Of Horses set, unfortunately I got there a little too late as they were thanking the crowd. Before they dove into their last song, the lead singer simply stated, “Take care of each other”. I appreciated that sentiment.
My phone was running out of juice, so I started walking around the festival grounds to find a place to charge it. Last year, when I had a VIP pass, I could just charge my phone at an outlet in the VIP section. This year, however, outlets were a lot harder to come by. They had a “charging station” sponsored by Sony or Samsung or whatever, but the policy was that they took your phone and you came back an hour later to pick it up. Screw that. I went to one of the merchants at the General Store and politely offered 5 bucks to use one of their outlets. They had no problem with that.
After charging my phone, I was stuck with a bit of a dilemma. Jurassic 5 was playing the same time as Blur. I flipped a coin. The coin told me to go see Jurassic 5.
I loved Jurassic 5 back in the day. I do think they kind of jumped the shark a bit when they did that duet with Dave Matthews, but that’s a criticism for another time and place. The group disbanded in 2007, so them converging at Coachella was pretty big news for a Los Angeles, underground, hip-hop head like myself. With all four original MCs, and Cut Chemist and DJ Nu-Mark working their magic, their set was “best of” compilation.
Back 4 U
I Am Somebody
Jayou
Nu-Mark Desk Solo
Hip-Hop History
Break
Monkey Bars
Improvise
Cut Chemist and Nu-Mark Solo
Quality Control
Concrete Schoolyard
Countdown
In the House
Freedom
King Tee
Red hot
A Day at the Races
What’s Golden
This Is (Outro)
I didn’t bother taking any pictures of video since I was far back in the crowd, but that was actually by design, as I new that I wanted to see the Stone Roses. As I left Jurassic 5’s set a little early, and headed towards the Main Stage for the Stone Roses, I noticed that the crowd that was there for Blur had substantially dissipated. I was quite shocked, in fact, that they only pulled a club size crowd for their set.
Me, being the optimist, assured myself that it was simply a generation of concert goers who didn’t know how the Stone Roses music, specifically their self titled debut album, had shaped the history of pop music. I mean come on … “I Wanna Be Adored”, “She Band The Drum”, I Am The Resurrection” …. That whole album was one of the first albums that fused dance, pop, and rock into a brand new sound. The Stone Roses were an indie rock band that shaped and fueled pop music in the 90’s.
But … as they started their set, and Ian Brown took the mic … my optimism turned into a bit of disappointment. It wasn’t as bad as the Shuggie Otis show at the Echoplex that I saw last year, but it was very sad. The band sounded good … The levels seemed all right … it was just that Ian Brown was extremely pitchy. Unfortunately, it was not a performance worthy of closing the Main Stage on the first night, and it seems that the Coachella Festival organizers agreed as Blur and the Stone Roses swapped slots the following weekend.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad I got to see the Stone Roses Perform, and I’m glad I got to see them rock some of my favorite songs, but it wasn’t the best way to end the first day of Coachella.
I only caught a few songs from How to Destroy Angels as I wanted to give the Stone Roses another chance. As I walked by the Main Stage again, all I could hear was Ian Brown’s voice missing the notes that I remembered from the album. I decided at that point that I was going to pack it in, head back to the house, and get ready for day two.
All of my friends staying in the house had gotten back in one piece and we talked about the highlights, and lowlights, of the day. We even got treated to a story about a valentine Karen O wrote one of the guests back in high school. I bust out the bottle of cask strength Glenlivet that I had brought with me, and plopped myself onto the couch. The scotch numbed the pain in my aching feet, and with Day 2 was a few hours away, I started to mentally strategize which bands I was going to check out, hoping that each band would live up to expectations.
#DKLPHOTOS 