live music & theater: March 2009 Archives

Seriously? Seriously.

I want to go and re-edit every single big show I've shot with Lightroom. Being able to do such simple edits in RAW that come out fan-effing-tastic and to be taking about one-tenth the time it took me to suck ass at use Photoshop has completely changed my life. I mean, really. I think the shots I did of the bands at KEXP this past Saturday might be some of the best in-studios I've ever done. Next up: 35mm prime lens and permanent software. And Laura's still awesome.

I have to stop saying seriously so much. But I can't help it.

We, as they say, are in business. Check this out:

The guys in The Soft Hills were super-sweet and super thankful for the photos. Easy peasy and a great set of music. Here's the flickr-ness.

Pearly Gate Music, on the other hand, made me pretty nervous. I had spent the better part of their soundcheck thinking I had almost deleted the first band's shots, and as a result I had to kind of burst into the in-studio room with about ten minutes left in the soundcheck. Standard lines ensue, hi, do you mind if I take some shots for the station, no one minds, get the shots, make nice, get out. When it's a really loud-ass friendly band (like Lady Dottie & the Diamonds), I've even stayed in for the actual set -- and while nothing inherently awkward happened with these dudes, and there was no un-friendly, I was all sweaty armpits and tripping over my feet. Long story short, I took about 240 shots in under ten minutes and got the hell out of there.

I hopped into the soundbooth room to watch & hear the set, and literally could not believe my ears. It was as if someone flipped a switch and this flawless incredible kind of awesome started pouring out of these guys. Then I'm talking to the sound guy about how I was totally losing at Hipster Olympics as I tried not to break any equipment / throw up, and I learn that it's J. Tillman on drums, and Zach Tillman on lead. (Seriously!) You can imagine the magic that was going on as a result. The music was eighty-layered vocal amazingness: think everything that's good and echoey about Fleet Foxes (circa MMJ doing it first, but that's just my opinion), minus the leftover hippie campfire-Americana, plus some bad-ass early Neil Young-esque abstract-Americana stop-you-in-mid-everything lyrics. Something like, your [stupid good adjective] hair / and my clumsy hands... Right. Unbelievable. Pass for next Friday's J. Tillman / PGM show in process.

As I mentioned earlier, these just might be some of the best live shots I've ever taken. I was editing them and kind of freaked out about it, and then I realized that with all this band-dude-in-the-dark shooting, I'm getting an insane photography workout. So capturing epic moments in a well-lit room gets to be almost second nature, because I can concentrate more on what's going on and less on whether or not my camera is doing what I want it to. Like when I take my point and shoot out to get something in broad daylight, I don't have to think about the in-the-dark part. I don't mean to imply that it's easy per se, but more that it's getting easier. I'm noting this in particular because it's been quite some time since anything has gotten measurably easier, and now so much is getting easier. Like I'm catching up, with something.

PS, high contrast black & white is my new rad. I've used b&w a lot to hide noise, shit lighting, screwups, whatever -- but in this case I used it on two shots for that, and on the rest because it made the shots look like what it felt like when they played.

And not to be brushed aside, even though it's the wrap-up set on this week's post, Mark Siano & the Freedom Dancers (with a lineup of my other theater group favorites) brought the schtick to the Little Theater this past Friday. Fun, fun, burlesque, Blood Squad -- who you should go and spend money to see as soon as humanly possible -- Becky Poole, and the rest of the regulars. Mark's been getting some good PR lately, and I'm happy that good things are happening for these guys.

In related news: I got a job. A real, honest-to-goodness job. With benefits, and paid vacations, and sick time, and a 401k. And yoga. And awesome. And it's a nonprofit. I'm so excited for it that I can't stop talking about all the rad, and as it turns out, a significant percentage of the people I know around my age also have Real Jobs. Who knew. This is so new for me, I'm like a little kid almost -- I've done sales and worked for friends and friends of friends for so long that I forgot what this stuff even looked like. Barring any hidden insanity, I think I've got a good gig with good people at a good company. And I am completely beyond grateful that all of this is going down. More to follow.

So, it's my last BioMed-paying-for-me-to-post, first day of the rest of my Everything kind of day. Oh, and it's my eight month anniversary in Seattle today. I'm fully vested in my imaginaryness, I'm having a blast, I'm making a lot of friends -- real, honest-to-goodness friends -- and I'm consistently trying on different styles of maybe-things-are-kinda-good-these-days pants. (They all fit, by the way.)

I'm going to go now, and try not to actively be waiting for something bad to happen in the middle of all this fantastic. At least, you know, until sometime next week.

Not a ton of shows from last week to now, so I'll just beef up the photo quota.

The KMRIA / Minus 5 show was off the charts. I'm not a big Pogues fan, and I'm also not a big Celtic-flautist lovin' St. Patrick's day enthusiast type, but dammit -- these guys were good. The opening set from Minus 5 (who I could see once a week and not get tired of) totally knocked me sideways, and I managed to pull off some rad shots.

[Mental note: Tractor, stage right.]

I went to Bop Street Records after the show, and just about had a heart attack. They seriously have every record ever made, ever, in triplicate. And then more records. And then more records. I know it's totes not PC of me, but this place was absolutely retarded. And amazing. And then more records.

And then more records.

The one-a-days are really more like one-a-every-other-days, but it's all good. Like many things say, I will be patient with intermittent progress. It's yielding some rad results.

Up & coming...

Mark Siano's latest cabaret on Friday, and I get my practice on at KEXP on Saturday.
Spring is Springing, the Croc is re-opening, there's imaginary craft-fests and volunteer shifts and a handful of guest list spots I'm keeping my fingers crossed on.

Kiss kiss, bang bang & I'll see you back here next week.
-V.

(And now, a word from our sponsor:)

Sometimes, I suck at photography. Bad. I definitely suck at PhotoShop, all the time.

This is Laura Musselman. She takes pictures. Dot com.

As a general rule, Laura does not suck at photography. Post-processing or otherwise. Plus, she's nice. And fun. And puts up with me geeking her ear off about equipment every time I'm within shouting distance of her at a show. She's so good that she could be a smug four-letter-word about her work and it wouldn't matter one bit, but she's not. Instead, she's rad.

Laura helps me to figure out what lens I should think about next, and the best things to consider when I want to sell my car to get new equipment. I, in turn, see the kid next to me trying to take pictures with a point and shoot, knowing better than to flash, and I help him figure out how to turn up the ISO so that he can take better shots. Small turns that all add up eventually. That's generally about how most things go here, in a land-of-misfit-toys kind of way.

But I'm not telling you all this to get on the Laura Musselman PR bus, or because she totally saved my ass with a new lens when I shot Death Cab for Cutie at WaMu, or because I'll get a discount at Glazer's for saying so. I'm telling you all this because Laura has single-handedly restored my faith in my own work, with one little word:

Lightroom.

I now suck a little bit less at post-processing than I did yesterday, or last week. And anything that helps with that deserves an honorable mention, at the very least. Those days when it's more suck than magic, those nights when I get home from a show with a bunch of mediocre shots, wondering what the hell I'm doing carrying around a camera and calling myself a photographer. Knowing how to edit properly eases the worst of the blows, it takes things up a few notches from "I can't take pictures anymore, I quit" to "that stinks, but I know what to do next time so that it doesn't happen like that again." Lightroom has made my life easier, and my work better. And save for digging up someone with a student ID to buy permanent software before my free trial ends, I couldn't be happier.  

Thanks, girl! You're really the bestest.

/PSA

(We will now return to our regularly scheduled programming, already in progress.)

All remiss with the regular updates, I know. It's official now: my job is no longer as of April 1st (and it's not a joke, unfortunately). So, amidst the slew of resumes and interviews and such, I bring you the week-plus in pictures:



Pablo Trucker had their album-y release show at the Sunset at the end of February, getting their sad bastard on in a big way with Conservative Dad. While the lighting escaped me, as the Sunset is prone to do depending on stage setup, the show was tremendous (as usual). Insert gushy verbose imaginary blogging here, heavy with love and adjective.

[Hi, John in Ballard, quoter of many things TIG! Such a coincidence that we answered phones together.]

As we were finishing up our imaginary craft-fest at Heather's tonight, I was talking to her about how and why people seem to be drawn to me, telling me I'm easy to talk to and spilling their guts practically on command. She said, "Well, you're still shiny. You haven't lived here long enough to be the way the rest of us have gotten." Me. Still shiny. Funny, I had to post up a note on my wall to remind me that Connecticut Victoria would be quite ecstatic to be spending even an hour in Seattle Victoria's shoes just a few weeks ago, and now it's creeping back to Shiny.

The pledge drive reinstated that in me last week, and I've got to say, even though I know most people despise it -- I fucking love the pledge drive. I love all of them, every time. I love the sense of community, I love the constant pleading for support that keeps everyone right-sized. I love being reaffirmed, I love sharing my love of the station and everything it means to me, and mostly I love the full frontal reconnection that the pledge drive brings with it. It's a snap back to reality, to the fact that KEXP isn't on the radio anywhere else but here, and how good we have it -- in a musical, creative, and supportive community sense. And I love how the djs get all cracked out by the end of the week, and the madness that ensues, and the cupcakes, and the friendships that get forged. Love it. Love. It.

I've started doing one-a-days, to take the pressure off of myself with my constant foray into improving at concert photography. To remember that I didn't start doing this to try to get paid for doing it, or to make a job out of it, or to beat myself up about it -- it was simply because I couldn't not carry a camera around anymore. And the more I obey the "pull over and take the picture" vibe, the better off I am for it. Just sayin'.

Port O'Brien played with M. Ward last weekend, and the set was a blast. They were, to make a lateral comparison, a little bit Moondoggies in the group-sing arena, plus some more indie rock roots, plus a stage presence that just wouldn't quit. The dancing, the enthusiasm, the wrangling of sounds from instruments, the well-placed silent breaks for a beat in a slew of good lyric -- I kept waiting for it to get bad, and it didn't. Total sleeper sneak-up surprise set, for me at least. And M. Ward was gorgeous, gorgeous, gorgeous: backlit, with a window (and fireflies!) up behind him on the stage, sound so good that it might have been a recording, and a voice like velvet and expensive chocolate coming out of the speakers in a warm blanket of awesome.

Unfortunately, like some nights at the Sunset, M. Ward was in almost total darkness -- I hammered off a few requisite shots before the drunken dude-bro set ruined it for me completely, yelling out in the perfect silence, flashing with a point & shoot. Sensitive as I am, I lost the juju after that and felt completely disconnected from the set, and headed out about halfway through. Reluctantly, I put the shots up on flickr anyway, but I'm not terribly thrilled with how it came out. Funny (not really, though) how my connection with what's going on onstage, or the lack thereof, directly and literally translates in my pictures. I can't hide it.

I suppose that everyone that goes to shows isn't there to see the show. Occupational hazard, which I will gladly deal with.

And, to cap off the deliciousness: Project Jenny, Project Jan rocked my striped knee-socks right off at Neumo's this past Saturday, opening for Pop Levi and Fujiya & Miyagi. I'll link back to the imaginary writeup as soon as it posts, but suffice it to say that Jeremy Haines is my new beat-pop freestyle Elvis. [Update: post here.] Seriously, I'd stand in long lines for these guys. They are good good good, and I'd recommend making the time to see their set if you catch them coming through your neck of the woods. Like Port O'Brien, there was a part of me that kept waiting for the bad part, and there just was none to be found. A veritable slew of goodness, and a bag of rad-ass dance moves.

Coming up... well, not a ton to plug in here. Coming up is me working on the job thing mostly, and a few blips on the radar here and there -- KMRIA and the Minus 5 will be at the Tractor this Friday, which is going to be rad as all get-out, but it's the only thing I have on a hardcore lock show-wise. There's a ton of good stuff this month that I'm sure get to and post about accordingly... but until then, it's back to scouring the internets for paid work.

Love, hand-me-downs, and extremely uncomfortable panel interviews for underpaid positions,
VIVA