24 February 2010 – White Rabbits are one of my favourite live bands I have ever seen and tonight I photographed them opening for Hockey at Koko.

Unfortunately they were the support act so I feel their set was too short because I could watch them for ages. I am not going to make this long because I have photographed these guys live quite a few times and don’t want to become boring going on about how incredible they are live but they are. Haha.

Matt had a broken hand and played as if it didn’t matter. I love that. These guys are cool, their albums are great and they will blow your mind away if you are lucky enough to ever see them live. These are a few of the photos I shot of the guys. Make sure to check them out.

24 February 2010 – Tonight I photographed Hockey playing at Koko and I never knew about these guys before this week so I wasn’t sure what to expect.

After hearing about them I listened to some of their stuff on MySpace and I really liked it so was looking forward to the show. Koko is an amazing venue and I really forgot how beautiful it is inside. The lighting for their show was mostly backlit and it was quite smokey but its alright except that it was extremely hard to get a good shot of anyone besides the front man as all the others were silhouetted. These are a few of the ones I shot that I like.

23 February 2010 – Tonight I shot 30 Seconds to Mars at Wembley Arena which was an ABSOLUTE nightmare traveling to and from.

I won’t bore you with my travel troubles but I just really never enjoy those trips because they just never work out right. Haha.

Anyway, I have shot 30STM before about 3 years ago and I was quite taken by their show then based on how much effort Jared Leto puts into it. I really liked their album “A Beautiful Lie” so it was great then seeing them play this material and the crowd then went crazy. Tonight was worse, the crowd was SO much more amped on the show and every one was ready to go off, kind of like a real “Mars Army”. I’ve never seen so many people singing almost every single song out loud. It was great to witness.

The show tonight was full of great efforts ranging from the initial curtain drop, to kick of the show, through to the lighting, screens and general live energy given off by the guys. I noticed quite a few mistakes during the set but in the end, does it really matter if the 12 000 strong crowd loves it? Not really.

With regards to the lighting from a photography point of view, I think tonight was one of the hardest shows I have shot because it was really different all the time. I normally work out what my settings would be and shift slightly to accommodate changes but tonight I was making such big jumps between no lights and too much light that it really was interesting. The smoke was slightly overkill for the first few songs but this died out slowly as the smoke made its way through the venue. The issue with smoke is that some times the subject just vanishes and it becomes hard to focus and create a shot worth anything (mostly back lit). In the end it’s important to remember that the band is performing for a crowd and not for 10 photographers in a pit so I understand completely when I think of it this way and with that in mind the light was great.

These are a few of the shots I took. They seem really grainy as lower resolution images but I shot on ISO 800 which is the same as I used for the Depeche Mode show this past weekend so I am going to take it that the smoke played a part of this.

20 February 2010 – One of the greatest bands of all times has to be Depeche Mode not only for the music that they have made over the years but also for the influence they have had on many of the bands I’ve ever liked. Tonight I photographed their show at The O2.

The stage set and lighting was very cool and the sound for the venue was incredible. It’s such a good thing witnessing live music and I really enjoy when bands pull together all their resources and make sure to give a good live performance. Not only that but the guys played 20 songs which took almost 2 hours with very little time in between wasted on speaking too much.

They had filming rigs around the stage which were used to film the backgrounds of the stage that everyone was seeing so during songs 2 and 3 we were asked to stay in a very small area to keep out of the way so that the guys could get into the right positions and move around freely to make sure that the imaging was perfect. During this time there wasn’t much I could really see worth shooting so I just joined in with the front row of the crowd and partied to the sounds that are so familiar.

These are a few of my photographs that I really like of Dave and Martin because the light was perfect for them so I focused on getting the best shots of them. The show was amazing and I feel so stoked that I got to shoot them because I have a feeling that it might not happen again. Hopefully I am wrong. After shooting the show from the pit I ran around to enjoy the rest of the show from the crowd so the last photo in this set is from where I was sitting which was about 2 thirds of the way to the back of the crowd. I love that shot.

Hope that you are all well. Marcus

19 February 2010 – Tonight I photographed Imogen Heap who is someone that I had been looking forward to seeing live for ages so it was really exciting for me.

I was at the Alice in Wonderland Premier in Leicester Square which finished up about 30 minutes before the show was meant to start so I ran my ass off to get to Shepherds Bush Empire which actually finally worked out without any complications for once.

Imogen is an amazing artist and it was incredible to be able to watch her do what she does. Unfortunately as is normally the case, the set / show (lighting and visually) didn’t start until the 4th / 5th song so it was really difficult to work with the lighting that was available. It’s actually not really that it was hard but more that it wasn’t really existent or even boring to shoot photos that could show off the scene. These are a few of the photographs that I like.

Anyway, the show was incredible and right now Imogen has taken the hot seat on my favourite show round up for 2010 and I feel like she will be there for a while. Make sure to check her out if you haven’t because she is great.

NOTE: I wrote a review for Clink Music Magazine which is live so give it a read if you have the time. I am not the best writer but thought it was worth posting.

16 February 2010 – The guys from Daytona Lights contacted me because they were looking for new portraits to use for their MySpace re-release so we hit it up one FREEZING night in East London.

When I say it was FREEZING I really mean it. I didn’t notice that it was so bad because I really focus on what I am doing when I shoot but I could see the guys taking strain and I was sick for the next few days. Regardless, it was a really good time spending it with the guys and working with them. They really are a bunch of talented musicians just enjoying what they do and I loved that they had an acoustic guitar with them to play with between scene changes. Music is an amazing thing and I often wonder what it would be like not knowing about music, I don’t think it would be rad.

Anyway, the guys have just put up their MySpace and they have added a few of their new songs to make sure that it’s worth checking out. Do it, do it NOW. Haha.

These are a few of my favourite shots during the time with them. For some reason my “save for web” option is really playing up and I don’t think the compression is working right so excuse the quality of the last few posts. I am working on it.

Other than that, I hope you are good and having a fun week so far. Happy Pancake day by the way. Marcus

They guys feature on the Blackberry advert currently showing on TV. It’s really rad and now that I have worked with them I see the ad everyday.

13 February 2010 – The start of this month saw the official UK release of We Are The Ocean’s full album release for “Cutting Our Teeth” which has been anticipated as hell.

Today the guys played a free show in Kingston, thanks to the guys at Banquet Records, to officially launch the album and they asked me to join them to photograph the show as well as some behind the scenes shots to document their signing session which kids had slept outside the venue for. Crazy.

I really like what these guys are doing both in their recorded material and in their live show and I think the entire band are on the same level all agreeing in what they are trying to achieve. They play with heart and every show I have shot with them is played as if it was their first show, based on the energy. I love watching them and have really looked forward to their album for too long now. I have a feeling that it’s going to be one of my top favourites for 2010.

Make sure to check these guys out especially if you are into post-hardcore / alternative / punk / rock with catchy rhythm and harmonies.

The video below was recorded during the set and it came out pretty rad.

12 February 2010 – I have worked with the guys from Just Me Again a few times before and they really are a super cool bunch of guys. Tonight I joined them for their show at the Bush Hall to capture a few photographs.

I have heard the guys recorded material and become quite familiar with what they are trying to do but this was the first time that I was seeing them live and I was quite excited. The guys are super young and really funny to hang out with so I was expecting a really young and inexperienced sound which was really naive of me because as they hit the first note it was made clear that they are really serious about what they are doing and also that they have put in a lot of thought and practice to try and make this work for them. They are following a dream that they share and know that it won’t just be handed to them on a plate and I really appreciate seeing guys living their passion and pushing themselves to make their dreams come true.

Their set was sadly cut short which I didn’t agree with but sadly I was not the event organizer so I couldn’t do anything to help out. It seemed really stupid because the crowd was really feeding off the material and having a good time but the guys took it as best as they could and just kept being professional, which again is really unexpected from a group of guys so young.

Elyar and Marty head up the front line vocally and together they work amazingly. I love that they split front roles between each other and focus on just making good music and having fun as apposed to who is going to grab the spotlight.

I am excited that I work with these guys and that they are so fresh on the scene because I look forward to watching them grow and enjoy the journey that they have embarked on. It’s a pleasure to witness their bond and I know that the journey is going to bring many laughs. Make sure to check out their stuff if you are into pop punk with a feel good sound and well thought out harmonies.

11 February 2010 – For a long time I have been wanting to shoot Lostprophets because I had a feeling that their live show would be a good one. Tonight I found out that it really was.

The guys have been together doing what they do for a while now but the launch of their latest album, The Betrayed, has created a lot of buzz for everyone especially in the UK. The reason has been steered a lot towards front man, Ian Watkins, personal life but I personally feel it’s because the album is just good and because they put a lot of energy and effort into their live set.

I was slightly disappointed just because the amazing lighting and set took a while to build up but it wasn’t even close to being interesting to photograph until the end of song 5 / 6 so that meant it was hard to get photographs that really give a good feel of what the the experience was like. It’s hard to explain but I just always try to capture a piece of what the live experience is like and I feel that sometimes the photos are a false preview / capture of what it was like purely because the show hadn’t yet kicked into full effect before the photographers were asked to leave.

Anyway, it was an incredible show and I look forward to seeing and working with these guys again. They are touring quite a bit now so make sure to see them if you can.

11 February 2010 – Tonight the opening band was none other than Kids In Glass Houses and I was looking forward to seeing them since my friend Warren introduced me to them earlier last year.

They were as good as I thought they were going to be and it was great to hear their material off the last album that I got into as well as a bunch of stuff of their latest album that is going to do well for them. The guys have a really good stage presence and they give a good show for sure. As is always the case with opening bands, the stage, lighting and sound is set up mainly for the headline band and although nothing else really seemed an issue, the lighting was quite hard to work with especially when trying to capture Aled while he ran around making the stage look really small.

These guys keep getting bigger and bigger so next time they will probably headline this venue and I will make sure to abuse the lighting then. For now these are my favourites of the photographs that I shot. I hope everyone is well. Marcus