Showing posts with label peter delaney. Show all posts
Showing posts with label peter delaney. Show all posts
Monday, November 28, 2011
Sunday, May 22, 2011
Monday, July 19, 2010
Naoto Kawate and The Balky Mule Tour
Peter Delaney
I can never take many photographs of Peter Delaney's gigs; the shutter makes too much noise. Maybe someday I'll be able to afford a Leica.
The Balky Mule
Before/In Between/After
I'm beginning to enjoy take photos at gigs, it's a difficult scenario in terms of doing something different so I suppose I like to concentrate on the things happening around the music as much as the music itself. I've never liked gig photography as a genre, either from the point of view of doing it or looking at it. There's something very shooting-fish-in-a-barrel about it sometimes, especially when the performer is really putting a lot of effort into the visuals. It's like taking photographs of statues; the thing is there to be looked at and just presents the photo-op too easily. So its enjoyable to take photographs of moments in and around the gig. I think maybe I like trying to demystify the process - it's an impossible task because if the music is good enough it'll transcend any other notions easily anyways. But it's fun to try. I suppose the images sum up how I experience live music, which I think is pretty different from this time last year now I've played a few gigs myself. I really do need a quieter camera though if I'm gonna be photographing quieter gigs. This was a really really great night, everybody was on top form and Naoto Kawate was such a joy to listen to; instead of saving the money for a taxi home I bought his cd and walked.
Sunday, June 13, 2010
Witches Club/Fairy Fort Number III
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| Poster and photo by Takashi Kumagai |
High Quality Potatoes, an improv act originally composed of Jimmy, Takashi and I but when Jimmy had to pull out due to being stranded in Belmullet Ger kindly stepped in. We were pretty ridiculous, but nobody threw charcoal at us so I guess that's a sort of success. Aaron took some great photographs:
Brigid Power-Ryce played an excellent set - her vocals have this eerily lugubrious tinge to them that was perfectly suited to the surroundings, compounded by her oddly off-tempo 12-string guitar strum. When I first saw her play live I just couldn't get into it, but with each successive performance I've liked her more and more, and am definitely a fan now... I took a couple of photos only, cos I'm very conscious of the noise the shutter makes at the Fairy Fort.
Peter Delaney has always been one of my favourite Irish musicians, one of my favourites full stop. (He also takes mighty photographs) He's miles away from a lot of stuff I would normally listen to - jauntily strummed melancholic sea chanties, just him and a ukulele mostly. He cuts a pretty unique figure when you see him perform, and completely draws you in, till suddenly you realise you're leaning in and listening intently. I somehow never realised how dark his lyrics often are, though they're usually tempered by a poetic sweetness, and sung in such a way as to lull you into thinking you're listening to something upbeat and carefree - "The Guest" is a good example of this. It's an eight minute ukelele epic and I've been listening to it on his myspace daily for the last two weeks. Goes one chorus:
"You've been by my window/
Howling in the night woods/
Perched above my front door/
You steal into my bedroom"
before reverting back into the simple, carefree sounding ukulele riff. It's a completely disarming and haunting song, and it's only a demo - I can't wait to hear it finished. Again, I only took a couple of photographs; I must get a quieter camera...
Some photos of the exhibition - Aaron's photograms and my miscellany:
I should have taken more, and taken them better.
Miscellaneous shenanigans -
These last were mostly taken by Aaron.
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