We Were Promised Jetpacks : Rhythm Room / Phoenix
Feb 24, 2010 Concert Photography
The last time I’ve been this hyped on a new band was when someone gave me a copy of Is This It - by The Strokes. We Were Promised Jetpacks, from Edinburgh, Scotland came to Phoenix, AZ on tour to support their album These Four Walls and killed it. Four guys with a indie sound and indie spirit that played their asses off for the sold out crowd at The Rhythm Room.
The Rhythm Room is a great old Phoenix Club that has hosted some legendary shows over the years. Since it is such a small venue taking photographs is a challenge. The lights are dim and there is not much of a spotlight during the sets. Another challenge is that when the club is at capacity moving around to get a good spot for photos is tough. The crowd stands up against the stage and there is no real photography access. Luckily last night the crowd was mellow enough that I could politely ask people to move for a minute and they were happy to oblige. In hindsight the tough shows to photograph are always the most rewarding and I am happy I had the chance to shoot ‘Jetpacks in such a small venue.
Most of the show was photographed at ISO 800 with my 24-70 f2.8 lens at about 1/60 (with no flash.)
What new music are you hyped on? What was your toughest music photo shoot?
Tags: canon, CenPho music, central phoenix club, Central phoenix music, concert photo, Concert Photography, digital photography, Greg Taylor, GRT2, live music, phoenix, professional photographer, Rhythm Room, We Were Promised Jetpacks
February 25th, 2010 at 5:00 am
My toughest music photo shoot…Janes Addiction 1990 in London. Back Stage access, shooting from on the stage small club completely packed. Shot 3 rolls with my 1960′s SLR and only captured one image and the only reason I got that was because I caught someone else’s flash in my exposure. I was trying to be arty with the camera right from the first song instead of getting some shots that I knew would have developed (no longer a prob these days) In the end when you have the only picture of something special how you got it or what it looks like becomes irrelevant.
Greg you have inspired me to dust off some of these and post them up.
PS: Here was one of my favorites, nothing tough here:
http://thehouseofsteam.wordpress.com/2009/01/29/animotocom/?preview=true&preview_id=1625&preview_nonce=ff06d922c4
Great work Greg!
PSS Heard them on the BBC not too long ago, cool band.
February 25th, 2010 at 6:17 am
Thanks Jason. I appreciate all your support and your dedication the http://www.thehouseofsteam.com blog over the years.
Using someone else’s flash is actually a photo technique concert photographers try to use called “Catch Flash” – I’ve never been really successful at using it. Todd Owyoung wrote a great blog post about it here (http://ishootshows.com/2010/01/11/catchflash/)
See you on whichever side of the pond sometime soon!