Another shot from Field Day, which wasn’t the photographic gold I’d hoped for to be honest – yet that’s the deal with festivals for the most part. Stages that are generally unadorned for most bands bar the headliners (in contrast to this, the shots I got for Phoenix on the same stage were dynamite stuff).

Still, Dev Hynes, aka Lightspeed Champion, played a blinder of a set, opening with a Beatles cover while is always guaranteed to win over a festival crowd….

Live on the Eat Your Own Ears stage at Victoria Park for Field Day 2010, shot for The Fly magazine.

Taken at Somerset House last week, for The Fly magazine.

Download or listen to ‘Dreaming of Another World (Wooden Shjips remix)’ below (via Sonic Masala).

Mystery Jets – Dreaming of Another World (Wooden Shjips remix) mp3

First picture I’ve posted in ages that isn’t portrait oriented. This is what comes from shooting to spec for magazines….anyway, this was an incredible show with an adoring crowd and an overwhelmed Kele Okereke.

A sweaty photo pit, angry challenging lighting, beer thrown all over my back and one of the best live shoots I’ve done in ages – if it’s not hard work, it’s not worth it.

Download or listen to ‘Tenderoni (Jungle Fiction remix)’ below (via DÖDSELECTRO).

Kele – Tenderoni (Jungle Fiction remix) mp3

From last night’s show at The Old Blue Last, shot for The Fly magazine.

A shot from a recent photoshoot I did with Bristol-based Fitness Club Fiasco in The Social and around the streets of London.

The Memory Tapes live experience is brilliantly transported from the wonderful Seek Magic album to become a whole new beast altogether – it’s more visceral and inventive rather than a simple attempt to reproduce the sound and songs of the album. More guitar heavy, with some ace live percussion and a perfect melding of the synthetic and the organic – just brilliant.

I’d almost forgotten about this photo.

The first time taking pictures in a venue you haven’t been to in ages can be an umitigated disaster. You have no idea on the lighting setup, you don’t know how well the flash will bounce if it’s dark in there and you just don’t feel settled until you have a feel for a place – for me it can take a couple of shows in the same place to get that confidence. I’ve only just started to work out the complexities of shooting in The Social after my fourth time there (for the record, it’s fun to bounce flash backwards off the window and onto the stage).

The last time I was at the Scala was about nine years ago – shortly after they reopened I think, following the closure for Clockwork Orange-showing shenanigans. I seem to recall smoking three packs of cigarettes in one evening, drinking five times my body weight in Smirnoff Ices and nearly going home with someone of ambigious gender. Such is life.

Anyway, I scoped the venue as soon as I entered, looked for good points to shoot, took my place and waited. Very quickly I realised I’d chosen entirely the wrong position – there was no pit on the ocassion – and just didn’t get the shots I wanted. Coupled with the lighting, which just didn’t fall in the right place. It was one of the few ocassions when the abscence of a press pit means you can’t use flash.

This shot did, however, turn out pretty okay and I’m real happy with it. When those silhouette shots work, they’re a real winner but as this was pretty much the only shot from this entire gig I liked, I’d filed that night under ‘photographic disaster’.

Anyway, my rule of thumb now for new places is to turn up very early and use the support as practise. Takes the guesswork out of the equation.

Sweden: home to many fine exports – IKEA, Julmust, Volvo and, of course, some of the finest, most sincere and beautiful music in the world. Maybe it’s the climate there, the lack of real pretension and the artistic impulse that seems inherant in every Swedish person I’ve ever met, but there’s a level of quality in their music that you just don’t get elsewhere.

So this week I’ve had The Forest and The Trees staying with me in London. Stockholm residents and husband and wife Joel and Linnea Edin were in the UK to play two shows at The Social and The Rest is Noise and introduce the UK to their swimmingly lovely folksy pop sound. They make music with a sublime heart and soul that sounds like it was recorded in a dusky field sometime in late summer. Totally transcendental and it even sounded great while there was a snow storm raging outside.

Their myspace has some good stuff and there are two great videos on Vimeo that you can watch here and here. Hopefully they’ll be back next year with an album to promote and we’ll get to see them play some more.

Kudos to Joel and Linnea (and to fellow live band members, the brothers David and Robin Lindvall) for being the perfect houseguests and making us wish we’d had more time with them to drink wine and talk music.

Another fine band from Portland Oregon, Horse Feathers are headed up by the mellow-voiced Justin Ringle – think My Morning Jacket’s Jim James but more lush – with arrangements by the multi-talented Peter Broderick.

They play very fine Americana and in the song ‘Cascades’ – out on 7″ right now – have released one of the more sublime efforts to hit my record player in recent days. ‘Curs in the Weeds’ – also on their myspace – is a pretty amazing song too. Check them out – they’ve just finished a short tour of the UK but should be back next year.