Music

Reacting to life’s changing circumstances.

Been a bit quiet for a while, but there’s just been so much going on with real life and family that I honestly have had to put a lot of my musical life on hold, this happens to us all at certain points in time, but it’s been a pretty difficult year all in all and as we hit October and I look back on what I’ve been to and done this year gig/review wise and it’s definitely been a lot less than normal, but there have been some great ones in there and have an over ambitious list of gigs to try and get through before the year is out. Of course for someone with Epilepsy, which is brought on by exhaustion, I will have to be careful with this stuff.

Right now a lot of my free time is not under my control and I have come to terms with that, but without my musical outlet the chances of slowly going mad are of course rising by the day, so in a couple of weeks I will be attending the Rockingham Festival in Nottingham, and am thrilled that I will be shooting/reviewing it, so a working break, but a much needed break all the same. And in reality it will become more difficult to get away for 3/4 days as time goes on and the need to be close to home becomes more important, for one reason or another, so I certainly don’t take going away lightly, the support of a very understanding wife and the help of some family and friends allows the possibility to be come a reality. At times at the moment it’s like working 3 jobs and not having a break inbetween, or very little, that’s where the stress, strain and sheer exhaustion kick in. So the opportunity to get away and shoot acts like Loverboy, KIX, Vince Neil, Harem Scarem, John Parr etc……… WOW, it’s going to be great, and a few nights in a hotel will hopefully bring some much needed sleep along with it.

I did manage to get over to see one of my Bucketlist bands, Living Colour, a couple of weeks ago and that was just an awesome night, but a night is gone by in a flash and have had to miss two gigs since, so it’s back into the same sort of rut again, which can be difficult to wrap your head around. Luckily there are a lot of good friends out there that we can all use to bounce things off, never be afraid to share with friends and let people know when times are difficult, we can all use help when everything gets on top of us.

What next year holds, well we will see, but with some gigs and Festivals already scheduled we can just hope that things become a little easier, my son will be running around a lot more by then, so that will be a different and fun type of change, but I think everyone needs an outlet of some sort, be it creative or just a fun hobby to escape to and release the pressure every now and then.

Expect a lot of updates with regards to Rockingham over the next month, and fingers crossed for some positive stuff in the near future 😉

Ebb and flow, ups and downs ;-)

AOR, Music, Uncategorized

Lot’s of positives and a few negatives recently, have finally managed to start writing again, hopefully not a temporary thing, but it’s been great to get some new reviews written up (damn I must add the links to the Reviews Section here, which also needs a revamp). Getting back into listening to some brilliant new music has been exceptionally therapeutic.

This year has once again seen a huge amount of really high quality Album releases and we are not yet mid way through August, there is still a lot more one it’s way in the coming months, exciting times. With regards to getting out to Gigs, well that’s been pretty slow of late, had to cancel my plans for going to the wonderful Bloodstock Festival, but still hoping there’s a lot to come (certainly plenty penciled in and November has become crazily busy already). Looking forward to a hectic time ahead, but will need to manage the energy levels along the way. And of course the everyday trials and tribulations of life can put a spanner in the works on occasion. Will hopefully make the next Gig Trip all the sweeter, to see a Bucketlist band and hopefully meet up with some of my FB friends that I have yet to meet in person, which is always a bonus.

While relaxing a bit this evening it seemed only fitting to take a little look back at one of the many wonderful highlights of last year for me, getting to shoot the wonderful Jean Beauvoir (The Plasmatics, Voodoo X, Crown Of Thorns) at Rockingham last October in Nottingham, the weekend was going to be awesome anyway, but to finally get to see Jean and not only that but have Tommy Lafferty and Hawk Lopez in his band, and on top of that they were going to be playing some Crown of Thorns songs, WOW!!!! blew me away, not afraid to say it brought a teat to my eye with songs like “Dying For Love” and “Standing On The Corner”, a moment in time that will never be forgotten. So a couple of touch ups and some photos that I haven’t released before ended up in a new Folder and here they are. Will add them to the Gallery at when I get a chance.

So onward we move, want to try and complete another review or two before the weekend is over and then it’s another Bucketlist band on Monday night in Dublin, things are looking up.

Can you have the Blues missing the Blues ?

Music, Uncategorized

So back home a few days from another awesome weekend of wonderful music, this time around it was HRH Blues in Sheffield, and I’m already missing it, yes I have the Blues from the Blues 😉 Was lucky enough to be shooting and reviewing this one for Firebrand.

A two day Festival, with some really brilliant performances though it did all seem to fly by all too quickly. With Artists from the UK, Europe and the US there’s plenty of choice in styles and approach, but there can’t of been many that go for it as much or as well as the Billy Walton Band, such a fun set for a band absolutely loving what they do.

Billy Walton of the excellent Billy Walton Band.

There were many highlights across the two days, of course it was such a shame that King King couldn’t play (sending best wishes and a speedy recovery to Alan Nimmo – maybe next year), but it was awesome to see Erja Lyytinen, Simon McBride, Ten Years After, Laurence Jones, Chantel McGregor, Sean Webster Band, Dan Patlansky and lets not forget Crow Black Chicken who got a lot of mentions in the last few days as one of the bands of the Festival. Just wish I could have seen a lot of the artists on the 2nd stage as well, sadly time overlaps didn’t allow. The slightly more mature crowd there were seats in the venue, which worked to a certain extent, but there just wasn’t enough space between the rows and made it a bit awkward for people to get around, especially on the main floor, but that’s a minor thing at the end of the day.

Working on the Photos and Review this weekend and will hopefully have it all ready to go very soon. Roll on the next one 😉

Sean Webster Band – terrific start to Day 2 on the Main Stage

My personal performance of the weekend Laurence Jones

Very much still an underrated guitarist, Simon McBride, great banter with the crowd.

Full flow Festival Season 2017

AOR, Music, Uncategorized

With one HRH Festival completed and everything online (Review below) it’s already time to head off to another, and a little different, this coming Bank Holiday weekend we have HRH Blues in Sheffield, again it’s another really cracking lineup with the likes of King King, Stan Webb’s Chicken Shack, Ten Years After, Erja Lyytinen, Chantel McGregor, Simon McBride and Laurence Jones all in attendance.

Having not been able to attend last years event I’m really looking forward to this show, there’s always a good atmosphere at HRH events and I’m sure this will be no different. Still hoping to do Bloodstock, Rockingham and squeeze in some if not all of Ramblin’ Man. Reality is that these days if you have the time and the money you could be doing a Festival every week.

HRH AOR V Review – broken into Day splits, just click on a link below for review/photos.

Day 1 – Tequila Mockingbyrd, Last Great Dreamers, Bonafide and The Quireboys

Day 2 – The Radio Sun (Acoustic), Walkway, Kane’d, Romeo’s Daughter, Jizzy Pearl’s Love/Hate, Bang Tango, Autograph, FM, Lita Ford

Day 3 – Häxan. Summers, The Radio Sun, VEGA, Paul Laine, Mike Tramp, Bailey, Michael Monroe, Slaughter, Reach

Festival time again ;-)

Music

Right better head off and get some sleep, up in a few hours to get the red eye over to Birmingham to begin the annual pilgrimage to HRH AOR in Pwllheli, North Wales. Shooting again this year and it’s going to be a busy few days, though as always great fun too meeting up with friends from far and wide.

This year’s headliners are the legendary Lita Ford, Slaughter and The Quireboys, with a plethora of great bands from both sides of the Atlantic including Autograph, FM, LA Guns, Jizzy Pearl’s Love/Hate, The Radio Sun, Bang Tango, Romeo’s Daughter, VEGA, Bailey and many more……..there will be much running around, but sadly with the review side of things also in play there will certainly be some acts that will be missed over the three days.

Look out for a few photos over the weekend and will be doing a full weekend review for the great guys at Firebrand. The one above is from FM’s last performance at HRH AOR in 2015.

New Year – New Challenges – 2017 bring it on.

Music, Uncategorized

tof-2016collage-pic2 So as we roll into the second day of 2017 I wonder what the hopes and aspirations for this year are for my friends and fellow music nuts. A new blank canvas awaits, there’s already a calendar filling up pretty rapidly, a number of old favourites and newly added Festivals that we will see if they can take flight and establish themselves. Personally I’m looking at 4 or 5 for the year, depending on how things work out, it’s never an easy thing these days to put your name down for something that’s a year away, life can change plans so quickly sometimes I think it’s foolish to plan ahead too far – but then again at least if there’s some sort of schedule formulated you have a chance to make it happen.

2017 is looking like AOR, Blues, Rock, Metal and maybe some more AOR, add in a number of shows already inked in and it’s an exciting looking year ahead. There’s a possibility I’ll finally get that Camera hardware upgrade that’s been on the wishlist for a while now, that would be interesting and bring in some new things to learn, which is always good.

Sadly as our musical heroes are aging, just like ourselves, we will continue to lose more of the stars, more of the lesser known but no less talented people, but lets hope the rate of attrition is nowhere near as high as the 12 months of 2016 were, the loss of global stars may be more thought provoking for the masses, but every loss is significant to someone.

Away from the Camera 2016 saw me reviewing over 40 Albums, 20 Gigs and Festivals and put together a couple of Interviews – which considering the amount of time I’ve been unable to get any work done is a pretty valiant effort, but hopefully the coming year will being at least that same level, working on a number of items already so fingers crossed. 2016 also saw some of my photos making Album booklets, contacts from promoters to shoot shows and some things a bit further out of left field, which all fill the heart and make things interesting.

So here’s hoping we all manage to have some success in what we do, and most importantly enjoy and have fun doing it, because when that goes it’s time to stop.

Time for a hardware refresh.

Music, Uncategorized

Well I think the time has come to upgrade some stuff, going to start with the Camera, to date I’ve just been using an entry level DSLR (Canon EOS 700D/Rebel T5i) and it’s served me well, have learnt a lot while using it, but now it’s time to move up a level, without breaking the bank completely, so a second hand model for the moment 😉

So while probably sticking with Canon, for the moment it’s looking like a 7D or 7D Mark II depending on a few things, but still researching, and as I’m covering some festivals this year I’ll be looking to pick up a a decent zoom lens to go with it.

Then I need to set things up properly at home, have far too much equipment, need to do a clearout of the old, setup my workstation in the Office and start doing my edits there, it might force me to be more critical and not try to fix shots there’s no hope for. Up to now, although there has been improvement, there’s still been too much time wasted trying to fix things, and save things. No more .

Lot’s of shows being added to the calendar, yey 😉

When health gets in the way of your music passion.

Music, Uncategorized

While we pass through mid April 2016, on a Sat night I sit at home resting and ever so gutted, this month really hasn’t worked out anywhere close to how it was planned, and nothing serious it definitely seems that as the years pass when my head crashes it takes longer to recover, and then that leads to having to be more sensible – and that grates a lot of the time, sensible, me.

Never being one to dodge a personal subject and having worked with the ups and downs of Epilepsy for twenty seven odd years, it’s not the condition itself that I feel causes me the most problems at this stage in my life, medication and more care than I used to take when being overtired means that I have been seizure free for a few years now and any incidents over the last ten years have been few and far between, but I definitely feel the the side effects of taking this form of medication long term have put other obstacles in my way which sadly means missing far more shows than anyone would want to. Leaves me semi functional, so will play with some photos this weekend.

Last weekend was supposed to be Sat seeing and photographing some of Irelands top Metal talent and Sunday should have been enjoying watching one of my favorite bands Overkill on only their second visit to Dublin, but instead ended up spending four days sitting/laying around the house doing nothing, but hey it happens sometimes, we get over it an move on. Thankfully last night I actually managed to get out to my first show of April, a terrific relatively new band called REWS based out of London, female duo that were really outstanding, wished I’d brought the camera, but sometimes you need to give a band your full attention. Keep an eye out for these ladies, they’ll be playing a number of Festivals in the UK this summer and I have no doubt you will be hearing their name a lot more.

And onto tonight, gutted to be sitting here typing this, should be on my way from Belfast to Ballymena right now to see only of my favorite bands from this side of the water, hard rock beasts Maverick – also one of my favorite bands to shoot live, they aren’t shy and always put on a terrific show.

So while I’m sitting around why not revisit my most difficult show to date, it’s always difficult when you physically have difficulty seeing the Keyboard Player from the pit, so why not see if we can get anything out of that set. The band Enslaved, from their show in the Button Factory, Dublin last September.

Enslaved - 03 — Grutle Kjellson of Enslaved – Button Factory, Dublin – 26-09-2015

Where does the time go ?

Music, Uncategorized

The more you do the more there seems to be to do, and it never seems to end. But hey most of the time it’s just good fun so you have to go with it. The trials and tribulations of March are now becoming a distant memory, and although it was wonderful to catch some bands from my bucketlist it was so tiring, I need to get into better shape for shooting Festivals I think.

And so we approach mid April rapidly, there’s a lot of work to get through, many album reviews, a couple of gigs to shoot and review, this weekend starts it off again with the second Semi Final of Bloodstock Metal 2 The Masses Ireland with some awesome local talent including Black Svan and AeSect, each year I think the bands are producing higher quality sets and the competition is getting more difficult, hopefully there will be some decent shots from the night appearing here soon. Following that on Sunday we’ve got the return of the mighty Overkill, who first visited Ireland only two years ago, I will be Reviewing that one.

Currently working on some slightly older photos from 2014/2015 and some of the first shows that I shot properly, just some of my favorite photos from those shows and will create a Gallery or two.

Below is a favorite so far from any of the shows I’ve shot Pat McManus in, this was The Pat McManus Band at one of the Christmas shows in The Diamond Rock Club in Ahoghill, Ballymena. This is a shot that I love to look back on and brings the night back into the memory vividly. A lot of the shots won’t be technically great, but I feel they are an important part of where I have come from and will include artists such as Rage Of Angels, The Answer, Screaming Eagles, Maverick, Tyketto and many more.

The Pat McManus Band - DRC - 26-09-2014 — Pat McManus – DRC – 26-09-2014