Friday night I went to see my old buddy Ed Toth, who is one of the drummers for the Doobie Brothers.

It was a beautiful night out at Jones Beach so I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to make this photo of the venue.

The Doobies are currently on tour with Chicago and they always have a great time on stage.

After each band played their set, all of the musicians took the stage together for six classic tunes. It’s quite a sight to see 16 guys on stage (including three drummers!) all playing “25 or 6 to 4.”

I was shooting up front, but I had a hunch that they might do a “curtain call” at the end. I ran as fast as I could to the back of the house and barely got there in time to make this photo.

TRAVEL FUN: Getting to Jones Beach from Manhattan isn’t easy. You take the subway to Penn Station, the Long Island Rail Road to Freeport (with a change at Jamaica), and a bus to the venue. If everything goes smoothly, it should take about 90 minutes.

But this wouldn’t be a normal trip. Everything was fine until the bus ride. At one of the stops along the way, a bunch of teenagers got on and the driver claimed that some of them didn’t pay. The passengers sitting in the front backed the kids up and said they all had paid, but the driver wouldn’t budge. Some of us volunteered to pay the six dollars that she said they owed, but she wouldn’t accept it and proceeded to call the police. Yes, the police. Meanwhile, there were 25 of us who were just trying to get to the show.

Needless to say, we had a near riot on the bus (New Yorkers are not afraid to show their emotions!) as we sat there for over 30 minutes. As the driver continued to argue with the police (who couldn’t do anything to help her), the next bus finally pulled up at the stop. We all got on (this driver even let us in without paying!) and went on our way.

That driver just didn’t want to drive the bus anymore. For all I know, she’s still out there mumbling to herself with the bus idling nearby.

| Leave a comment

On Friday morning, I shot Coldplay’s performance on the Today Show.

Before the band started, co-hosts Ann Curry and Meredith Vieira posed together for the photographers. When they were done, they turned to give each other a kiss on the cheek but they wound up accidentally kissing on the lips. Their sheer embarrassment made for a fun photo.

This was the first time I’ve photographed Coldplay. It was a ridiculously early hour for a rock concert, but the guys performed at full strength.

Chris Martin was really into it and the fans who came out early got a great show.

——-

| Leave a comment

My friend and fellow photographer Brian Friedman married his lovely bride Jessica at a beautiful ceremony yesterday. I pulled my twice-a-year suit out of the closet to attend with Alice Marie and Amanda.

Brian shoots a lot of weddings himself, so he was very smart about coverage. He asked a few of his photographer friends to each shoot part of the day.

If any one of us shot the whole event, we would not have been able to enjoy ourselves as guests. Since he had three people shooting in shifts, it didn’t feel like work, Brian didn’t have to hire an official photographer, and he got a wide variety of photographic styles to choose from.

I was asked to cover the ceremony and was happy to do so. I knew I had to get the kiss, so I positioned myself to be ready for it.

Congratulations to Jess and Brian. They’re perfect for each other and the wedding went off without a hitch (except for the fact that they actually got “hitched”).

| Leave a comment

This is a slight Departure from my photography blog, but I just wanted to share it.

In my formative years (the early 80’s!), there was no band bigger in my mind than Journey (Styx was a close second). On April 24, 1983 at the Miami Baseball Stadium (which is now long gone), my brother took me to my very first concert. The lineup in order:

* Bryan Adams – “Cuts Like a Knife” was his big hit. He’s actually a really good photographer now!
* Aerosmith – When they were going through a rough period.
* Sammy Hagar (BVH – Before Van Halen). His big hit was “I Can’t Drive 55.”
And, of course,
* JOURNEY

I was 13 and up until that point it was the greatest day of my life. I can’t remember if Frontiers had come out yet, but they were still riding high off the success of Escape.

Over the next few years, I pumped a lot of quarters into the Journey video game and Raised on Radio was the first CD I bought (along with Sting’s The Dream of the Blue Turtles). I’ve now seen them play live three or four times. I even watched three Michael Bolton sets at Grad Night in 1988 because Jonathan Cain and Ross Valory were playing in his band. I still have the autographs somewhere.

I just re-watched the Live from Houston 1981 DVD and those guys were awesome. I wish I had been a tour photographer back in those days but I don’t think my mother would have let me go out on the road at 13.

So now it’s 2008. The band is still touring (without Steve Perry and Steve Smith). Neal Schon found the new lead singer on youtube! Arnel Pineda is from the Philippines and sounds exactly like Steve Perry. It’s pretty incredible considering he has a thick accent when he speaks.

They just released a three-disc set called Revelations. It contains one CD of new material, one CD of re-recorded classic tracks, and a live DVD. I was bummed that they didn’t take the opportunity to play around with some of the arrangements on the classic songs. Those tracks are timeless, but the new versions sound exactly like the old versions. When they come up on my iPhone, it sometimes takes me a minute before I can figure out which recording it is.

Having said that, the new material sounds great and the live concert is awesome. It’s still fun to watch those guys play. And who knew Deen Castronovo could also sing like Steve Perry!

Their U.S. tour starts in a few weeks (co-headlining with Cheap Trick and Heart). I don’t have any connections to them but being their tour photographer would be a dream gig for me.

I think my mother would let me go this time.

| Leave a comment

Yesterday I did a band portrait with The Banner at the Blender Theater in NYC.

In the bio on their label’s site, lead singer Joey Southside’s instrument is listed as “throat.” He told me, “I get paid to scream.”

As is often the case, the most hardcore bands seem to be made up of the nicest guys. They were fun, easy-going, and never asked, “Are you done, yet?”

I’ve shot a few portraits at this venue so it was a challenge to come up with something new. Fortunately I’ve never used the seating section so I figured I’d give it a shot.

When the guys sat down, Joey flashed a wad of cash. I snapped my first frame and it turned out to be a fun shot.

Today I’m attending my friend Brian Friedman’s wedding. Something tells me that the only screaming I’ll hear is when he gets the bar tab at the end of the night.

——-

| Leave a comment

Yesterday I had another shoot with innerpartysystem. Kerrang really liked my photo of the guys in the video monitors and will be running one of those images as a poster in an upcoming issue. But for the “introducing” piece on them, they wanted something where you could see them a little better.

We decided that the band would put duct tape over their mouths and pose in Times Square. Since we picked this location just a couple of days ago, I called the Mayor’s Office of Film, Theatre and Broadcasting about obtaining a permit on the day of the shoot. I specifically mentioned Times Square and the nice girl on the phone said it wouldn’t be a problem.

That’s actually code for “Don’t be silly, sir. Of course there will be a problem.”

As a side note, the permit office is in the Ed Sullivan Theatre where they shoot the Late Show with David Letterman. When I went down there, I was in the elevator with building engineer George Clarke (a character who often appears on the show), and on my way out of the building I practically walked into bass player extraordinaire Will Lee. The cool thing about New Yorkers is that celebrities walk around on the street and everyone is too cool to care. But we can still write about it on our blogs!

After turning in my permit application, I waited for a bit before being informed that they now require seven days advance notice for Times Square permits.

After explaining that this wasn’t a big production — just four guys in a band with me and my assistant, she told me that my application was denied. Perfect. I asked if I needed a permit if I wasn’t going to use a tripod or put down any stands. She said if I looked like a tourist and didn’t block any traffic (pedestrian or automotive), I would be fine.

That night at the shoot I had my assistant Jenica Miller hand-hold a small flash as we walked around Times Square with the band. This was guerrilla shooting at its finest.

At the first set-up, it took literally three seconds before a cop came over and told us to move on. I politely pointed out that we weren’t blocking anything and asked if we could shoot there for a few minutes. He politely told us to move on. Immediately.

We walked down the street a bit and started to shoot under an overhang at a theater. I got off a few frames before a private security guard informed us that we were on private property and had to leave.

It looked like this was going to be a long night but things got better after that. We walked a couple of blocks away from the chaos and were able to shoot without any hassles – even posing in the middle of the crosswalk about 15 times.

At one point, a cop started coming towards us so we turned away and walked in the other direction. He called out and asked us what we were doing and why we walked away when we saw him. We told him we were just taking some photos. He was totally cool and said it was fine as long as we didn’t block traffic.

So I guess it just depends on which cop you get and what kind of mood he’s in. Unless of course you’re a celebrity. Then no one would care.

| Leave a comment