Great summer so far for UK, splendid weather and hot festivals, well until today that is but I’m sure the sun will be back. Now I did it again, not updating regularly and there was quite a lot of action since last time so it will be another quick summary.
Last big news was the first Burning Head produced music video, we now have just finished our second video! This was a commission for the Mancunian electronica label Clear Notice, on a track called Emancipation from the talented electronica artist Tricil (Atlanta, USA). We can’t show it online for a while but this will be part of a very original release pretty soon so more on this later – there should be some kind of preview online in the www.burninghead.co.uk site soon. The video features Miss Maleficent Martini, the front-woman of the band Maleficent, and she is a truly talented dancer.
Snapshot of the new Burning Head video for Tricil "Emancipation" out soon on Clear Notice's Enter Calico
Since last updates I went photographing Dead Can Dance’s half Brendan Perry at a really nice show at the Union Chapel, it was great to hear this very familiar voice- as I have been listening to DCD a LOT, beautiful.
Brendan Perry performing at Union Chapel, London on June 10 2010
Then I left for the homeland to photograph French’s biggest metal festival, HELLFEST in Clisson near Nantes, France. This had caused many controversies provoked by a stupid minority of extremist catholics who probably thought this Hell festival was going to feature black masses, sacrifices and who knows the conception of a few antichrists? It is funny how narrow minded some people can be. Thankfully they got ridiculed in their action and the festival was really nothing but a very friendly yet very loud feast of metal. The line up was a real pleasure for the big heavy metal crowd, although the press was handled in an appalling way (or at least for photography) and the pit was invaded by half a hundred photographers of all sorts, which is nothing wrong really, if there had been a hint of organisation to ensure that the ones that are working (and there was already a lot of us) can actually work. Will give it a miss next time. My highlight was Jello Biafra who preformed a truly awesome show in the Terrorizer tent.
Three days, three galleries: Hellfest 1, Hellfest 2, Hellfest 3, featuring Arch Ennemy, Between The Buried And Me, Biohazard, Deftones, Fear Factory, Finntroll, Ghost Brigade, Godflesh, Hypocrisy, Infectious Grooves, KMFDM, Mass Hysteria, Sepultura, Sick Of It All, Sybreed, Walls Of Jericho, Young Gods, Airbourne, Alice Cooper, Anvil, Discharge, Immortal, Jello Biafra, Nevermore, Slash, Behemoth, Devin Townsend Project, Diilinger Escape Plan, Exodus, Mondo Generator, Motorhead, Saxon, Stonesour, Udo and Weedeater.
Alice Cooper at Hellfest, CLisson, France, 19 June 2010
Slash performing at Hellfest, CLisson, France, 19 June 2010
Motorhead performing at Hellfest, CLisson, France, 19 June 2010
Followed three busy days covering the photography in the VIP & backstage area at Hard Rock Calling 2010 (headliners Pearl Jam, Stevie Wonder and Sir Paul McCartney), another great HRC weekend ending up in gigabytes of photos from which here is a selection: Hard Rock Calling Day 1, Hard Rock Calling Day 2 and Hard Rock Calling Day 3, featuring The Hives, Gomez, Elvis Costello, Bill Wyman, Tiffany Page, James Morrison, The Chakra, Lissie, More Than Me, Alejandro Escovedo, Melissa Etheridge, Diane Birch, Corinne Bailey Rae, The Gaslight Anthem, Robert Francis, Rox, Joshua Radin, Crowded House, Urban Voodoo Machine, Joe Echo, Crosby Stills and Nash and the Jonas Brothers with their mate Frankmusic, pfiou.
The Hives at Hard Rock Calling 2010, Hyde Park, London, June 25 2010
Gaslight Anthem at Hard Rock Calling 2010, Hyde Park, London, June 25 2010
Bill Wyman and Micki Free performing at Hard Rock Calling 2010, Hyde Park, London, June 26 2010
Diane Birch at Hard Rock Calling 2010, Hyde Park, London, June 26 2010
Corinne Bailey Rae at Hard Rock Calling 2010, Hyde Park, London, June 26 2010
That’s all for tonight, lots of things in the pipeline, more in the next blog update!
