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Laneway Festival 2011

Daniel Boud — Mon, 21 Feb 2011 01:38:09 +0000

A wheelchair proves no impediment to crowd surfing at Melbourne Laneway Festival

Last weekend I wrapped up one of the best photo assignments i’ve ever had as official photographer for the Laneway Festival.

I’ve shot Laneway every year in Sydney since its first time there in 2006 and i think it’s the best festival in Australia, and I don’t just say that because they have the good sense to employ me.

I’ve been the official photographer for events like this before but going on the road with a show like this is something way more special. There’s a camaraderie that only comes from those shared late nights and early flights and the familiarity bred from seeing the same crew at every show. The bands, the crew, the punters – everyone was in fine spirits. It really was a privilege to be a part of.

I photographed the shows in Brisbane, Melbourne, Sydney, Adelaide and Perth and in each city i recruited a second local photographer to shoot with me too. They were Elleni Toumpas, Leah Robertson, Nikki To, Rodney Magazinovic and Anthony Tran and they all did splendid work.

Screenshot of the Laneway Festival Photos website

One of the things i’m most proud of as a result of the tour is the building of a special website to share all the photos i and the other photographers took. The Laneway Festival Photo site presents all the photos in a large 960 pixel wide format and you can browse by various categories.

The single column wide photo format was first popularised by sites like The Big Picture which showcases exceptional photojournalism. Then last year i noticed British photographer Andrew Kendall began to publish photo mini-sites with a similar format for UK festivals like Secret Garden Party and Offset.

Those sites were built using a platform Andrew developed called Digital Photo Gallery and i could tell it was a nifty system for presenting photos online and managing them behind the scenes. It was designed and built by a photographer who understands how we work and how our work is best displayed.

It’s still invite only until Andrew polishes things up for a bigger user base but i’m hooked already and it’s something i’ll be using for more sites in the future. Maybe even my first ever portfolio site.

But anyway – on with the Laneway photos. Here’s some of my highlights, you can see way more on the Laneway Festival Photo site.

Violent Soho in Brisbane

Brisbane boys Violent Soho were the heaviest band on the bill and made for some great photos as they thrashed around and whipped the crowd into a frenzy.

A Violent Soho fan

Violent Soho in Perth

Another loud and heavy band on the bill who made for fun photo times were Les Savy Fav.

Tim from Les Savy Fav makes out with a girl in the crowd while Lindsay McDougall looks on with approval

Les Savy Fav

!!! in Brisbane

Another act with a great live show was !!! with frontman Nic Offer spending much of his time off the stage dancing with the crowd.

!!!

!!! frontman Nic Offer supported by the Sydney crowd

Two Door Cinema Club

The band who probably drew the biggest and most fanatical following of the tour was Two Door Cinema Club.

Two Door Cinema Club play in Sydney

Two Door Cinema Club in Perth

In Perth the Francis St stage was overlooked by a backpacker hostel filled with backpackers getting a great free view out their window. I thought it could make a good vantage point for a photo so i left the festival grounds and went exploring in the hostel, knocking on random doors. The first room i was welcomed by a friendly group of Irish lads, but their window looked into a tree. I tried their neighbours and was greeted by some English backpackers who had a great view over the stage.

A guest at Perth's Old Swan Backpackers Hostel gets a free view of the stage

Warpaint

Warpaint's Aussie drummer Stella Mozgawa

Warpaint

The Antlers play on Melbourne's River Stage

Deerhunter frontman Bradford Cox

Yeasayer

Cut Copy

Cut Copy's Dan and Tim get cosy on the stage floor

Cloud Control on Perth's Museum Stage

Jenny and Johnny

Beach House

Foals

Foals frontman Yannis Philippakis plays in the crowd

The Sydney crowd watching Foals

I can often get bored of shooting the bands and so turn my attention to photographing the rapturous fans enjoying the show.

Brisbane crowd

Adelaide crowd watching Yeasayer

Brisbane crowd watching Warpaint

Brisbane crowd watching Two Door Cinema Club

The Adelaide crowd dances to Cut Copy

As well as the crowd shots i also got some one on one portraits with punters. Laneway draws some interesting looking characters so it was opportune to get their picture.

Many more photos to see on the Laneway Festival photo site.

PopFrenzy Afloat

Daniel Boud — Mon, 20 Mar 2006 08:05:36 +0000

Sydney record label and tour operator Popfrenzy hosted a killer lineup of overseas bands aboard a boat cruise on Sydney Harbour earlier this month. It was the same boat used for The Presets loveboat gig a few weeks earlier but the crowd was less glam more indie this time round. Sydney turned on a perfect evening for it too.

The line-up consisted of Jens Lekman, The Gossip, Les Savy Fav, Thunderbirds are Now! and Pretty Girls Make Graves. All top acts that bubble away beneath the mainstream (and kick against it).

The main revelation of the night was The Gossip, a three piece with a punk attitude and a dynamite lead singer and rhythm section. Have a listen to Standing in the Way of Control (mp3) to hear what i mean.

Les Savy Fav were entertaining as ever and Jens Lekman made hearts flutter with his sentimental ballads.

There’s some photos of Popfrenzy Afloat in my gallery. Speaking of which, i’ve upgraded the gallery software, so let me know if anything is broken or you’ve got a suggestion to improve it.

Sydney Laneway Festival 2006

Daniel Boud — Fri, 10 Mar 2006 04:29:56 +0000

Broken Social Scene Guitars

It seems the unanimous opinion that the inaugural Sydney Laneway Festival was a raging success.

I’m already late posting my photos (i’ve been sick – woe is me, etc…) so i’ll skip the commentary and just link to my gallery of photos from the Laneway Festival in Sydney. There’s shots of Les Savy Fav, The Gossip, The Drones, Broken Social Scene and a bunch more.

More photos can be seen at Triple J, Sean has some commentary including video of the infamous Les Savy Fav wall incident, Chris has some notes and photos too.

In other news U2 have “postponed” their Australian tour. I’ve got tickets to both Sydney shows plus a ticket and flight booked for Melbourne. There goes that idea.

Les Savy Fav at The Gaelic Club

Daniel Boud — Tue, 28 Feb 2006 12:56:54 +0000

Les Savy Fav are one of the best live bands around. Their front man Tim Harrington is a hefty bald fella with a beard with absurd amounts of energy and creativity when it comes to performing.

For example, while the band and roadies were setting up he came out on stage, sat down and pretended to meditate, then started chatting with the audience. A long haired fan asked for a photo – so he posed for that and proceeded to bite a chunk of the fans hair off. He put it under his cap for safe keeping, a few minutes later recovering it to assemble a DIY voodoo doll made with the hair and some gaffer tape and set it off to be passed round the room. All this before the show even starts.

And when it did start there were plenty more antics – leaping into the crowd blindfolded by a scarf he’d pinched from an audience member, taking the mic into the crowd and going all the way to the back of the venue and out to the street, lifting up a foldback speaker and holding it over his head and still singing into the mic, getting about a dozen people from the audience to throw their hats to him so he can attempt to wear them all at once, heading into the crowd and taking the tshirts off a couple of guys backs and putting them on himself, pashing girls and guys in the front row… Not just your usual run of the mill kind of show.

They sound alright too – the tight band keeps it all together while the frontman goes on his forays. Take a listen to their song The Sweat Descends (mp3).

Support was provided by another couple of bands visiting from the US, Thunderbirds Are Now! and The Hold Steady.

I took some photos which you can see in the Les Savy Fav, The Hold Steady and Thunderbirds Are Now! album. Some might appear in a poster/magazine type thing called Moss.

You’ve got two more chances to catch Les Savy Fav in Sydney – on Saturday aboard PopFrenzy afloat also featuring Jens Lekman and Pretty Girls Make Graves and on Sunday at The Laneway Festival in Circular Quay.

Rockin all over the Harbour

Daniel Boud — Sun, 21 Nov 2004 13:20:20 +0000

It sounds trite, but tonight’s boat cruise with Les Savy Fav and Pretty Girls Make Graves (karaoke style) was really something special.

Since i’m ~~hopeless at writing sentences that flow into each other~~ lazy i shall bullet point some of my highlights:

The utter hilariousness of Tim, the lead singer from LSF. The guy is just born to entertain. The wisecracks in between songs, outrageous stage antics, the sea captain’s outfit, the words ‘Drop Bear’ scrawled in large letters over his back, the stripping… Completely off the wall, totally charming and wickedly funny.
The singer from Pretty Girls Make Graves was sick, but rather than just cancel their set the band performed and let people from the audience sing their songs. Just like karaoke there was a sheet posted on a wall that listed their setlist, you just needed to write your name down next to a song and you could sing it. How wicked is that?! Everyone who sung performed admirably with the highlight probably being the one sung by the singer from Further.
Pizza! The boat made a pitstop to pick up about 50 pizzas. They were gobbled up pretty quick.
Sydney! What a freakin beautiful town we live in. There’s no better way to appreciate Sydney than by a boat on the harbour. Watching the sun go down, cruising the harbour, having a few drinks with mates old and new. It don’t get much better.
Fireworks! Perfectly timed to coincide with the Les Savy Fav set was a fireworks display on the harbour courtesy of Australian Idol.
To end the Les Savy Fav set, Tim got everyone laying on the floor and slowly soothed us all into a sweet and calming end to their raucus performance.
Idol! Arriving back to port just in time to amble over to the Opera House and catch the Australian Idol verdict.

It was a wonderful way to spend an evening, and i hardly even mentioned the great music. Credit must go to the folks at PopFrenzy for organising the whole shebang.

Les Battered Sav

Daniel Boud — Wed, 17 Nov 2004 22:15:46 +0000

If i was to have sent you a text message from the Les Savy Fav show last night it might have read something like this:

OMG!! LSF r so fckn awesum!! Les singer is mental - he climbed all over tha balcony @ Gaelic Club + got nekkid. He is fat + bald but all sex. Best gig eva!!

They just announced a show with Pretty Girls Make Graves on a boat cruise on Sydney harbour this Sunday evening. I’m so going. Details on the PopFrenzy website.

Oh and just so you know, i don’t really write texts like that, i’m more of a proper spelling and punctuation kind of a guy.

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