Did some location scouting today with Sean Conaty. We found this gem of a location in Van Nuys.
In June of 2008 my friend James Minchin III and I ventured out to the Mojave Desert with Andrew of the band Jack’s Mannequin to shoot a short film/long format music video called ‘Choke California’. It was 115-120 degrees during the day out there. Our producer Justin made sure we drank a bottle of water an hour and fed us salt tablets. The soles of my feet almost caught on fire. The sunscreen was pancaked on our faces and arms. We got 6 hours of sleep a night, one in an Econo Lodge in Barstow with a bed made of plywood that didn’t even matter. We ate bad fast food and Denny’s. Our bodies craved the shade. The 1964 Betty Blue Olds went 65 and had no air conditioning. My cameras almost melted.
But we had an amazing time. We shot some amazing images. Here are some video stills from those days.
Back when I was taking live photographs I shot a Wilco show at the Pikes Event Center in Colorado Springs, CO on May 8th 2008. It was one of the best shows I’ve ever seen. Here are 4 photos from that night. (photo 4 of 4)
Back when I was taking live photographs I shot a Wilco show at the Pikes Event Center in Colorado Springs, CO on May 8th 2008. It was one of the best shows I’ve ever seen. Here are 4 photos from that night. (photo 2 of 4)
All around Europe in two weeks. Again.
This is a blog entry of mine from April 2008 when I was on tour with The Fray. Its fun to look back at those days and read something that I wrote and still find some truth in it.
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“Well Dan, I guess I’ll see you in Alabama.”
Tell me the last time you imagined yourself saying that. Hell, the last time I woke up in Alabama was after a battle with a gentleman named Jack at a watering hole on the south side of Chicago. But that is another story for another time. The point here is that there won’t be, and shouldn’t be too many times in your life when you plan on waking up in Alabama.
The past few weeks have been long. Some time off which results in me being busy for the first week or so and then going stir crazy. I’ve got to get out of LA. Took a trip to San Francisco and a trip to the Phoenix Film Festival in Scottsdale.
This two-week jaunt started Thursday in Orlando at Walt Disney World. What an awful place. The pool was full of little children and I’m positive that I saw a filmy layer of urine floating on the surface. We had these super top secret, plaid clad tour guides to the Magic Kingdom. They were in possession of key cards which allowed us top priority access to all the rides. We cut the line. Budged in front of little children whose families had paid top dollar to enter the park. Our admission fee was waived, of course. A bizarre experience getting to see the underbelly of Disney World, we walked through the tunnels underground, the city beneath the city as they call it, from ride to ride, location to location. I wrote my mother and father an e mail the other day thanking them for having never taken us on a “vacation” to Orlando. I am glad that they spent money instead on summer enrichment schools and camps.
Our summer tour is shaping up to be a banger. It appears that I will be involved in the creation of the video content for the live show. Art. Art. Art.
Just found out that on May 14th I’ll be flying to NYC, playing Good Morning America on the 15th, then flying to the Netherlands arriving on the 16th. On the 17th we fly to London for two days where the band will take part in a BBC documentary for the anniversary recording of the Beatle’s Sgt.. Pepper’s album. The band is one of 12 bands chosen to rerecord tracks from the album with the original engineer on the original equipment. Wow. On Sunday we will fly to Hamburg Germany and then go to Zurich on Tuesday, London on Wednesday, Madrid on Thursday, Bologna on Friday and Milan on Saturday, and then back to the states on Sunday. I am going around the world, again.
Did I mention that our next five shows are with Aqualung? Great people. Good to be out here with them.
Three years ago a book of my photographs, ‘The Fray: There & Back’ was published by Marquand Books. Technically, the first book went on sale at shows in January of 2009. The Fray was about ready to release their second album, the eponymous titled The Fray and I was also very excited about the upcoming release of the feature length documentary ‘Fair Fight’ which was going to accompany the album release.
Marquand had published Lance Mercer’s book of Pearl Jam photographs ‘5x1’, a book that Ben and I were fans of. I’ve always regretted not laying out the book myself, even though Marquand did a find job of printing, as the photographs were never given a chance to shine in the way that I wanted them too.
The odd part though is that not many people even know about the book. The book was never sold through any book sellers such as Barnes and Noble or Amazon. To this day I’m still not sure why but I’m secretly hoping that someday those several thousand copies of the book that are sitting in an office in Nashville will make their way to the coffee tables of The Fray fans.
While updating my website yesterday I stumbled across the preface to the book I’d written in the fall of 2008 and I wanted to repost it here.
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In late January 2006, my friend Mark Cunningham called to tell me that one of the bands his company managed was looking for a “t-shirt guy.” I’d been spinning my wheels in upstate New York, having seemingly run out of options other than going back to school. The timing was perfect. The tour would start in mid-March and run through the second week of April, right around the time I would be sweating bullets over graduate school applications. I asked Mark if I could bring my camera on the road. Sure, he said, why not? The band’s first single, “Over My Head (Cable Car),” was catching on, and the band’s monitor engineer, Brian, had been shooting video of the crowds singing along every night. Mark suggested I could probably take over for him.
A few weeks later, I found myself flying into a cold and rainy St. Louis, entirely unsure as to what the next three weeks on the road had in store. Other than several hectic coast-to-coast moves, I’d never had the time to actually get out on the road and explore. Would I get my own bunk? Did the beds have sheets? What about power outlets? And where would I go to the bathroom? From the minute I landed in Missouri I started filming: my taxi ride from the airport, my arrival at the Pageant Theatre, the bus parked in the empty sleet-drenched parking lot behind the venue.
As I wandered in the backstage door, I came face-to-face with the guys. Introductions were made and I tried to imagine who played which instrument. It was Thursday, March 23rd, the start of the band’s second headlining tour, a three-week stint around the Midwest. Every show on our run would sell out. To say the rise was meteoric would be an understatement. That first night at the Pageant, I snuck away from the merchandise table. Though I probably wasn’t supposed to, though I could have lost my job for leaving the merchandise unattended, I got my camera out and started shooting. When it came time to settle with the venue that night, the cash box was around a hundred dollars under, the only time it would be short during my days as the cotton tech.
We woke up the next day in dreary Kansas City, and I went about setting up my merchandise stand. I managed to find time to shoot more footage of the band as they took care of the few hours of boredom that come mid-afternoon in an empty rock club, the sound check, a trip up the street to a mediocre burrito stand, and then some more of the show. I was taking liberties, certainly, but nobody took much notice. A few days later, Ben and Joe asked to see some of the footage I’d been shooting. It was that moment that solidified my creative relationship with the band and became the catalyst that would eventually send me off on the journey of documenting nearly ever step of The Fray’s existence over the next three years.
Several weeks ago I asked Isaac if I could get a ride home from the studio. Production for the band’s second album was coming to an end, and I was hoping to squeeze off a few more shots of the dusky Denver skyline for the studio documentary I’d been shooting for the past five months.
Halfway home, Isaac turned to me and asked if I liked any of the songs. For a few short breaths I considered his question. “I love them all,” I said. “How could I not?” After spending so much time with the band, I felt an indescribable connection to the unique existence of four musicians whose moments felt more and more like my own. Having been there every step of the way, over three hundred shows, thousands of frequent-flyer miles, countless stamps in my passport, and just as many photographs, it was hard not to feel the emotional attachment to each and every moment. This had become my life and these new songs a testament and soundtrack to every single one of my images.
The photographs printed on these pages are a simple documentation of existence: from naps caught in a dressing room in Switzerland to the thousand eager faces at a show in Minneapolis. To me these images represent more than just a year of travel, tour, and life. They are a living record, proof that all of this has actually happened. These moments are not just memories. Life in a band and being on the road is like everything and nothing you would imagine. It is both beautiful and brutal. But if you ever went looking for proof as to the size of Ben, Joe, David, and Isaac’s hearts and the passion for what they do, perhaps it would be found within these pages.
Rod Blackhurst
September 5, 2008
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(Source: thefray)
Back when I was taking live photographs I shot a Wilco show at the Pikes Event Center in Colorado Springs, CO on May 8th 2008. It was one of the best shows I’ve ever seen. Here are 4 photos from that night. (photo 3 of 4)
Back when I was taking live photographs I shot a Wilco show at the Pikes Event Center in Colorado Springs, CO on May 8th 2008. It was one of the best shows I’ve ever seen. Here are 4 photos from that night.
My friend Pete Gardner is in a new commercial popping up in your television these days. He’s also in our new film, You Were Once Called Queen City.
New Funny or Die short film that Brian McGinn and I directed. Its NSFW. Just warning you ahead of time.
