For the past few years I’ve covered the V Festival at Weston Park in Staffordshire for SJM, the promoters of the event.

It’s only 25 minutes from where we live so I can get there quickly and come home at night to my bed and a hot shower in the morning. No camping for me with thousands of pounds worth of camera gear!

This year I was joined by my good friend Bianca Barrett and we aimed to cover as much as possible between us. When Bianca was shooting Kasabian, I was shooting The Prodigy. When I was shooting Kings Of Leon, she went over to photograph The Charlatans.

In between bands we did our best to capture pictures of the crowd and get some of the vibe of the festival. The line-up wasn’t amazing this year if I’m honest, but there were a few gems along the way.

I started Saturday with Example on one of the smaller stages…

We bumped into Seasick Steve backstage just before he went onstage. Here’s his number 1 fan, Bianca!

Shed Seven

Madness

Paolo Nutini – the man who never opens his eyes!

La Roux

The Kooks

Faithless

One of the best bands of the weekend, Frightened Rabbit…

Doves

Saturday night saw a quite spectacular sunset

One of me taken by Bianca

Imogen Heap

The Prodigy

Sunday saw the sun come out. Finally!

Feeder

Passion Pit

Another of my highlights – Joshua Radin. I had to shoot from the crowd though!

Paloma Faith

Apparently the ladies LOVE Liam from The Courteeners…

One for the girls then:

Newton Faulkner

So, if you want to video the gig, all you need is a Canon DSLR. And a few gadgets!

Editors

Trying to cover a festival properly means it’s almost impossible to see a whole set of one band but I managed to stay for the entire set when it came to one lady – Lissie.

I knew nothing much about her before seeing her at V Fest but I’m now a total convert. Amazing voice and fantastic tunes. Even better live than on record too.

Paul Weller

Bumped into Passion Pit in the backstage bar

Errrr….

The brilliant White Lies

Stereophonics

The enigmatic Mark Lanegan

Florence & The Machine

Tricky smokes a funny cigarette!

And finally…. Kings Of Leon

Thanks a lot to Wayne Larner and Kara from SJM, all the people from Cake and Evelyne for letting me escape for the weekend while she looked after 3 kids!

Here’s to V 2011.

Photographing bands can be pretty amazing. It can also be a little dangerous on occasion. And that’s why I love shooting the smaller, rowdier gigs. You never know what might happen next.

Converge are a somewhat legendary hardcore band from Massachusetts who have been a force to be reckoned with for 20 years. Their live shows are intense, so when I set out to shoot them at Birmingham Academy this month i wanted to try and capture some of the energy of the show.

I reckon I managed it…

A couple from support band, Kylesa, too…

Some bands are a bit dull to photograph in concert. They stand there in subdued lighting, staring at their instruments and hardly communicate with the crowd.

KISS are not one of those bands!

Earlier tonight I was at the LG Arena in Birmingham to photograph KISS for the second time and the self-proclaimed “hottest band in the world” are possibly the most fun band you could ever want to have in front of you when you have a camera in hand.

Here are just a few of my fave photos from the gig…

As great as it is to photograph the huge stars on an arena stage, I have to confess that the place where I get the biggest buzz is when I’m shooting a sweaty little gig in some dive bar. The energy and intimacy of these gigs adds an extra element to the event and you get the feeling that anything could happen.

One such gig happened on Monday night at The Rainbow pub just a couple of minutes walk from our studio in Digbeth. Headlined by Brighton hardcore mob The Ghost Of A Thousand, this was such an amazing gig! The bands could hardly stay on the stage, seemingly preferring to mingle with the audience or climb the rafters. My 24-70 lens gave up on me just as I was about to start shooting (I’ve now bought a brand new one) so I shot the whole gig on my 50mm 1.4 lens but I love the results.

This is Sharks, one of the support bands, taken outside the venue just after their set.

And main support, The Computers, who were extremely entertaining.

And the main event… The Ghost Of A Thousand.

Tom Lacey hits the roof (almost)!

I feel that last image captures the essence of the gig. Energy, passion and interaction. Great gig. Great bands.

I can hardly believe I’m actually getting to post this… Anyway, let’s start with a little history…

When I was 12 years old I used to go to school parties (usually at somebody’s house) and some kids would bring a few records so that the host had a variety of music to play. I remember plenty of Duran Duran, Adam & The Ants, Human League and quite a lot of The Smiths (who I hated at the time but now love). I would usually turn up with two albums – Highway To Hell and If You Want Blood… both by AC/DC.

Two years later when I was 14 I went to my first ever concert – AC/DC at Manchester Apollo. I counted the days up to the concert and it blew my mind! Since then I have been to hundreds of gigs but I still have that ticket in my bedroom as a souvenir.

Roll forward almost 3 decades (!) and last Thursday I was one of just seven photographers invited to photograph AC/DC on their current Black Ice Tour as they hit the LG Arena in Birmingham. To say it was an honour is such an understatement. This was a dream come true! You can see my friend Toni’s review on the Birmingham Live! site but here are just a few shots from the gig. A million thanks to Marina from Sony Music…

On Monday night I was lucky enough to be invited to photograph Joss Stone playing an intimate gig to around 200 people in the back room of a pub just a couple of minutes walk from our studio.

It’s always great seeing artists perform in tiny venues and Joss put on a great show. The pub was packed out and there was no pit for photographers so I had to squeeze through the crowd whilst apologizing politely in order to get the shots. Here are just a few of the lovely Miss Stone doing her thing…

I’m a big fan of Biffy Clyro, especially their latest album “Puzzle”, so I was pleased to get a call from Rock Sound magazine asking if I could shoot their Birmingham gig on Thursday night at the Academy.

My friend Dave Musson was covering it for Birmingham Live… or so we thought. His pass had been arranged through the support band and, on the night, he was informed he couldn’t shoot the headliners. I felt awful for him but it was lucky that I was there too as it meant we still had some images of Biffy for the review.

The band were spectacularly good and came on all guns blazin’ with some of my favourite tracks played while I was down the front photographing them.

This is almost certainly my last live gig of 2008 and was a great finale. I’ll be posting about my highlights of 2008 here soon but for now here are just some of my pictures of Biffy Clyro…

Being a music photographer in Birmingham means that I get to shoot bands on a regular basis and it’s a part of my job which I absolutely love (actually I love most parts of my job). Occasionally I do get to photograph bands which could be seen as iconic and, when I do, it’s an honour to add them to my portfolio.

Oasis are undoubtedly one of the most influential British bands of recent times so I was pleased to be one of only four photographers who got to shoot their gig at Birmingham NIA last night.

The atmosphere inside the venue was intense! Oasis fans are passionate about their heroes and many had indulged in a few light ales before the show and were in high spirits as Liam, Noel and the boys hit the stage. I got to shoot songs 2, 3 and 4 and came home with some great images, including one of Liam giving me his trademark snarl. Mad fer it!

Speaking of extreme music, my wednesday evening was spent in the company of the immense Dillinger Escape Plan down at birmingham’s Academy 2. You can see my review on BIRMINGHAM LIVE! but I can honestly say it was one of the best gigs I’ve ever witnessed. And after seeing several hundred gigs over the years, that’s quite a statement. Here’s a few photos from the night…

Last night Evelyne and I enjoyed a rare night off and plonked ourselves down on the couch with a glass of wine and some Mistresses. Not quite as sordid as it sounds but it was a treat to have some down-time after being out every night.