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.
….****>>>>
Steve, amazing as always… what an ACE set!
Scorching.
Simply brilliant Steve. What a great time we had
Here’s to 2011 indeed! xxx
Awesome Steve. As ever.
Great photos agan Steve . . . but that man-kini shot is very disturbing!
could you poss email the mankini shot to me pleeeeeaase…fantastic pics you have. fab weekend!