September in my little world
Writing by bts on Tuesday, 29 of September , 2009 at 4:49 am
Recently I’ve been just about as busy as I’ve ever been. I’ve been shooting an average of 6 or 7 shows a week, sometimes two in one night. It’s fun and I’ve been seeing a lot of great music but it gets tiring. Especially when struggling with the head cold I’ve been trying to kick since last Wednesday. I think it’s almost gone, but it still is lingering a bit and disorienting me.
Most of the photos I’ve been taking are in the photography section of the site, http://www.belowthesun.com/photography. I’ve also been writing reviews and sending some photos to NewOrleans.com, mostly focusing on metal and rock coverage.
The biggest recent event, however, was a trip my sister and I took out to LA. We decided to drive since she had not been through much of the west at all, and I had plenty of time on my hands.
The drive took us about 26 hours in total, we stopped for the night in Las Cruces, NM and continued on to LA arriving around 11pm or midnight. Once we got to the western side of Texas it was a beautiful drive. Being from Louisiana and almost amphibious, the desert and mountains are quite novel to us swamp land creatures.
We stayed in LA for about 4 days, shot the FYFFest for an online music magazine, checked out some hipster bars, went to the beach a couple times, went to a metal show at a dive bar in Long Beach, couch surfed for the most part between a couple of friends places and then decided to go north to Death Valley in order to make the most out of our desert road trip.
The drive out there in it self was exhausting, the sun was burning through our clothes even in the car. The desert air is hard enough to get used to when you are accustomed to the lush subtropical environment of the deep south, but the sun burning through the dryness felt like an oven on my skin. In my sisters little car we climbed the mountains, finally ending up in a place that had no electrical wires, and no cell phone access. We wound through valleys and in between boulders and sand dunes and gravel hills, on roads that barely existed. It was breathtakingly beautiful. It was almost as if we were transported to another world where we were the only people that existed. Everything was brown, orange, black, red, yellow, the warmth of the environment colored our vision with all shades of amber.
After a few hours we started to get hungry and run out of gas but the GPS kept sending us in circles, through the same boulders and sand dunes.
Finally we found our way out on the other end and were taken down a small highway into Nevada. We ate, I left my cellphone in the bathroom and remembered it only 5 minutes down the road luckily. We drove on away from the sunset until it was about midnight - an hour east of Las Vegas. We stayed in a hotel where I spent the last 2 hours before sleeping editing my photos from the FYFFest.
When we woke up the next day we did not expect to be driving the entirety of the next 25 hours in one stretch, but thats exactly what we ended up doing. My sister drove the first hour, I drove 3 hours, my sister drove 3 hours, I drove 5 hours, my sister drove 8 hours, and i drove the last 4.
The last 6 hours were the only unpleasant part of the entire trip. I ended up getting a speeding ticket somewhere between Lafayette and Baton Rouge.
Finally we arrived home on Wednesday, Sept. 9th sometime around 2pm. I can not explain how difficult it was to walk straight, let alone hold a conversation or do anything that involved any kind of motor skills. I don’t even know how I was driving still at that point.
After arriving home, unpacking, showering, and eating I decided to finish off the night by going to Preservation Hall where Andrew Bird was to make a surprise appearance. I couldn’t bring my self to sleep through the opportunity to see more good music :)
(Some images from the trip)
Sister and I at venice beach, by Mariana Oz
Manhattan Beach
Some where in arizona
After all these months of not having my car, the day after i got home I was able to get my car back from the body shop guy who had been fixing it on and off since the accident.
Aside from all of the live music photography, I also have just recently launched a website for a client and am in the process of redesigning my own site. I also had a shoot with a wonderful photographer named David Rodrigue.
Here is one of the images from that:
It has been a long month, and October is not looking any less epic than September was. I can only hope that its every bit as wonderful.
Here is a video of one of my current favorite bands, Russian Circles. Some crazy talented musicians.
Category: creativity, happiness, music, photography, travel, vacation, work
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