I’ve probably come back to this story at the very least, once every few months. Over the course of the years, a lot has changed and there have been many ups and downs. More than anything, I use this a way to remind myself why I started on this journey and why I choose to keep at it, even if it’s only in my spare time. As much as I’d love to dedicate the rest of my days to this, it’s something I’m still working towards.
I was reading an old blog post about the day I decided to become a concert photographer… Instead of retelling it, here’s the original blog post, the way I remembered it when I first started blogging.
My favorite memory was a Christmas show I attended. All of the bands were great, though the first one could have been a tad better if the vocalist wasn’t so creepy-looking. The one band that made a lasting impression was the 2nd band, Mercyy. I’ll just put my cards on the table when I say that I’ll immediately go weak in the knees for a glam rocker: big hair, edgy clothes, give-em-hell attitude.
My mindset was literally ‘take every single picture and video possible on cellphone — do not miss a second of this.’
To my surprise, the band caught on to what I was doing with the phone, even if it would turn out very low quality, and they posed a lot for me and would get close when I struggled for a good shot. Unfortunately, I didn’t get any good video footage (I had one where the vocalist sang and lowered himself(face) to my phone for video at one point.
It’s funny, I’ve gone to many concerts before. I’ve typed up reviews, I’ve talked to the band members, gotten autographs, watched the videos. None of these bands have given me butterflies in my stomach like Mercyy has. It’s already been years and I still remember everything about the show, and about them. It’s truly rare when a band, or a person can make such a lasting impression on you like this band has done. I don’t know if the band is still together or not; I truly hope they still are.
It’s always difficult to explain to people why I love music the way I do and why I decided to get into photography to begin with. For a long time after going to this show, I decided to only do pictures at concerts. Hopefully you can understand my feelings and gratitude through the two pictures I managed to take (that weren’t completely horrible quality) of this band.
