Well, another year gone by with the camera more or less grown on to my hand. However, even though I took more than enough photographs during the year, somehow I’m left with the feeling that I should have done more. Note, this will be an exceptionally photo heavy post.
When Insomnium released their new album mid-October this year I finally woke up and listened to the semi-local band. And was immediately hooked. One video review that I’ve later watched even called their latest album, One for Sorrow, a gateway drug. Well, in my (or I should say our) case that definitely what it was.
As an interesting fact, I also realized that the surgeon who operated on my finger that I managed to damage a couple of years back is/was Insomnium’s second guitarist, Ville Vänni. I remember at the time, Anna and I were thinking that the surgeon definitely is a metal-head with the long hair and tattoos. Well, that mystery was finally solved.
This was also to be Ville Vänni’s second to last gig in the band – and his last gig in his hometown so expectations were high at least in the audience. Ville was greeted with shouts of his name throughout the gig. And honestly it felt like Ville played his heart out.
While lately Kerubi (and it’s predecessor Kellari) haven’t been really full in metal gigs, the place at least appeared packed to the limits. It was hot, loud, and even managed to have a small circle pit going on every now and then.
For a metal band the lights were surprisingly good. But for once, when I had fairly good lights there was a security person parked practically right in front of me, so many a good photograph has been left out. Although if you look through the gallery, you’ll see his head silhouetted in some photographs.
But the night was all we wanted it to be. An evening of good metal and headbanging with the chance to get some good photographs thrown in. Thank you Ville V. and good luck to Insomnium on their road to come.
As always, more pictures in our gallery.
Warming up for Insomnium’s first gig in support of One for Sorrows was Tuomas Saukkonen’s (Before the Dawn) solo project Black Sun Aeon. BSA is quite similar to Before the Dawn. So similar in fact that the only reason that I can see for the solo project is Tuomas Saukkonen’s desire to play every single instrument on the album. And honestly, he plays them well.
Melodic death metal was on the table for the evening, but I must admit that I was pleasantly surprised by the fact that Janica Lönn was along with the band for the tour. Especially as a photographer it was nice to shoot a female instead of the (mostly hairy) men that dominate metal.
As far as BSA’s set goes, I must admit to being quite disappointed. I’d listened to them through Spotify even before the gig (and afterwards as well) and have quite liked them. I’m fairly certain that my disappointment in the gig comes from the mix being off. It was so bass heavy that it drowned out most of the other instrument – luckily at least the vocals did come through enough to give the songs some atmosphere.
As always, more pictures in our gallery and stay tuned for pictures of the main act, Insomnium.
It was just a few months ago that we spent a nice summer evening with Reckless Love in the same venue. That time the gig was free and open to all ages – and it showed. We had a full (or nearly so) house and lots of teens. Now it was a normal gig with the age restriction of 18 and over. Alas, Joensuu should be ashamed since Kerubi was half empty.
Sure, Reckless Love may not be serious metal, but it doesn’t mean that metalheads shouldn’t be able to appreciate well done and happy glam metal. Or hair metal. Or hard rock. Or whatever other genre you want to drop Reckless Love in.
Like every other time, Olli didn’t fail to get in some jump kicks and get the female crowd screaming by tearing off his shirt. The rest of the band rocked a solid show as well.
And of course in my book everything is right in the world now that Pepe has an Ibanez RG shaped guitar in his hands. Especially in a bright neon color. No other guitar says 80s metal quite as well.
This time I’d placed myself dead center and thus didn’t get quite as good an angle on Pepe, but it meant that I got better pictures of Jalle and Hessu, so it a good tradeoff.
All in all, it was a great night filled with good rock and roll. Next up some gloomy melodic death metal once I get the images processed. But as always, more pictures are available in our gallery.
Ok, I admit that I’m an Evergrey fanboy. After all, this was the third time we saw them this year (Lutakko, Nosturi). This time though, we were a bit far from home :)
We were on a trip to the US and naturally we decided to catch Evergrey playing live in Chicago since we were there at the same time. They were on a longer tour of the US supported by four other bands (The Absence, Blackguard, Powerglove, and fellow Swedes Sabaton). Unfortunately we missed The Absence, but we did catch the rest of the supporting acts. While none of them held any real interest for us, I did take some pictures.
I’d love to say that Reggie’s Rock Club in Chicago is a photographer’s dream venue, but it seems to be very much the opposite. Or at least it was when Evergrey hit the stage. Based on the pictures I’ve seen taken during the US tour from other photographers, they prefer green lighting for the set. In this case a flat green wash was practically the only light for almost the first half of the set after which some other colors and more light started to hit the stage.
But, challenging light only meant that I needed to up the ISO and concentrate on getting good pictures with isolation from the background. And in post, converting most pictures to black and white since a green wash is less than flattering ;)
All in all, I managed to make some of the best concert photographs I’ve made so far. So I can’t exactly complain. In fact, the challenging lighting made me concentrate harder on my photography and didn’t let me get complacent.
Since Reggie’s doesn’t have a pit and we were parked in front of Johan, I did mean to go around the crowd – which was much smaller than I expected – over to Marcus’ side but I never made it that far. I simply got too carried away enjoying the show.
As always, more pictures in our gallery.
P.S. I did consider leaving the venue without any link love, but all in all the experience was positive. In fact, in the concert venue the staff was great, but on the bar side not so much.
