Hello to the lucky soul who just so happened to stumble upon this page. This is where I occasionally dump my brain with regards to the musical goings-on in my life. No filter, no editing, no nothin’. Scroll at your own risk.
:) <3
MAC
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Baby’s First Interview: A Conversation With Pop Artist Rosie Darling
March 11th, 2023
This!!! This interview was so awesome. I was actually really surprised by how much I enjoyed it— I didn’t think I could end up enjoying interview assemblage more than concert reviews, but I had a grand old time. I, just now, sat and continuously edited this piece for FOUR HOURS. Four whole hours, without Ritalin (it’s a prescription, I promise), without any distractions at all. I cannot tell you the last time I did something like that voluntarily. In this process I also discovered that I do, in fact, have carpal tunnel. My wrists and fingers feel like TV static right now, but there’s no way in hell I’m going to let this high go without documentation.
I actually interviewed Ms. Darling a week ago yesterday, so today’s work consisted of editing down the thirteen page zoom audio transcript down to a meager five pages. During the actual interview I remember feeling painfully awkward— trying my best to provide positive commentary on her work without sounding like a complete and utter kiss-ass. I didn’t know if my list of questions was too short or too long, and I learned that that is something that will differ with each subject you speak to. Some will take more time on certain questions than others, and you definitely need to be flexible with your interview structure. Be prepared to drop certain questions in a split-second, and come up with others right on the spot. Trust your gut; also, it’s better to go in over-prepared than underprepared. Go in with more questions than you need, and let some go based on the direction that the conversation takes. I would say having designated beginnings, middles, and ends would be a good idea, though, just to ensure that you have some kind of flow. I went in with a list of 17 questions, and ended up dropping about four of them in the moment, and combining a few as well. In the end, I had about 11 questions (some of them two parters), and the interview ran for 39 minutes.
What I’m still trying to navigate is how much of my own experience to share with my subjects— when it’s in direct relation to their music or the interview I’m sure it’s relevant, but at the end of the day it is still an interview about Rosie. I’m not sure she needed to know how her answer to my question reminded me of part of my experience as a dancer. Learning to balance friendliness and professionalism will be an interesting journey with these interviews.
What I didn’t realize was how magical putting together/condensing an interview transcript can be. I was truly not expecting this. Rosie— if you’re reading this (ha, ha— yeah right), you have a new stan. In the moment, I didn’t feel like my interview questions were all that special, but once I went through and got rid of all of our collective likes, ums, and so on, a beautiful discussion really started to take shape. It was like cracking open a rock and finding out that it’s a geode. I honestly feel like I’ll cherish this piece forever, not to be corny. But hey, I just compared editing a transcript to finding geode, so we’re already there. I just can’t believe my questions prompted her answers— and her answers were good. Like, I caused this! I designed this piece, essentially. God, I really do love surprises. I wonder who’s next.
When the interview is published I’ll add a link here. As of right now I don’t have anything else lined up— I’m trying to shoot about 6 more shows this month, but no one’s really getting back to my press requests ~sad face~. I’ll probably do a post reflecting on what it was like to coproduce my first showcase (which happened on February 9th), but I really hope I’ll get something else lined up soon. I start my new job at BET this week though, so that’s definitely where my main focus will be. Maybe I’ll throw in an entry about that, but I guess that’s not really the point of this blog. We’ll see. I’ll keep you updated!
Until next time <3
xoxo
MC
Reviewing JID and Smino at Terminal 5: Becoming a Published Writer!
March 8th, 2023
Hellooo everybody! I’m writing to you as an official, published literary contributor to the music and mental health nonprofit and 501c3, Sounds of Saving. Who would’ve thought? Me, actually. I would’ve thought. And I did, clearly. I attended the first of to JID and Smino Luv is 4ever tour performances this past Friday at Terminal 5, and while I wasn’t blessed with a photo pass like I was for Kimbra (more on that later), their team was generous enough to offer me a free ticket so I could review the performance. So, I curated a plan to arrive at the venue an hour early so I could push my way to the front without too much trouble, and still take some decent pictures on my new point and shoot. Much to my dismay, this plan was anything but foolproof. By the time I arrived, the lagging line had already sprawled around three corners— tragic, really. Fortunately, I was able to pay a man $10 and somehow make my to the very front of the line with ease. I still can’t believed it worked— I was so confident that I had given away $10 for no reason, but thankfully, “John” was worth trusting with the fate of my pictures. I ended up right against the barriers in house right, the perfect spot to snap some pics.
Once I heard I would have to leave my trusty Canon Rebel T5 behind, I took it as a sign to go out and buy myself the point and shoot that I’ve been pining away for for the last few months. It’s the perfect excuse to blow $450 on a new device; I’m sure there will be many other shows in my future where I’m denied photo access. Plus, I paid in cash, so I basically didn’t even spend any money. For those of you that don’t know, the rule for bringing cameras to most shows revolves around whether or not you can remove the lens. If you can, then it’s considered to be a professional camera, and you won’t be able to bring it to a venue without express permission (aka, a photo pass). Anywho, back to the story. I ended up settling on a Panasonic Lumix Leica DMC-LX10. Now, while I can’t tell you what any of that actually means, I can tell you that this is a dynamite little camera. It’s honestly an upgrade from my dinosaur DSLR (no disrespect to my Canon— you know you’re my forever thing, baby). It shoots in 4k, has a flip up touchscreen that has insane focus abilities amongst many others. My favorite thing about it would have to be the 4k burst function, where it takes a burst of photos at 30 frames/second for as long as you hold down the shutter button. The cam then proceeds to save the shots as a video file, where you can go through and save the ones you like individually before deleting the video. This function is absolutely perfect for concert photography as your subjects never, ever seem to be standing still. I definitely abused this function though, because I ended up with an overwhelming amount of frames to go through once the night came to a close. I would say the only noticeable downside to this little point and shoot would be that the autofocus would definitely lag from time to time, and I ended up missing a few awesome shots because of it. All pics from the show were shot on my new baby Lumix. :)
I was nervous about writing my first published piece— what would my voice as a writer come out to be? As I sat down to write I was wary about looking to other reviews for inspiration; I wanted the piece to come out as authentic to myself as possible. Honestly though, I don’t even know what that looks like since this is my first actual review. My original intention was to braindump as soon as I got home, but by the time I walked in the door it was well after midnight and I was exhausted from being knocked around in the audience. Once I actually sat down to write it (with a time constraint) it didn’t come too easily. I never braindumped onto a blank page, so I was knitpicking almost every sentence I put down before moving on to the next one. What I learned from that is, YOU NEED TO BRAINDUMP. Even it’s a voice memo walking home from the show, or random sentence fragments typed hastily into your notes app, having anything to work off of is better than having nothing. I wrote it in two sittings, the first was more knitpicky than the second since I was working under the time constraint of my incoming shift at work. Not having the time to scrutinize actually worked out better for me, although I do wish I allowed myself some more time for edits. All in all though, I’m incredibly stoked about this experience and how it turned out. I’m actually not all that bad at this, and I’m having an insurmountable amount of fun. And hey, free concert tickets! What’s not to love about that?
Until next time <3
xoxo
MC
Reviewing JID and Smino at Terminal 5, and My First Interview Ever With THE Rosie Darling
INCOMING!!! - Part Two and Three :)
February 28th, 2023
Guys! I got a ticket to review the JID and Smino concert at Terminal 5 this coming Friday— I’m so excited! My high school friends would be so jealous lol. I’ve loved both artists for a long long time now, and I can’t believe I get to see them both perform on the same stage. I’m nervous to write an actual, published review. Unfortunately I couldn’t snag a photo pass for this one, so any pictures I have to offer will have been shot on my humble iPhone 12. It’s been so long since I’ve been in the audience a rap concert, and I’ve definitely missed the energy.
I happen to be doing my first interview ever with rising pop artist Rosie Darling that same day, which I’ll also be writing about for SoS. I’m not sure if she’s even really ‘rising’ anymore; she has almost three million monthly listeners on Spotify. I’ve been drowning myself in her music, and she’s brought me to tears and joyous laughter multiple times already. I adore her.
I’ll keep y’all updated.
Xoxo
Kimbra at Webster Hall
A Stab at Concert Photography - Part One
February 16th, 2023
I stood in my first ever press pit this weekend, folks. Typically when I review a concert (and by typically, I mean the one other time I did this) I try and get the words down as soon as humanly possible after a show, before that euphoric post-show high slips away. Today, however, that was not the case. It is now the morning after Kimbra’s NYC show at Webster Hall with opener Tei Chi, and let me tell you, I’m still reeling.
I can’t really decide if I want these entries to be about my personal journey in concert photography, or if I want them to be more of a show review vibe. I don’t know about you, but I’ve never really documented my journey with a new hobby— especially right from the first moment I try it out. I’m really curious to see where this journey takes me, and I think it would be fun to have a record to look back on as I get the hang of things. Also, who knows, if anyone, anyone at all, happens to read this (the thought of anyone stumbling upon this page makes me chuckle) and finds themselves wanting to give concert photography/music journalism a shot, maybe this could be helpful. Even just a little bit. And hey, now that I’ve embarked on this road publicly (aka via Instagram) I’m not gonna just let myself quit. Public failure, ~shiver~ not an option.
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The first thing that I was worried about was my camera’s ability to hold its own in the lowlight setting of Webster Hall, occasionally streaked with the ribbons of bright light gently wrapping themselves around the flowing limbs of an artist. My camera isn’t anything special— It’s a Canon EOS Rebel T5 that I stole from my high school in 2014. Well— not really stole, I like to think that I borrowed it and simply have yet to give it back. I mean, they never actually came after me for it, so it’s kind of on them. But I digress, I let it collect dust in the back of my closet for the last 8 years until I made the last minute decision to bring it to Colorado with me for my summer Marketing Apprenticeship with Theatre Aspen. Little did I know, the course of my whole summer wound up revolving around that little device, and I had the pleasure of rediscovering my old love for photographing people in the seemingly religious practice of doing what they were put on this earth to do— what they love to do the most.
Once I had completed my apprenticeship and moved back to NYC, I figured that I would combine this newfound joy of mine for watching other people engage in their passions through the lens of my camera with my absolute favorite thing to do in the world: attending concerts. The result so far has been nothing short of magic to me.
But back to my camera! Turns out it’s completely adequate. These pictures you’re looking at above only required some light editing to get to where they are now. You really don’t need the most expensive equipment in the world to do this, although I’m sure it probably helps. I shot the whole show on my Rebel T5, and switched between an 18-55mm Canon EF-S zoom lens with an aperture range of f/3.5-5.6 (ideally you want a far lower setting so your cam lets in as much light as possible, like f/1.8), and a 50mm Canon EF lens with an aperture of f/1.8. I bought this little lens for around $50 on Ebay over the summer when I was struggling to shoot the dim performances in the Theatre Aspen tent. I found, though, that the stage lights at Webster Hall were bright enough that I didn’t really need this lens. What really mattered was my timing, and the settings on my camera’s body. Though the lighting was good at times, as is with all live concerts, it changed and flashed on and off a lot. This time I ended up somewhat blindly shooting over 700 pictures between Tei Shi and Kimbra’s sets, and I came out with about 20-25 decent shots, total. That’s about 3%. “Just keep shooting, just keep shooting, just keep shooting, shooting, shooting” was my motto that night, but going forward I think I have to do better with anticipating the lighting changes and their relationship with the music, and what’s happening on stage.
In terms of body settings, keep your ISO high, high, high! But not too high. lol. I mainly stuck with my 18-55mm lens once I figured out that it served the same purpose (and then some) as my 50mm lens. I shot the whole night in manual, and since the aperture didn’t go as low as I liked, I was sure to keep it at the lowest setting. I found I had the most luck with an ISO of 1600, the aperture set to f/3.5, and the shutter speed at 1/200secs. The above two pictures were shot at those settings, and they came out pretty decent. Ideally I’d like a higher shutter speed to minimize blur, but I’ll make do with what I’ve got and continue to play around with settings in the months to come.
Overall, I think I did a pretty good job for my first time, especially since they only give you the first three songs in the press pit. I’m honestly surprised I didn’t black out for the whole experience, considering my universally present state of discombobulation from switching my settings and lenses so often. Let’s not forget about the perils of focusing a camera in the dark— autofocus is not the end-all-be-all, folks. Honestly though, I felt surprisingly calm throughout those three songs in the pit, and even found moments to simply stand and watch Kimbra and Tei Shi perform without worrying about my camera work. I loved my photos so much that while I was dancing around my room celebrating, I managed to sprain my ankle in a humbling twist of fate. Though concert photography is a joy in and of itself, I never want it to take away from why love to attend shows in the first place. I feel truly blessed to have been able to take part in a journey like this, and I can’t wait to see where it takes me.
Xoxo,
GoSsIp GiRl lmao no but for real
Ta! Until next time <3
Goth Babe at Webster Hall
February 18th, 2022
I can honestly tell you, my dear reader, that my time spent at Webster Hall with Goth Babe this past weekend was the time and place that I have felt the most overjoyed, the most at peace, the most calm and the most euphoric in months. And yes, while the music was a large part of that experience, a close runner up for me was the energy of the audience. For all you newbies, no, their music doesn’t sound like their name (but even if it did, I’d likely still be an avid listener– shoutout to all my fellow former scene kids); Goth Babe’s music creates a dream-like combo of indie-pop and alternative surf beats that sucks their listener into the enticing space between reality and nirvana. As I have said before, the audience of a music show is often where I am happiest; but, it is also one of the places that presents the potential for me to find myself in complete distress. I’ve only fainted once in my life: in the crowd for Billie Eilish at Gov Ball 2021, and I never intend to do it again (we were barely halfway to the front too! Ugh. Disappointing). But I digress, Griff and the gang know how to create a vibe like no other. Webster Hall was very much a safe space for all this past Friday night and I, and I’m sure many others, was incredibly grateful for it. If the last two years have taught us anything as a nation and as a city, it is to value the places and people which grant us the coveted feelings of safety and happiness.
The band utilized a wide variety of crowd engagement strategies, ranging from their goofy audience polls (would you rather be a reverse centaur or a reverse mermaid? Think about it– there’s only one right answer) to audience dance battles that playfully split the crowd in two. The audience was strewn with crowd surfers, and a few lucky birthday folks even had the privilege of being on the receiving end of a birthday cupcake and serenade gifted by Goth Babe himself. I felt at home in that crowd– a corny cliche, but nonetheless one that I was thrilled to be a part of. The ability to foster this type of environment is a factor that differentiates a good musician from a great one. And, to be able to do that over and over again while on tour without having the energy zapped from your soul (or at least without looking like it has been), now that’s a gift that must be put to good use. Goth Babe’s spark and glow as a group extends beyond their musical skill, which is undoubtedly there– the question is, will they be able to maintain these same relationship dynamics with their audiences as they continue to grow? One can only hope, and simply wait and see.
