I never thought I would ever shoot a music festival themed around Kid Rock but when Sailor Jerry asked me to come to Nashville for two days I wasn’t exactly going to say no. The hot chicken alone was reason to make the trip but I had no idea what I was getting into with the 2nd annual Kid Rock Fish Fry.

I should start by mentioning that there were no fried fish. I mean you could get a couple fish related items from the many food trucks but apparently the “Fish Fry” thing is some sort of inside joke or something. People kept asking me where the fish were. But, there were two people dressed as neon green guitar playing fish which was easily the best thing to happen to me all weekend. I mean how can you not love confusing fish mascots?

I also thought it was pretty interesting that the music lineup was the same for both days. I don’t think I have ever seen that at a festival before. Kid Rock played both nights and his set was exactly the same. He said “I have some good news and some bad news. Good news is that we have a badass set for you tonight. Bad news is that it’s the exact same show as last night.” His gave his reasoning behind this explaining “You never met a motherfucker quite like me.”

I was there with Sailor Jerry and so I spent a lot of time in their “Norman’s Garage” set up. Norman “Sailor Jerry” Collins is the tattoo legend the spiced rum is named after and they built a garage with two hair cutting stations and had a documentary about Sailor Jerry playing. You could come in and get your hair cut for free (I got my beard trimmed) and watch the documentary. I liked it because on Saturday it was hot as hell and the garage was a great break from the sun and then on Sunday it got suddenly unreasonably cold and it was a good excuse to hide out since I was wearing a t-shirt. They also had live painting from tattoo artist Mathew F. Scott and Daniel “Gravy” Thomas was there with the custom Sailor Jerry Ford truck that he brought on the Pawn Stars spinoff Counting Cars.  He and the truck got recognized several times which was kinda cool. I haven’t seen it yet but I kinda love those History Channel reality shows.

I took a TON of photos so this gallery is huge. I didn’t shoot much of the bands (although The Shrednecks were pretty good and have an amazing name) but I did shoot a million crowd shots. If you liked my juggalo photos you are probably gonna like these. They aren’t as crazy of course, but there are some wild mother fuckers in this gallery with some of the craziest outfits I’ve ever seen.  ICP and Kid Rock are both from Detroit and have made music together so it only makes sense that their fans would share some of the same sense of not giving any fucks.

So click here to see all the photos from the 2nd annual Kick Rock Fish Fry at the Fontanel just outside of Nashville, TN.

Saturday was cold and rainy but that couldn’t stop the Moto Fellas guys from throwing an end of summer BBQ at Brooklyn Moto. I only stopped by for a bit but there was tons of food and free Sailor Jerry and a lot of bikes. Los Pepes did a photo booth, but unlike most photo booths you could actually pull your bike into the photo booth and take a photo with it.

Speaking of bikes, this is the second motorcycle party I have shot in a week and given that I dress like a Sons of Anarchy extra most of the time you’d think that I would learn how to ride. Fortunately for my safety and the safety of all those around me I have yet to learn. I did jokingly Tweet how I needed to meet a babe that will let me ride around on her bike and I did meet two ladies from a whole crew of babes on bikes so maybe I will get to look hilarious riding around on the back of a motorcycle being driven by someone half my size.

That was a pointless tangent but I like to fill space on these posts or they look weird so I hope you enjoyed that. I am gonna let you look at photos now while I go work on this Kickstarter video I shot yesterday for my new book. Thanks to Moto Fellas and Sailor Jerry for having me out.

Click here to see my shots from the Moto Fellas End Of Summer Party at Brooklyn Moto. 

On Saturday my cousin got married in North Carolina. His dad is Indian and he had two weddings on the same day. First the Indian wedding and then later an American one. It was a actually really cool but the wedding lasted about 12 hours. On Sunday I had an 8am flight so I could get back to NYC for the Dolfans NYC event I was throwing. We raised about $400 for charity and the Dolphins won, but the game went into over time so I was running late for a gig.

I got to Jane Motorcycles for the Distinguished Gentleman’s Ride after party late and on almost no sleep and completely stressed out but before I even got to the door of the building I had taken two dozen photos… and even one or two good ones. The party was packed with cool bikes, good looking people and one of Andy Shaw’s adorable dogs. There was plenty of food from Dépanneur (I order delivery from them at least once a week) and Sailor Jerry rum and free haircuts from Blind Barber. I walked in just before a huge raffle featuring thousands of dollars worth of stuff  that made me kinda wish I owned a motorcycle.

The Distinguished Gentleman’s Ride features a bunch of dapper motherfuckers riding bikes to raise money for prostate cancer and men’s health. They ended up raising over $3,000,000 with rides all over the world. It’s a kinda amazing event that also happens to be really photogenic which made my life a lot of easier.

So yeah, I wasn’t at the party very long but in the short time I was there I took a ton of photos and there are some fun ones you should probably check out. After the event I went home and slept for 12 hours and I am back to my normal upbeat happy go luck self and I got more stuff for you tomorrow so come back soon…

Now check out all the photos from the Distinguished Gentleman’s Ride after party at Jane Motorcycles in Brooklyn.

I spent my birthday at Pier 84 photographing the Sailor Jerry Fleet Week party. It was the culmination of a week of Sailor Jerry Fleet Week events honoring sailors (Navy, Marines & Coast Guard). They gave out free drinks, hair cuts and tattoos and then threw this huge free party with a live performance from Cage the Elephant.

I didn’t make the other events but I saw Cage The Elephant at Lollapalooza in 2011 and they blew me away so I figured this would be a pretty good way to get paid to have fun on my birthday. I have shot thousands of bands over the last 20 years and Cage The Elephant are one of those bands that really sticks out. I went out and bought one of their albums after seeing their live show

Aside from the Cage show there was a lot going on. For some reason there were a couple Playboy Playmates hanging out and arm wrestling sailors. No one seemed to mind them cheating for some reason.

Ink Master judge Oliver Peck was giving sailors free Sailor Jerry tattoos all day. I have photographed a lot of Sailor Jerry tattoo events and it was awesome seeing the right people getting the classic tattoos for their original meanings. Last time I saw Oliver he was tattooing my knee so it was nice to see him without wanting to pass out.

They were giving out on site silk screened shirts and my friend Myles was sewing Sailor Jerry patches on the shirts or whatever you wanted. And did I mention the free drinks? There were a lot of free drinks.

Shortly before Cage went on, the Walking Dead’s Norman Reedus drove a custom Sailor Jerry Harley Davidson on stage and gave a toast to the troops and the proceeded to take hundreds of selfies with sailors and other fans. It was pretty impressive to see him spend over an hour taking photos with people and signing autographs.

Finally Cage went on and after shooting their first few songs I decided I had taken enough photos to just enjoy the rest of the set. I had a couple of drinks and they got right on top of me because I hadn’t eaten or slept because I am terrible at life. So I ended up staying late talking to US Navy guys about the nature of war and service. Pretty intense way to start Memorial Day.

I finally left and met up with some friends for dinner and ended up sobering up a lot as soon as I got food in me and then started to get drunk again and ended up at some punk show and on a roof in the rain and talking hockey with some fucking Penguins fan at a metal bar and then went home and ordered $40 of delivery food before passing out while watching Game of Thrones. Did anything important happen?

Oh right, photos, sorry… let’s do this.

Click here to see all the photos from the Sailor Jerry Fleet Week party at Pier 84.

And that was easy. All my SXSW posts are done in one day. Aside from FloodFest I only shot two other events and one of them was a private dinner so we only need two updates. Magical.

After hitting the Levitation party last year I figured I would stop by Hotel Vegas again for the 2016 edition. I was only there for an hour or two but I got to see a bunch of bands since they had four stages. I got there just in time for Thee Oh Sees which is part of my SXSW ritual (I have probably seen them 20 times in 13 SXSWs) and I got to see Saint Pé which was cool and I shot this fun band Creepoid who got Sailor Jerry tattoos the very next day.

I also ran into the radical September Girls and ended up running into my friend Tess and my friend Erica and my friend Ronen. All of these people are great so the party was extra fun. But the best part of the party might have been that it was on St. Patrick’s Day and almost no one was dressed in green. Oh, did I mention that there were infinite cute babes at the party?

I have kinda a terrible back so I decided I should go drop off my camera gear and go back out to have some SXSW fun but instead I didn’t get off my sick air mattress until I needed to go eat pancakes in the middle of the night. Party forever.

And with that all my SXSW updates are over. Go look at this quick gallery and I am gonna go unpack.

Click here to see some photos from the 2016 Levitation SXSW Showcase at Hotel Vegas in Austin.

After a few days to recover getting up this year’s South By Southwest posts is going to be really easy. I didn’t shoot the film fest and unlike in past years I pretty much just suck to one event during music week. I got hired by two different clients to cover Flood Magazine’s FloodFest day parties at Cedar Street Courtyard. I was there starting at 11am so I had to be up every day by 8:30 or so. Normally I would just get no sleep all week but it was my 13th SXSW and for once I decided I would take it easy. I did shoot two other parties but one of em was a private thing so I only have one update after this one. Praise rock music Jebus.

So yeah, FloodFest day parties! 30 bands over four days! I could list them all or you could just look at this list over here. I was there for Sailor Jerry again who had Keith Underwood and Phillip LaRocca doing tattoos all week and Original Penguin the classic men’s wear line that was gifting bands and had one of those evil photo booth things set up that cost me jobs (just kidding).

Let’s just bang out some highlights.

Best band: I really loved Sir The Baptist. Gospel, hip hop and r&b mixed with a hell of a live show. Real worth checking out.

Most fun band to hang out with after: September Girls were these rad Irish babes who played on St. Patrick’s Day because of course. I ended up running into em later in the day too and they all got Sailor Jerry tattoos.

Worst/ Best tattoo: The winner of the best and the worst tattoo goes to the front man from the band American Bombshell who got SXSW 16 tattooed to his knuckles. Holy shit.

Best babes in Austin: I had Ela Darling and Carter Cruise come visit me. Always good to see my worlds smash into each other. Ela was in town for the Interactive part of SXSW and was giving talks on VR in the Adult industry. Carter was in town DJing and ended up getting a pretty sick SJ tattoo.

Other friends getting tattooed: The homies Ho99o9 came to get tattooed and get some free Penguin gear. It was awesome to see this savage punk band in button up shirts. Hollywood Holt also came by to get his hand tattooed. My friends Keaton and Tess came by and got little jammers too and while not that interesting as far as the write up goes it was nice to hang out with them.

Other bands I dug: The Heavy, Deap Vally, So Pitted, Thao & the Get Down Stay Down and although they were a little to chill for me Polica was a huge crowd favorite. Over all most of the bands were pretty good although there were a few exceptions that made me want to murder all of music but I will probably just go ahead and not mention their names.

Anyway, go look some photos and thanks to Sailor Jerry and Original Penguin and Flood Magazine for having me out. Also thanks to Phil for the absurd SJ tattoo! Now go look at way too many pictures!

Click here to see a TON of photos from the 2016 SXSW FloodFest at Cedar Street Courtyard in Austin.

October has been a big month for Sailor Jerry. I already shot Lucero in Nashville and in NYC for their SJ Presents tour and last night I went down to Schott’s Soho store to celebrate the US Navy. Before Sailor Jerry was a rum company they were a clothing company based on the designs of tattoo legend Norman “Sailor Jerry” Collins and to this day they still sell the clothing. They also do some really cool clothing collaborations like when I went down to Miami for the release of their Iggy Pop designed collection. Yesterday they teamed up with the iconic outer wear brand Schott to create a pea coat for the 240th anniversary for the US Navy.

Schott started making pea coats for the US Navy during WWII and Sailor Jerry Collins was in the Navy and was tattooing Navy men in Hawaii during WWII. The connection makes total sense and the pea coat they collaborated on is pretty fantastic and it even has a semi secret flask pocket so of course they had to design a leather wrapped flask as well. The whole thing was a pretty inspired idea.

Meanwhile tattoo artist Oliver Peck became friends with the Schott’s after his favorite 60 year old Schott leather jacket started to fall apart. Schott ended up fixing his jacket and since the pea coat release timed perfectly with Oliver being in NYC for the Ink Master live season finale they got Oliver involved in the release party. He was doing free Sailor Jerry tattoos all night and everyone had a blast.

On a slightly related note I have owned a bunch of leather jackets in my life but they never felt right to me. I finally got one that I like (although the zipper is broken) and it was actually a vintage rip off of the iconic Schott Perfecto made by Sears. I should have worn it last night… or maybe I should just sell it and try and buy a new Schott jacket since they are pretty amazing.

Anyway, click here to see all the photos from the Schott/ Sailor Jerry pea coat/flask release to celebrate the 240th anniversary of the US Navy!

Before I head out for a very long day of photographing the New York Comic Con I wanted to get up some more photos of Lucero. Last week I shot them in Nashville as part of the kick off for their Sailor Jerry Presents: An Evening With Lucero tour. Well last night the tour came to NYC so I figured I would shoot that show as well.

Once again they opened for themselves with an acoustic set and then playing a second, longer, electric set. It was a big crowd that filled up most of the massive Webster Hall. I don’t have much to say different from the last show, except that I ran into a bunch of friends including Oliver Peck who is on tour with Lucero for a few days before he comes back to NYC for the live Ink Master season finale on Tuesday.

Anyway, it was a fun show and I think it was even better than the Nashville show because Webster’s sound is fantastic and I had actually slept.  Now go look at some photos and I am gonna go photograph some nerds.

Click here to see all the photos from the NYC edition of Sailor Jerry Presents: An Evening With Lucero.

Last night Lucero played the first date of their US tour, kicking things off with a two set show in Nashville. Fortunately Sailor Jerry is sponsoring the tour so I got a chance to fly down to Tennessee for the event dubbed “Sailor Jerry Presents: An Evening With Lucero”.

The idea was that Lucero would play two sets, one acoustic and then come back 30 minutes later and play a second electric set dubbed “the drunk set” by front man Ben Nichols. It’s a pretty cool idea especially if you are obsessed with a band like a ton of Lucero fans are. It was a packed house and I met people who came from NYC, Baltimore, San Diego and even Ireland for the show. Kinda amazing dedication.

In my life time of music I can only think of a few times when I have seen a band open for themselves. I saw They Might Be Giants get dressed up for Halloween and pretend to be a TMBG cover band only to play a legitimate set an hour later. They spent a lot of the set making fun of the “cover band” for drinking all the booze on their bus. I saw Camper Van Beethoven open for Cracker and while technically they are two different bands they just swapped out guitar players. And once when I was managing the band the Gaskets I hired a cover band to play their entire first album at the release party for their second album. Not quite the same thing but their die hard fans loved it. They got to hear the old hits and the whole new record.

Not that any of that is relevant to last night, but my flight back to NYC is delayed so you get that random story because I have nothing else to do.

If you are a Lucero fan this is a tour you should not miss. They are playing at Webster Hall next Thursday and I will be covering that show as well so I hope to see a bunch of friends there there. Check out the rest of their tour dates here.

Now click here to see photos from the Sailor Jerry Presents: An Evening With Lucero tour kickoff at the Cannery Ballroom in Nashville.