It’s New Years Eve and we are all about to be partying and what not like we all do at  this time of year but I wanted to look back on the year and talk about three things that really made a difference in my life in 2011 and I am looking forward to them still being a big part of my 2012. 2011 was a pretty great year for me and I hope 2012 is even better for me and you and everyone who reads this damn website.  Thanks for paying attention.

1) Fucking Bullshit

I worked in some way with music for most of my life. When I was 15 I started a zine and shortly after founded a record label. I started booking shows and taking photos of bands. Later in life I managed a band for 5 years, I started booking dance parties and went on tour with bands and DJ’s and even worked in the studio with bands. I did everything you could imagine except be in a band. And like every single person who works in music all I really wanted to do was be in a band.  Finally in 2011 I got my chance and I started my punk rock cover band Fucking Bullshit and we are somehow way better than we ever should have been and it’s more fun than I ever thought it would be.  We get the New Years started with a bang with our next free show January 5th at Don Pedro’s in Brooklyn. Come see us!

2) Dolfans NYC

I have been running the New York City Miami Dolphins fan club for a few years but this year I think we really established ourselves. Even though the Dolphins have sucked we have had a big group at our bar, Third & Long, every single week. We brought a HUGE group to the Meadowlands for Jets and Giants games and we are starting to be taken very seriously by the Miami Dolphins organization. Their Weekly TV show did an interview with us and we have had more and more contact with the team. 2012 seems like it is going to be even bigger for us as we are helping to promote the 40th Anniversary reunion of the 1972 undefeated Dolphins team in North Jersey. If the Dolphins ever started wining some games we would be in Phin Heaven.

3) Travel

2011 was amazing for me as far as adventuring is concerned. The year started off with a trip to LA and Vegas and then my yearly trip to SXSW but this year really got crazy when I went back to LA and ended up driving across the country. I ended up being out of town for 28 days and I did almost no actual paid work and was living on savings and ad money. Fortunately when I got back in NYC I met the Sailor Jerry Rum PR girl Dana Dynamite who over the last six months has become a great friend and Sailor Jerry has hired me to work Lolapalooza and then Voodoo Fest in New Orleans and then Fun Fun Fun in Austin and even Art Basel in Miami. Even though I rarely drink alcohol, Sailor Jerry is the perfect client. Their brand is all about tattoos and partying and half naked tattooed girls. They send me out to amazing parties and I get to talk bands into getting free Sailor Jerry tattoos. I even got a free tattoo out of the deal. It’s been pretty fucking amazing.  2012 is looking like it will be just as adventurous as on the 12th I head to LA for a week vacation before heading to Vegas to shoot the AVN Awards and then back to LA for a few days before heading to Aspen to cover the X Games for Sailor Jerry.

So yeah, 2011 was fucking amazing and assuming the world doesn’t end 2012 should be even better. But looking back there was some sadness too and I want to take a moment to remember the people I lost last year. My friend good tragically Colin died of brain cancer in his mid 20’s and my closest grandparent, my grandma Jo finally passed in her 90’s. My grandmother has been one of the closest people in my life so losing her killed me but losing a friend at 25 was so much more tragic. But with death comes new beginnings and 2012 will mark the release of a project I have been working on since the week my best friend Ross Harman died in late 2010. His tribute album will be released in late February and while it will never bring my friend back it will go a long way to helping me deal with his loss.

Let’s hope no one reading this has to deal with any of that loss in 2012 and as a fantastic year.  Happy New Years everyone!

My old pals Sailor Jerry decided to throw a party at The Gramercy Theater and they had The Dirtbombs and White Mystery play. The Dirtbombs are a pretty legendary band so I expected them to be awesome but White Mystery were a pleasant surprise. I had never heard of them but it turns out we have a bunch of mutual friends and they pretty much kick ass. The party was such a good time that I stayed an hour later than I was supposed to and Santa Clause showed up and got drunk on Sailor Jerry. You cannot fuck with that. I gotta go shoot some pics for XXL Magazine in a bit so I gotta make this quick.

Click here to see all the shots from the Sailor Jerry Presents: Dirtbombs/White Mystery party at Gramercy Theater.

Last year at Art Basel my friends at The Overthrow threw one of the best parties of Miami Art Week, this year was no exception. My boys in Ninjsonik were playing so of course this party was #1 on my list of things I wanted to do. Luckily for me my favorite client Sailor Jerry was one of the sponsors so not only did I get to hang out at the insane party but I actually got paid to be there. This is how you win at Art Basel.

The line up of the party was absolutely sick. Aside from the Ninjas Basel Castle featured Yelawolf as a headliner, a Rapture DJ set, Penguin Prison, Bad Rabbits, Chris Cab, Tamara Sky and a bunch more. They had live painting from Ron English, Greg Mike, Shark Toof, Sam Flores and more. There was a photo booth run by my party photo brother from another mother Rony Alwin and a lot of Sailor Jerry and PBR to fuel the 11 hour party. Also the whole thing was thrown by Hyundai who keeps throwing really good Re:Mix Lab parties and even though they aren’t paying me I need to give a shout out to them for mixing art and music really well and paying for rad people to do rad things.

Sailor Jerry had their Airstream on site and as the line wrapped around the block we would pull people in for some Sailor Jerry and a place to chill while they waited to get in. There were 8,000 RSVPs to the party and trying getting in after 8pm was pretty much impossible. Luckily the Sailor Jerry trailer was there to keep people entertained. It was also a spot for artists and rad people to get away from the madness of the party for a minute and have a drink. It was a very cool spot to have access to during the party.

Yelawolf killed it, Ninjasonik were amazing as always and meeting Ron English was a pretty awesome experience but the highlight of my night had to be when amazing street artist Shark Toof had one too many Sailor Jerry and decided it would be a good idea to spray paint my vest. I had just had lunch with him earlier in the day and I was kinda joking about the idea but around midnight it seemed like a really good idea. He had just painted this insane shark and then he turned his cans on me. What I thought was going to be like a two minute thing turned into nearly an hour of him spraying my vest until it was a true work of art. Tons of people gathered to watch the whole thing and I handed my friend Rodger my camera to get a few shots. It was pretty great.

Anyway, this is the last gallery of party pictures I have from Art Basel but I also shot six or seven rolls of film so I will have one all 35mm gallery from Basel that should be pretty cool.  But in the mean time…

Click here to see all the shots from Overthrow’s 2011 Basel Castle party at The Overthrow Castle!

Ps. Just wanted to say sorry to Buff Monster and his girlfriend for getting them stuck outside of the party for twenty minutes when the cops shut down the gate. I hope that huge bottle of Sailor Jerry made up for it…

The French nightclub Le Baron throws yearly pop up parties at the Florida Room in Miami during Art Basel. Last Friday they held a New York themed night featuring 2/3rds of the Ruff Kids and appearances by a bunch of New York nightlife kids. The Friday Le Baron “This Is New York” night was put together by GrandLife the entertainment arm of GrandLifeHotels. You had Mike Nouveau DJing, Steven Rojas hosing plus New York based Whitewall Magazine helped by sponsoring the party.  Sophia Lamar showed up with with camera shy Misshapes and for a while it felt very NYC 2005 up in the club.

There were some not so NYC celeb sitings as well. I got a pretty hilarious shot of Mr. Brainwash and Waris Ahluwalia was hanging out all night. I saw James Murphy there for a second and I heard Adrian Brody was there but I never saw him. There were also a bunch of well known art types who I have no idea who are because I lack culture.

It was a fun party and there was a line around the block all night. People were getting wild, no doubt because of the two hour Sailor Jerry open bar, and I had multiple model looking girls tell me how much they like my punk rock jean vest thing. So it was a pretty good night.

Click here to see all the picture from This Is New York Night at Le Baron at The Florida Room At The Hotel Delano At Art Basel 2011, etc.

For the second weekend in a row I found myself at a music festival in an airstream trailer watching bands get Sailor Jerry tattoos. At the Voodoo Fest in New Orleans we tattooed members of Fishbone, Major Lazer, Peelander Z, TV on the Radio and Boots Electric. This time at Fun Fun Fun in Austin we tattooed Big Freedia, Spank Rock, Johnny Nelson, members of Passion Pit, G-Side, Paint It Black and nearly everyone in EYEHATEGOD.

Big Freedia was a highlight, not only because she got a hilarious tattoo but because later when she was talking to Ryan Gosling she showed him it and I got a picture and it blew up all over the internet and made my client very happy and ultimately that will lead to me going on more adventures like these. My homie Johnny Nelson is on the road with Spank Rock and he got a shark right near his Driven By Boredom tattoo and Piink from Major Lazer who got inked last week came back and got a tattoo this weekend that actually says Sailor Jerry on it. It was pretty amazing.

All the tattoos were once again done by Terry Brown at Uptown in New Orleans. Next time down there you should get him to tattoo you… just don’t get him started on his love for Public Enemy or he might never stop tattooing you.

Anyway, I got a busy day today and my band has a show tonight so I am going to get out of here, but check back in a little bit because I have one more post for you and it’s a good one….

Click here to see the Sailor Jerry tattoos from the Fun Fun Fun Fest in Austin Texas.

Just like on Halloween Weekend at Voodoo Fest Sailor Jerry set up one of their airstream trailers in the artist area of Fun Fun Fun. They gave out rum drinks and actual tattoos to artists, media and festival staff. The airstream also became a place to hang out. There were benches out front and the airstream was one of the only dust storm proof place at the fest.

This star studded gallery is a collection of photos taken in and just outside of the airstream. Lot of rad bands and cute girls stopped by and you clearly need to look at these pictures. I will be back tomorrow with a sequel of sorts to this gallery when I show you all the Sailor Jerry tattoos that were given out at the airstream. Get excited.

Click here to see the party inside a party that was the Sailor Jerry Airstream at the 2011 Fun Fun Fun Fest in Austin Texas.

This is post one of a series of photo posts from the Fun Fun Fun music fest in Austin Texas that was held last weekend. I was asked to cover the crazy three day party for Sailor Jerry who seemed really happy with my work at the Voodoo fest the previous weekend. They did tattoos and passed out free drinks and I documented at all but I also got to have fun fun fun at the fest and I shot a bunch of bands and a bunch fun times and a bunch of Ryan Gosling.

This first intro post is just full of the crowd shots I took that don’t fit into any specific galleries. These photos are from all over the fest but most of them were taken in the artist/media area that I spent most of my time in because I needed to stay close to the Sailor Jerry trailer. Plus most of my friends are pretentious VIP types and they don’t like to pay for drinks or venture out into public with the unwashed masses.

Also since this is the intro post of Fun Fun Fun I should mention the Ryan Gosling thing.  He was filming a Terrence Malick film called Lawless during the fest and he was there all damn weekend and then he was at all the after parties. I ran into the guy 50 times and EVERYONE was talking about it constantly. Yesterday when I was in Chicago I felt like there was a hole in my life and I didn’t know what it was… I realized that no one had mentioned Ryan Gosling to me in the last twelve hours. So in the next three galleries will be full of “RyGo” as people kept calling him (seemingly just to intentionally make my skin crawl). After that we will move into band photos and this website will once again be a Gosling free zone. So enjoy your Gosling while you have it ladies.

Anyway, I am about to get on a plane so let’s get it on.

Click here to see all the crowd shots from the 2011 Fun Fun Fun Fest in Austin, Texas.

Trying to crank these Voodoo Music Experience photo updates out before I get to the new stuff from Fun Fun Fun Fest. I shot a few thousand images this weekend and I have tons of fun stuff for you guys. I was thinking about just putting up all the rest of the band photos from Voodoo all up at once but I wanted to give special consideration to Peelander Z and Boots Electric and for the same reasons. Both bands feature rad people and both bands got Sailor Jerry tattoos.

As you may know by now I am a big Peelander Z fan. They are a crazy Japanse band that I have been checking out for about a decade now. They put on an amazing show and they are all super friendly and hilarious. I have nothing but love for this band. And then you add to that the fact that Peelander Green got a big bad ass Sailor Jerry octopus tattoo and it makes me even more pro-Peelander.

Boots Electric got our Sailor Jerry tattoo promotion the most press because their frontman Jessie Hughes (also of Eagles of Death Metal) got his tattoo filmed for Fuse TV. He actually got a Sailor Jerry bomb with the Fuse logo in it. Jessie hung out most of the day and seemed like really good people. Also his girlfriend Tuesday Cross is a girl I photographed at a hotel party in Vegas like four years ago. She is rad as fuck and their band is a lot of fun.

So, now that I gave both those bands a little shout out, let’s get on with the photos. God willing I will only have one more Voodoo fest update and I can get started with the Fun Fun Fun stuff ASAP.

Click here to see all the photos of Peelander Z at the Voodoo Music Experience in New Orleans.

Click here to see all the photos of Boots Electric at the Voodoo Music Experience in New Orleans.

I have a shit load of band photos from Voodoo and I am probably going to put most of them up in one giant post but a few of the bands I shot a bunch of photos that weren’t just your average boring concert shots will get their own post.  The first one of these acts was Major Lazer.

I love shooting Major Lazer because Skerrit Bwoy, while insanely hard to spell, is an amazing entertainer. The dude might be the best hype man since Flavor Flav. He and his partner Piink get the kids going nuts while Diplo towers over them in his DJ booth. Skerrit Bwoy is king of the dagger, taking out girls in the crowd, but Piink is not to be fucked with, when she brought up a guy from the audience who wouldn’t dagger her she jumped on him traumatizing him for life.

The show was great and I got awesome pictures, but what was even better was that they had a bottle of Sailor Jerry on stage the whole time and Skerrit Bwoy fed it to the crowd making my client very very happy with these shots. Plus we got Diplo and Piink to get Sailor Jerry tattoos after the concert… So pay attention kids… this is how you do liquor branding right!

Click here to see all the shots of Major Lazer at the 2011 Voodoo Music Experience.