We all had to travel on the lowest of budgets so after a bit of research we booked some cheap flights from Charleroi to Riga with Ryanair and took the bus from there to Tallinn. I had been partying the night before we left and as a result was completely wasted. I figured since we’d be travelling all day I would easily be able to sleep a bit along the way. Every time though I could finally catch up on some sleep on the plane or the bus either the clumsy flight-attendant bumped into me with the food car, and the ass did that twice, every time I just managed to fall asleep, or we would get passport control and some rude officer I couldn’t understand would come poke me for my ID. You can’t believe how happy I was to finally arrive at the hotel!

The next two days were practice days and we’d spend all day at the arena. The first day though we immediately messed up. We had gone into town to look for some lunch and a supermarket to get some stash, but we got terribly lost and we arrived way late for Willem’s first two hours of practice leaving him with only half an hour. We decided to stick around to watch the other groups ride and lucky for Willem security wasn’t all that tight so he could sneak onto the course and get some more runs in that first day. Second day went pretty good, too, though I hadn’t slept that well and getting up at 8am for another two hours of morning practice was horrible. This time we were one of the first there and Willem enjoyed the free space that first half hour very much. We stayed again until all BMX practice was over and than went back to the hotel to wait for the rest of the Grounded crew to arrive.

A couple minutes and some google searches later we found out there were two Tallinn City Hotels and we were on opposite sides of the city…

Later that evening we got a text from Brecht (the Grounded TM) that they had arrived at the hotel and we had to come meet them in the lobby. When we got there the lobby was empty though. All a bit confused we called Brecht and a few weird moments later we realized we were in different hotels. A couple minutes and some google searches later we found out there were two Tallinn City Hotels and we were on opposite sides of the city… Why nobody checked this before we left I still don’t get! Both hotels were fully booked though so there was nothing we could do. In the end the other guys were only staying for two nights so it wasn’t that big of a deal, but still was pretty stupid we couldn’t hang out now. It also was Bart’s birthday though on Friday and he was hungry to go out so we got on the bus across town and met up with them at the first Simple Session party for some celebrating. It ended up killing me the following day as the harsh cold and the by then serious lack of sleep had caught up with me. And it hadn’t really been such a great party either so that sucked a little!

Waking up with a terrible headache and a sour swollen throat really made me want to stay in bed, but we headed out to the arena for qualification anyway and I struggled myself through the day trying to focus on taking some good pictures. Willem was stressed as always at such a big comp so his first run wasn’t verry good, but in his second visit he was clearly over it and rode a really good run. He ended up finishing in 74th, which doesn’t seem all that great, but if you know he rode against the best of the world and you see who finish under him or barely a few point above him it was pretty impressive and obviously he was stoked.

Like Catfish raves all day on his mic, when you visit Tallinn you get an overdose of beautiful women and this club was no exception. It was stuffed with ‘em!

I can’t report on the Saturday party as I was crashing hard at the hotel that night and probably slept for like 11 hours straght, but from what I heard from the rest of the crew I missed the best party of the weekend. I couldn’t care less though ’cause Sunday I felt a lot better and was ready to see some crazy stuff during the finals. I’m not going to get into details of what went down as that has been all over the web already when we hadn’t even sobered up from the afterparty sunday, but history got written that night. The two tricks I can clearly remember are the insane cliffhangers that crazy Pat Casey was firing out all weekend, and of course the amazing no-handed cashroll Brett “Maddog” Banasiewicz pulled of as his last trick like he did them all day every day. That kid is so smooth!

It was Drew Bezanson though who took the win yet again this year, the judges and the crowd both love this guy. He has so much control over his bike, sees crazy lines that no one would ever think of doing and does both the crazy tech stuff like the icepick to footjam on that huge vertwall, as the big complete mental tricks like his huge tailwhip drop, first trick of his final run, and the caveman and bars to ice way up on the judges tower. A deserved winner for sure and if you want to get all the good stuff that has been posted of this years edition in one place, go check out the Simple Session’s website. The got it all there!

Sunday night was an insane afterparty! Like Catfish raves all day on his mic, when you visit Tallinn you get an overdose of beautiful women and this club was no exception. It was stuffed with ‘em! You also get to congratulate the riders in person as they are all hanging out and you even get to witness some of your heroes go completely nuts, drunk as hell. Good times!

We stayed two extra days to check out the city and go play tourist and shop a little, and it was great on the one hand as Tallinn truly is an awesome city and it looks almost fairy tale like in winter with all the snow, but on the other hand it’s so damn cold and we all returned home with a huge cold which wasn’t all that fun. Overall I had a blast though and I’d probably return next year if I could, maybe even come out this summer for the Summer session… We’ll see! Enjoy the clicking through the pictures, I brought back a ton and I’m pretty stoked on how they turned out!

Romanov is an awesome bar! It opened just after I moved so I’ve only been there a few times since it’s opening about a year ago, but it is easily one of my favourite bars in the country. It is however not a club, so when a band plays there, there is no special lighting nor a stage for them to play. And this is great for the spectators as the band is all over the place and it makes for great ambiance. But as a photographer, it’s awful! Or I should say, a challenge.

Sticking on a speedlite during a concert is something I’d normally never do. A stage is lit in a special way and that is the experience that got created for the spectator. If you want to capture the concert in a truthful way, that is the light you work with and you should never be blasting some of your own light in there. If a room is almost pitch black though and the majority of light your camera is receiving comes from a couple flashing coloured spots directly on top of the band, you have absolutely no choice. I probably blinded a couple of people standing behind and to the side of me while bouncing in some light here and there, but I did my very best to keep the available light as the primary light source and only fill in with the flash.

If a room is almost pitch black though and the majority of light your camera is receiving comes from a couple flashing coloured spots directly on top of the band, you have absolutely no choice.

I started off using ETTL like I mostly do when bouncing, but it gave me pretty inconsistent results due to all the flashing lights during the exposure assessments, so I switched to manual flash for the Now Voyager show. Looking at the results I probably could have done a better job adjusting the flash every time I moved, but think they turned out all right. The exposure is more consistent at least I think.

I only stayed for about an hour and a half, but I really enjoyed myself. The turnout however wasn’t all that great. A lot of college student probably had to pass because of exams and I can imagine for those still in high-school it wasn’t easy to get permission or a lift to go out on a schoolnight. But if you missed it and really wanted to see these guys play, as I can imagine, you are not to worry, both the nice people of the Elijah and Hopes Die Last told me they were definitely playing in Belgium again later this year so keep an eye on their Myspace pages and try to make it then. I for one am looking forward to seeing them return!

Tek-One is a dubstep trio. I’m not a big fan of the genre but I actually liked their show. Check out their Myspace for some wobbly tunes.

The Devil Wears Prada and Architects both are bands that started to combine the breakdown hardcore metal genre with melodic vocals just like Bring Me The Horizon, but do it both in their own unique way. Like I said, I hadn’t really been listening to these bands before, but seeing them live swept me away and made me get their music. Hit up their Myspace pages if you like BMTH, but don’t know these guys yet.

Bring Me The Horizon played in my opinion, like I said in the intro, their best show so far in Belgium. They have evolved a lot the last couple of years, became enormously popular and their latest album There Is A Hell Believe Me I’ve Seen It, There Is A Heaven Let’s Keep It A Secret dropped like bom and sky-rocketed into the first place in many lists only days after it came out. If you don’t know them, go check them out, they are awesome!

After getting lost riding my bike from the train-station to the skatepark in the pouring rain, I met up with my friends Willem, Hannes and Micheal at SOMIC. I used to ride with ‘em all the time when I was in high-school and still living with my parents. When I started taking pictures they were also the ones in front of the lens most of the time. They are all really talented bike riders and shooting with these guys is always a blast. Every time we meet at least one of them has a new trick to show off.

Willem just got hooked up by Grounded that week and needed a couple pictures for a bike check for their website so that’s what we shot first. After that we moved on to the action. Bear in mind though, that he put that bright green Amity frame, and some other new parts, on only the night before. Fresh from the shop. If you like to know what his normal level of riding is check out his welcome-to-the-team-edit filmed in the park only a week later, when he got a little more used to his new ride. Bangers all the way through.

Because of the small turnout and the fact I’m really comfortable shooting with my friends makes the pictures are mainly of them, but I managed to get some lucky shots from a couple of other riders as well. Let’s just hope they read this and next time are a little less scared of approaching me and ask for a specific shot. I haven’t bitten anybody since kindergarten, I swear! And that was even only in self-defence. But seriously, It’s important. Every trick has it’s ‘best’ side and it’s own timing. Knowing what the trick is going to be and where the rider is headed gets you the best results. So please, if you see me shooting again some time, just come talk to me if you got something you want shot and we can work on it together.

I had some bad luck with my computer and I can think of a few things I’ll have to do differently next time. Like announcing way earlier and maybe do it on a Saturday in stead of a Wednesday. All in all though, I really enjoyed my little shoot, so expect more to come once my shoulder is healed enough to hold up my DSLR again.

Vooruit is a really old building. Build in 1913 by architect Ferdinand Dierkens for the socialist association Samenwerkende Maatschappij Vooruit. It was supposed to bring culture to the working class. The opening however only took place after World War I in 1918. It bloomed for many years, but after it’s occupation during World War II it never got back on it’s feet again and went out of business a little later. The building got neglected and started falling apart. But in 1982 it got offered a second chance. And because of photography of all things.

In the early 80′s two young photographers shelter from the rain in the ruins of the old building, so the legend goes. They get intrigued by all the long lost beauty and start taking photographs. The photographs make their way to the people through exhibitions and a book and al of a sudden everyone sees the building’s potential and realize it has got to be saved. By 1983 Vooruit gets declared monument and it gets restorated. It took almost 20 years to get everything back up and running, but these days Vooruit is blooming again.

Nice story, huh? Back to the concert though. I guess everyone does this. When the last band went off stage and I make my way to the exit. While shuffling along in the big stream of sweaty people. I process the show. How was the crowd, how was the band, did they play all the songs I wanted to hear?

For both bands my conclusion was pretty much the same. The crowd was sweet, very good atmosphere. The band though, disappointed me a little. Like I said it’s punk, so I wasn’t expecting them to sound like on the album. And they didn’t and in a good way, they were clearly enjoying themselves, just jamming away. No what disappointed me was the songs they choose to play. In my opinion both bands have a lot of great songs and some I like a little less. What happened was that they played quite a few lesser ones and also just completely left out some of my favourites. I really don’t understand what happened there, but that’s what went down.

Never the less I still love these guys, so check them out if you like a smile on your face. For those wondering, Hell Yeah! by Zebrahead and That’s Why They Call It A Union by Less Then Jake were two songs I really missed in there.

I only arrived just before The Gaslight Anthem was going to play and so I could forget finding a nice spot in the front. Even trying to get a bit closer to the centre was pretty much impossible so I decided to check out the balcony. At higher-energy-shows you just have to be in the pit so I never been up there before, but the view is actually pretty nice.

A minute or two later the show started. And they open with a little talk! Not run on stage and start their first song, no they calmly came on, grabbed their stuff and then said hi first. It was surprising, but kicked things of in a very nice way. It also struck me how well they play. I’m used to see bands getting a bit sloppy when playing live, but these guys know their stuff. Along with that the crowd was great as well. The great thing about club concerts is that every single head in the crowd comes out just to see these one or two bands which creates an amazing atmosphere. People sing along, the applause is huge after every song and you can feel the band enjoys it a lot too. Another great and rather surprising thing was that, a song or two from the end of their set, lead singer Brian Fallon made a deal with the crowd to not do the encore stuff. So in stead of wasting time on going of stage and then coming back on for another song they wanted to just play as much songs as they could before they would get shut down because of the curfew. Everyone loved it!

I really enjoyed seeing them live and as usual recommend you to check them out as well. They come from New Brunswick, New Jersey and play some nice old meets new (punk)rock. Have a listen on Myspace, check out their website and they even have a page on Wikipedia if you like to learn more.

Every year this thing keeps getting bigger and bigger and keeps getting better and better. It was the first time for me so I can’t compare to earlier years, but it was massive. I’d love to give you some numbers, unfortunately I can’t find them anywhere… This years line-up and the like are on the I ♥ Techno website so check that for more info.

Although they sold out, I had a hard time finding people to come along. Since I started working, money for stuff like this for me isn’t really a problem any more. Most of my friends are in college at the moment though, and stdudents generally don’t have that kind of money to spare. Luckily my friend Ward was up for killing is allowance for the next couple of weeks so just before they all were gone we managed to get our two tickets. We ended up seeing most of Boys Noize, A-trak, Goose, Bloody Beetroots Deathcrew 77, Fake Blood, Steve Aoki, Dr. Lektroluv and Sound Of Stereo, which were all amazing. Wild night!

The Schildpadhoeve (Turtleranch) in Retie, a small town near Antwerp, was the venue of this year’s edition. It rained a bit as is usual here in the fall, but all in all weather was pretty good. We managed again to get down the usual mix of rehearsals of running big pieces with a little bit of lighter fun music in between and the group games we play with the whole bunch. I definitely had a blast!

I also brought my camera along to shoot some pictures. They already got displayed at our annual members banquet, but they will be used at our Winterconcert the 8th of January in some way too. I’m pretty stoked on how they came out. I think they really captured the atmosphere.

The bar they played at was only a minute or two walk from where I live so we agreed to meet up at my place. The funniest thing about us two going out together is that we just can’t get anywhere on time. So when the band was supposed to start that evening I had only just started eating diner and there was still no sign of Lorelei. A few seconds later she called that she was on her way over, but got lost and needed some directions. My computer was still running so a couple clicks later I had located her on Google maps and she was back on her way. About 20 miutes later we managed to get to the bar. Lucky enough the band didn’t care for starting on time either and had only just climbed on stage. We quickly grabbed a beer and sat ourselves down.

The place was jam packed, but somehow people still found room to dance around. It was a funny sight!

Peut-être Demain is not a band I see myself go to a concert off very often but I liked their music a lot. They play sort of a blend of folk and rock. It’s a bit strange, but really catchy. And you can feel that they really love what they do. Very hard not to like! If you ever get the chance to see them, I really recommend you do. Check out their Myspace and have a listen!