I’ve been so remiss in posting lately that I’ve not only had the honor of contributing a photograph to Touch Radio 64, but the just-released Touch Radio 74 as well. The former is a fascinating field recording of the songs of wolves by Yannick Dauby, whilst the latter is a piece by one of my favorite electronic musicians, CM von Hausswolff.

Please take the time to listen and enjoy these recent instalments in a fantastic podcast series. You can subscribe to Touch Radio via iTunes or you can stream all episodes directly from the Touch iPhone app (which I helped make—sorry that I still haven’t posted about that!).

Many thanks to Mike Harding for his continued encouragement of my artistic pursuits as well as to Jon Wozencroft for always having been a visual inspiration to me.

Do you like pubs? I like pubs. Who doesn’t like pubs?

When I lived in London, I spent most of my time in them. As you do.

The good people at Touch have just released the latest installment in their exceptional Touch Radio podcast series, Pub. They were kind enough to pay me the honor of using the above photograph of mine as the visual counterpart to this episode. As a longtime follower of their always brilliant releases, I am massively thrilled to have my work presented alongside theirs.

The recording is of secret origin, but I do know one thing that I am permitted to tell you: it was recorded in a London pub. It’s Friday, so have a pint of ale, listen to Pub and allow yourself to enter this pub. It’s a friendly, lively place.

Another pint of Adnams, please!

The Chicago blizzard of 1967 (from Chicago Now):

The Chicago snowpocalypse of 2011 (from CBS):

*shakes head*

Tristan Perich

October turned out to be quite a busy live music month for me. Covering more than two gigs in any given week is a bit overwhelming, but this past month had almost the perfect amount of activity: enough to make me feel like a healthy, socially functional member of society, but not so much so that I fell behind on Boardwalk Empire.

From the classic indie sounds of The Vaselines to the plodding terror of Swans and from the dark new wave pop of Gary Numan to the 1-bit electronic minimalism of Tristan Perich, a diverse range of talent passed in front of my lens. Although I shot all these events for Gapers Block: Transmission and my photographs appear in the respective reviews there, here’s a quick look back at the highlights:

Gary Numan

Christoph Hahn of Swans

Eugene Kelly of The Vaselines

Frances McKee of The Vaselines

Michael Gira of Swans

A conversation this morning on Twitter with Dave Quam focused largely on the topic of dick riders. Since you can’t have the yin without the yang, I naturally expanded the discussion to include haters. Every city in every country on this planet has haters, but here in Chicago, we have them in abundance. Dave was moaning about all the dick riders in town, but I warned of that far more dangerous threat to life, creativity and general all-around good vibes: haters.

Since Mr. Quam indicated that he’s planning on starting a badass music night soon, I took the opportunity to prepare this graphic for him. It projects the growth of both dick riders and haters across the lifespan of any creative project you may choose to execute. My chart assumes that you’ve got a good idea and you’re executing it well. Don’t worry too much about the haters: due to the principle of Haters Gonna Hate, the number of haters will eventually stabilize and should remain relatively constant throughout the duration of your efforts. Don’t be discouraged if, at one point, it seems like you have more haters than dick riders (note the blue dashed line in the above graphic). Jesus started with only twelve dick riders and look how famous he is now. If you keep on track, your number of dick riders will pick up and hopefully one day approach infinity.

Don’t like dick riders? Good for you! You keep it real. Nevertheless, it is the dick riders that will come to your nights and tell everyone that you’re the man. Dick riders form the foundation of your fanbase. Don’t hate on them. If they really annoy you, simply pay them no mind. Keep on doing what you do best and be thankful someone is interested in your shit.

Now then, anyone know where I can get some dick riders for my photographic work?

Download a larger version of the above graphic (1440 x 900)

What a lovely day! I do believe that I shall wheel myself into town so that I may witness the wonders of the modern world with mine own eyes!

High-resolution download (2048 x 1280)

October is Chicago Artists Month and I’m participating in two East Pilsen shows this weekend, October 1–3. The first is located at 2003 S. Halsted Street and is organized by the Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs, the Chicago Arts District and Gapers Block. I have two 11″ x 14″ photographs in this show and share the space with loads of other talented local artists. The second will be held in The Ministry of Caps at 732 W. 19th Street, #3R and features several of my photographs along with a selection of jewelry from Bees on Toast. Both shows occur simultaneously, but are within a five minute walk of each other. Friday, October 1 is the opening night party from 6pm to 10pm, but the show continues on Saturday, October 2 and Sunday, October 3 from 12pm to 7pm.

Please come and visit these shows, bring friends and take the opportunity to see my neighborhood. All the galleries in this art district will be open, so once you’ve seen my work, I encourage you to spend time experiencing the talents my neighbors have to offer.

I’ve almost finished consuming everything that the brilliant Lynda.com has to teach me about Adobe Illustrator CS5. As I just learned about Live Trace this week, expect to see an excessive display of tacky photo-based illustrations from me in the near future. I’ll start with this scary zombie I made based on a stock photo of a corporate businesswoman who has rather unfortunately come to dominate many of my daylight hours. Now she can walk the nightmares I have whilst sleeping as well as the ones I have as I bang my head against my desk 37.5 hours each week.

BEHOLD! Zombie… UNLEASHED!

Download as a desktop background (1440 x 900)

It wasn’t long after returning to Chicago that I found myself wanting to shoot gigs again. Whilst living in London, I had the pleasure of reporting on a wide range of music events, including the Melvins, Fennesz, Dan Deacon, Gravetemple and Philip Jeck. Some of these I covered in words and all of them I covered in pictures. The main focus of my photography isn’t gigs by any means, but as a life-long music lover, it inevitably became a part of it.

I’ve always been a fan of the venerable Chicago blog Gapers Block, so when the opportunity arose to join the staff of their music section, Transmission, I jumped at it. Technically I’m part of their photography staff, as I joined to shoot gigs and let others write about them. When there are, however, events about which I’m so passionate that I also must say a few words, I wear both caps. Such was the case with the first annual Sónar Chicago this past weekend, where in the end I produced three reviews and a handful of snaps. They are all up on the site now, so please do have a read and a look. Cheers!

The reviews:

Sónar Chicago, Day One @ Pritzker Pavilion, 9 September 2010
Ben Frost @ Chicago Cultural Center, 11 September 2010
Rangda @ Empty Bottle / Appleblim, Cosmin TRG @ Smart Bar, 10 September 2010

The photos:

Sónar Chicago 2010 – a set on Flickr