One night only

XThe ‘Music to my eyes’ tutorial (N-photo 140, Summer 2022), brought a smile to my face as I remembered a fabulous night in May. I sent an email to a local promoter asking if I bought tickets to one of his tribute night shows, could I get backstage passes? A set of family tickets came my way free of charge, along with backstage access and an invitation to meet the bands.

The two bands were Petty Criminals, a Tom Petty tribute, and Money for Nothing, a Dire Straits tribute. Both bands gave me interviews for my blog and invited me to take as many photos as I wished. Money for Nothing even invited me on stage for the encore to take back-of-the-stage photos, where I got to take pictures from the exalted position, behind the drum kit. The bands both got copies of all the images and have since used them on their own websites.

I was only a music journo for one night and it only ended up on my blog but the adrenaline rush of being at the sharp end of a large gig kept me on a high for weeks. Not having a 35mm prime lens (yeah I know!) like your article suggested, I used the shorter of my two zooms, an 18-105mm, I shot some images with a little fill-in flash provided by the on-camera flash, rather than risk blinding the acts with a bigger hotshoe gun, I also set the camera to a fast ISO using between 1600 to 6400. It was a great night and I’m back again in a few weeks for The Jam and AC/DC – tributes, of course!

Simon Elson

If you don’t ask, you don’t get! It’s great to hear how you managed to get access to photograph your passion – and came away with some cracking shots of the evening.