Leica M (typ-240), 35mm Summilux Asph FLE.
Archive for September, 2013
The Happiness Of Adams Morgan Day
Posted in Uncategorized with tags Leica 35mm Summilux FLE, Leica M-240 on September 8, 2013 by johnbuckley100Neko Case Is A Man, An Animal, A Gorgeous Singer, Ambitious Songwriter Too
Posted in Music with tags "The Worse Things Get The Harder I Fight The Harder I Fight The More I Love You", A.C. Newman, Neko Case, The New Pornographers on September 8, 2013 by johnbuckley100Last time around, Neko Case declared she was a “man, man, man eater,” and the title of one of Middle Cyclone’s best songs was “I’m An Animal.” Now, on her most accessible and strongest solo album, the glorious The Worse Things Get, The Harder I Fight, The Harder I Fight, The More I Love You, Neko declares “I’m A Man,” and does a better job of convincing us than Muddy Waters ever did. More like a Superman, both the king and the queen of our species.
“Man” was the first song we heard from the new album, and the best instantaneous signal it sent to our brain was that had to be the New Pornographer’s Kurt Dahl on drums. We love the way most of Neko’s solo albums have had Calexico’s John Covertino hitting the skins, but Covertino is a moody and mysterious artist on the traps; to have the rolling thunder of Kurt Dahl powering things along meant that this was going to be a different kind of Neko Case album. And it is.
Lest you think, from the title, that Neko’s joined Fiona Apple’s ranks, The Worse Things Get… is the least baroque, most straight ahead rock’n’roll album of her distinguished solo career, even as it retains all of the complex folk song structures we’ve grown to love. For someone who was introduced to most of the world through the high camp pop dynamics of the New Pornographers, Neko’s solo albums have always been something way different, as different from those albums as Utah’s Dirty Devil River is from Vancouver Harbour. We have loved Neko’s voice from the first moment we heard it, but if you had to mark the moment it truly captured our heart, it was actually when she sang backup to Sally Timms on the Mekons’ “City of London” on Journey To The End Of Night. There was just something about the emollient power of her vocals that lassoed our left ventricle and yanked. But there was such a leap between the pop dynamics of her early role in the New Pornos, which eventually morphed into true co-equal status with A.C. Newman, and the solo albums she recorded with the likes of Calexico and Giant Sand, that while we admired the raw ambition of her songwriting, we didn’t really love the albums. They were work, punctuated by some songs so great you immediately created a new playlist just to have them star on it.
Even on the great Blacklisted, in which Neko’s funny, marvelous lyrics seemed like a beautiful woman spouting Kant, just to show she’s not just another pretty face, we found the music slow going. Again, the metaphor to torture is these songs were often like a creek in the beautiful high desert compared to the easy and torrential flow of the Columbia, up there in the geography of the New Pornographers. We didn’t much enjoy Fox Confessor Brings The Flood, though Middle Cyclone took on some of the aspect of her satisfying solo album, The Tigers Have Spoken, on which, with a great live band, she kicked ass. We played Middle Cyclone a lot. But since we’ve downloaded The Worse Things Get, we can’t stop listening to it — an indicator this is something different, something a little easier, poppier, and yeah, better.
You might think, listening to the opener here, “Wild Creatures,” that we are in for another dark, difficult ride, one where you could admire the scenery, as in a Terence Malick movie, without much loving it. But by the time we get to “Man,” it’s clear: this is Neko’s masterpiece, at least so far; the album that combines this most ambitious songwriter’s gathering strength with a varied template that makes room for crowd-pleasing melody. While we’ve always loved hearing Neko’s voice, on the new album, we can have it all.
The Muslim Girl In The Bishop’s Garden
Posted in Uncategorized with tags Leica Monochrom and Noctilux on September 4, 2013 by johnbuckley100Gorgeous day in the Nation’s Capital. Who wouldn’t want to do her homework in a quiet, shady spot at the National Cathedral? Leica Monochrom, Noctilux.
What We Learned Over One Year With The Leica Monochrom
Posted in Uncategorized with tags Black and White Photography, Leica Monochrom, Leica Photography, One Year With The Leica Monochrom on September 1, 2013 by johnbuckley100
The first full day we had our Leica Monochrom — which arrived one year ago this past week — we took the above picture and amazed ourselves. Not that the photo was so good, but we marveled at the strange fact that, as a lover of deeply saturated color images, we likely never would have processed the picture in black and white; we would have kept it as a color image, and toyed with white balance and tones. If anything, we would have enhanced the color. And in so doing, we might never have discovered that this was an image that would look better as a black and white print.
Over those next, early September weeks, it was as if we had discovered photography anew. It had been decades since we’d developed black and white images in a basement. We’d forgotten the joy of not simply capturing the world to see what things looked like as pictures, to paraphrase Gary Winogrand, but to see life transformed into something with more classical resonance. We went to familiar places and, because we were thinking in terms of luminance, not chroma — light, not color — we could see shapes and patterns that once would have been uninteresting to us, and which now, because we were shooting with a black and white sensor precisely as limited as black and white film, could be seen in literally a different light.
Those first few weeks with the Monochrom were magical, but the adventure continued throughout the late autumn and into the winter. We learned that, shooting with a mindset that was determinedly focused on light and composition, not seduced by the garishness of color, the city that surrounded us could be seen in new ways.
Portraits offered a completely different spectrum of possibilities. The Monochrom had the effect of not just transforming the world we saw into black and white, it transformed the way we considered the world. It transformed our approach to photography. It sent us back to photography books, to see how all the great black and white photographers understood the world they set out to capture. The history of photography became even more relevant.
When out and about with our Monochrom, we were drawn to photograph very different people than we might ever before have asked if we could take their picture.
We went out into landscapes we were suddenly excited to try capturing in monochrome, exploiting possibilities inherent in the season. Once again, we saw familiar places and things anew. Yes, dedicated black and white photographers might scoff at this journey we were on. But, the point is, ever since we first took a picture with a Leica M7 and Fuji Velvia film, we’d been dedicated to color photography. This was something new. It made us excited by photography all over again.
As we waited for spring to arrive, and the landscape to erupt in color, we weren’t stymied by flat light and a limited palette. Photography had become possible in any light and season. In fact, in some cases, flat light was preferable.
In March, we were fortunate enough to acquire a Leica M (typ 240), which was a step up from our beloved M9. But even as we went on vacation in the Yucatan, and and drank deeply from the rich colors available in that tropical light, we knew for certain which images would be better off taken with the Monochrom. We retained that sensibility that black and white photography was a superior approach, sometimes.
As summer arrived, we went out with a different expectation of what we could record with our camera(s). There were days when we deliberately set out to find images that lent themselves to a kind of classical photography that just a year earlier, we wouldn’t have considered. Or would have taken in color and not have had the sensibility to exploit in the more dramatic medium of black and white photography.
Our time out West this past summer was spent in a possibly schizoid contrast between taking photos of the natural environment with as much appreciation for the color palette as possible and then deliberately desaturating what we saw in our mind’s eye so as to capture timeless images in black and white.
As the full year with the Monochrom came to a close, and an event like the 50th Anniversary of the March on Washington arrived, we went out in the streets with our Monochrom, because now it simply appealed to us to capture such an event in black and white.
A camera is a tool. But one year with the Leica Monochrom not only enabled us to view images in a wholly new way. It opened our eyes. It is more than a tool. It is magical.
Follow John Buckley on Twitter: @Johnbuckley100.
Tulip Frenzy 