Andrew St. Clair

If Nirvana and The Jimi Hendrix Experience had a baby, it would be Screaming Females. This intense punk rock power trio are not only one of my very, very favorite bands to see live, but on a personal level they’ve always been generous in giving me access to them off and on-stage. So, I’m always looking forward to them coming to town.

I got to the Seaport about an hour early to hang out and shoot some candids of the band. At one point, they were chilling out, tooling around on their phones (well, at least Mike and Jarrett were) and I asked them to sit next to each other for some shots, but otherwise, I was pretty undemanding. I chilled out with the band talking about how emotionally manipulative Pixar movies are, moving to new houses/apartments, Paula Cole and Limp Bizkit (haha)… while occasionally taking a candid photo here and there.

The last time I saw Ted Leo was at the Michael Azzarad concert where he sang five Minor Threat songs while a reel-to-reel played the backing track. All of which Ted recorded himself. Ted was hanging around with the Screamales and his bandmates. He’s a pretty friendly guy and has a ton of great stories to share.

Screaming Females just tore shit up! Probably the most intense I’ve heard them play. I think I say that every time I see them, actually. But to be fair, I heard similar thoughts from other concert goers. Marissa seems to get the most press mentions, but Jarrett and Mike fucking ‘do work’ and at the same time, they give Marissa room to shred the fuck out. They are playing at House of Vans in a couple weeks with Cro-Mags and Fucked Up. Should be a fucking crazy show.

As for the photography part… The lighting contained lots of orange, but oddly, not very bright (at least not at the beginning). So, I used a flash to neutralize the slight orange hue (when I could) and be able to shoot at a higher aperture to reduce depth of field so that the background wasn’t blurred out. Such as the audience or objects that included the thin masts and booms on the boats at the seaport would disappear into the bright background at f/1.4 so, that was pretty much my attack plan. And here’s a rarity… the photo pit was open for their entire set. On top of that, I had an all-access pass and had arranged to shoot from the back and side of the stage.

After the Sceamales scorching set, I was helping to move some gear off the stage and I told Jarrett, “That’s going to be tough to follow. I feel bad for that Ted Leo guy.” All the while knowing that Ted was in earshot. He popped his head out of the backstage tent and said “I’m the clean-up band.” I don’t think Jarrett and I had ever heard that term before, so Ted proceeded to tell a story about how when he was in the band Chisel. Chisel played after Radiohead as the ‘Cleanup band’ playing for 200 people vs. the “Twenty Thousand” that came to see Radiohead. Ted said that a large portion of the audience left after they played ‘Creep’.

Ted Leo took the stage and told the crowd that Screaming Females were “the best band in the world… for now.” So, I guess from that statement, Ted was the clean-up band. But, at least wasn’t playing for just 200 people. But seriously, the turnout at Pier 17 was pretty great. The majority of the crowd seemed to be big fans of TL/Rx and really showed their love for them. Not only did they play through the entirety of ‘The Tyranny of Distance’, but another 8 or 9 other songs as well. The band was fun to shoot, especially Ted, who was constantly moving and jumping around. It was great to see TL/Rx perform tracks that the band rarely play live.

I’d like to thank Marissa, Jarrett, Mike, Kate, Ted, James, Chris & Marty (& Joe at Don Giovanni Records) for letting me hang out during a great summer evening. Especially Marissa for not thinking I was a (complete) retard for accidentally calling Jessie from Toy Story “The Girl Cowboy”. You can see the photos over on TheMorningAfterPills.com, plus some candids on my Flickr stream.