Lux Interior, R.I.P.

He was one of two of my best and favorite subjects to photograph - Lux Interior... frontman and founder of The Cramps.

The noir lighting was my idea... the props were all his.

Lux was best known as a malevolent beast of a performer. He knew no boundaries... he wore women's clothes on stage, and more often than not, shed most of his clothing anyway. He'd fellate the microphone, dance around on super high fuck-me pumps and act like a transvestite Frankenstein and still, the ladies went wild for him.

Together with his soul-mate, life-long partner and wife, Poison Ivy Rorshach, Lux cut an atavistic path in a new genre's future. The Cramps music drew upon 50s and 60s culture and icons - b movies, monsters.... bikini girls with machine guns, Ghoulardi... they elevated bad taste from the underground sewer into the very same gutter that Oscar Wilde imagined being in while gazing up at the stars.

The unexpected passing of Lux Interior has struck a deep chord in the hearts of all punk rock fans. I don't know any death that has hit so hard. For all his dark side stage persona, Lux Interior was not an evil man. Far from it, he was clever and down right intelligent and kind. He gave so much to so many. And for me, he gave me confidence as an artist, encouraging me to trust my own vision and run with it.

The evidence of that is played out each day on punkturns30 and in coffee table books that feature the classic Cramps group portrait from the Tropicana, 1978.

Lux Interior, I will miss you.

Dear Ivy... there are no words to express how heavy my heart is for your loss, and how over the years, I have appreciated you sharing your man with the world.

Rest in Peace, Lux and give em hell in heaven.

the wall of death, part 1

over the course of the last three years, whenever i go for a walk in east nashville, i stumble upon a dead bird. luckily, most of the times, i have had some kind of camera to document it.

its not that i am morbid or fascinated by death in any way. its not that i like that the birds are dead. but they are incredibly interestingly photogenic.

while the advent of cameras built into cel phones has really lowered the bar for the appreciation of the art of capturing images, you simply cannot beat the convenience.



the very first dead bird i photographed in nashville
photo taken with a real camera

i was taken by the way the dead birds blended into the sidewalk, as if they were integrated as a single piece of art.


pigeons in cleveland

living birds just don't appeal to me the same way dead ones do... where photographs are concerned.
add to these particular images the low resolution of the cel phone camera, the absolute digital look of the pictures... they're strangely like a crime scene photo that has been photocopied just one time too many and has lost the definition. the weaknesses of digital photography and low res cel phone images work together to elevate a certain "artiness" to these dead birds... a certain postmodern, i saw it on tv art, but i believe that's what art has devolved to. a dangerously political statement to be expounded upon further elsewhere. perhaps.




i know an artist in brooklyn - a woman in her early 20s. her name is rebecca bird. her real name. for real. and she painted dead birds, from models. dead birds she found on the street. whenever i found dead birds in brooklyn, their cause of death was freezing. like this sparrow here:


dead sparrow photographed with a real camera

apart from natural causes, such as hypothermia, i think that the birds i see on east nashville's streets are killed by feral cats. there are so many stray animals... a feral cat lives under my house and i know she leaves us presents from time to time... i mean - i know the dead birds and assorted rodents i find on the porch are offerings from her, thanking us for the shelter



ah the food chain

its always been all about available light

self portrait at mimi's, originally uploaded by AvailableLight2008.

it doesn't matter to me if the light is crappy; if it is the kind of light that most people wouldn't shoot in without a flash or without bringing in extra lights. that's the light i like....

i like mirrors too. they are a great source of light

it will all come to bear in my 2008/2009 show and tell.... starting in september....

highway 304

last week, i took a day trip to northern mississippi... drove around taking pictures, ended up at tunica to have a cheap all you can eat buffet lunch at a casino.

PIG FOR SALE proclaims this sign on highway 304 in desoto county.
its like another time

thanks bobby for the day trip and the outrageously fattening lunch.

exploring the visual treats of mississippi is a project that could take months. i can't wait to take time off to do it...

the magic light of the photobooth

because i am a photographer - and behind the camera nearly all the time, i am not a good subject in front of the camera. i make a pretty stupid face most of the time and try to open my eyes wide and as a result, i look pretty lame most of the time. i do a lame rachael ray thing with my mouth... which is big, so its a big crooked smirk-instead-of-smile that i do. big. stupid.

however.... that doesn't negate anything from the PHOTO BOOTH ITSELF. what a fantastic contraption that thing is. the lights just blow all the ugly details out of your face (that means wrinkles, blemishes, etc). you are BLASTED with bright light... and you never have red eye because the bright lights begin to flash before the shutter does. ingenious. i wish i had one in my house.

but i have embarked on a brand new project - one in which i've already gathered 100's of images... all of which i find stunning

taking a photo of a subject who is seated in and illuminated by the photo booth.

i received the most amazing compliment from this handsome gentlemen, who let me focus on his recently broken nose in this shot:



that is bruce bennett, know for both his work as a musician, a filmmaker, and a writer.

as a writer, he is gifted with a particularly witty turn of phrase whether he is writing criticism or creative... a confirmed cineaste with encylopaedic knowledge of the geeky thing that is my craft: cinematography... well, bruce knows his cameras, angles, exposures and lenses... you can't get anything past this guy... and while i went out of my way to focus on the singular physical fault upon that most handsome face (and one which i find makes him just that much more handsome), bruce was man enough to look beyond my elevation of the evidence of his injury to invoke the name of one of my favorite cinematographers (shooting elvis and bill holden in one career! i strive for that kind of thing) when commenting on this technique.

therefore, i know i have latched on to a winner.

i photographed bruce in one of our favorite bars, magnetic field. its photo booth emanates this crazy chartreuse light. at once it reminds me of carnies and of vermeer. crazy.

in a photo booth across the river, at lakeside lounge, an even darker bar.... i photographed kae who is a percussionist in the local whimsical band, mr badger.

the photo booth at lakeside lounge has a colder light and dark blue curtains that keep the cold. it would be all wrong to call this photo "hot asian chick in the cold blue light," even though in the most vulgar of worlds, that's what it is...



instead... i call this ECSTASY.

ECSTASY not unlike that of st teresa of avila (the one who spells her name wrong but who had the magical visions), ECSTASY yes... like in adult movies. ECSTASY, that as a photographer instead of a painter, i am able to capture in a fraction of a second, rather than remembering that fraction as i paint, or asking the model to hold her pose for an interminable period of time.

i am ECSTATIC about the light...

meanwhile, kae's bandmate jim donned his pirate gear for this fun portrait



the difference between the two photo booths is clear.



this is lee, one of the owners of magnetic field, in a photo booth portrait that for me channels vermeer... one of my favorite painters. i long to someday take a photograph that channels his "girl with a pearl earring" and i believe lee's photo booth can help me achieve that.

does this look like a storm to you?

it shouldn't because it isn't but it does have OMINOUS borders... its been raining for about 15 hours non stop. normally, i like that sort of thing but its just caused so much havoc. i wonder if i will be able to get out of town and to the airport and on the plane and make to to ny for my show.

going lo-fi

this photo of billy idol is actually one of the few of my punk rock images that i would call a fine art photo. there are so many fine art photography elements in it... the various reflections, the composition, the unguarded moment in which the subject was captured... and my favorite of all juxtapositional elements...a beautiful subject in gritty surroundings... the print itself is gorgeous... such beautiful tones, etc...

but when between susan arosteguy (the genius graphic designer who created the look of my tour materials) got a hold of the pix i would be using for posters, postcards and handbills, she took the pictures to even grittier levels... and when i sent this already deconstructed image to rosa guerrero, who organized the exhibit at sound exchange, she added to the vintage punk rock of it all by handwriting the show info on it....

and yet... i think the image of billy retains all its fine art qualities and i love seeing it juxtaposed with the hand written gig info and presented in a most high contrast, over-xeroxed way...

yes... punk rock imagery changed our visual palette for sure...

black & white is better. i already KNEW that...

i have been tweaking these photos i took last year of jack yarber for about the whole year.

jack was trying on different hats - it was in the evening - already dark outside, and he was doing his hat tricks in an interior hallway in his apartment...dimly lit, and of course, reflecting all the greens and yellows in the place, casting a pall on skin tones as if the lights were the deadly fluorescent variety. i have battled with those tones...and today, it hit me like 16 tons...that which i have known all my life...PICTURES ARE BETTER IN BLACK & WHITE.

with a little help from photoshop, i just eliminated the color, and instantly, i now love the pictures.

i hope jack does....

the hat trick set is posted on my portraits page, the female gaze.

open all night stuff

i wish the prius wasn't parked in front of canter's and also the car behind it. then this image would have been timeless... with the neon lights totally sending the colors off into the land of 1970s kodak chemical tones...

but because of the hybrid car and the "they all look alike" model behind it, this photo is wearing the scarlet letter of being 21st century. too bad.

what i like about photos and certain photographers and cinematographers is when you can't tell when the photo was taken, and it doesn't matter. like tim burton's edward scissorhands.

punk rock's inner circle?

i don't get out much anymore. really. i'll bet you think i jest, but seriously, i stay home plugged into my telephone (literally - with the headset!) and computer, talking to clients and also planning and organizing my upcoming photo tour.

however, last week, i ventured out in the hot hot heat to see my old, dear friends, the legendary british punk rock band, sham 69.

i don't go in too much for the live action photos anymore. i've shot at least 100,000 frames of guys with guitars. not that there's anything wrong with it - but anyone with a camera and some stamina can do it.

i prefer to capture a moment that resonates for me on a very intimate level.

portraits.


dave parsons looking like alain delon or jean-paul belmondo

not your standard portrait.


steve and ames, road crew guys for the dickies

i don't think i could actually do one.

but as the reviewer for the nashville scene wrote a couple years ago when my first punk turns 30 exhibit traveled, Kereakes' photographs, which are often (uncharacteristically) in color, have the informality of family photos - that is, if your family includes Dee Dee Ramone and Stiv Bators.

i liked that review.

punk rockers ARE my family....

the details and informal family photos of my day with sham 69 are at punkturns.30.com

summer fruit

there is nothing so lovely as a tree.

on an overcast day, with the sky and the ground both shades of grey, these vibrant purple plums provide the signs of life.

yes, punk is 30

i've been dropping the hint for a couple years!

but i still get excited when photo researchers and editors find me...like one from a MAJOR publication did today.

today (well, technically yesterday) was the anniversary of elvis's death. the king is dead; long live the king kind of thing.

google tells me that iggy pop is the king of punk rock. well, that certainly is a good thing and i do not disagree.



but did any royalty you know every look that good?

water, sort of...

the street offers a panoply of beautiful images. i love the manhole covers and other forged (as in foundry forging, of course) metal coverings.

i knew i couldn't be the only one who was into this. while living in nyc and working in brooklyn, i took a different route each day, and noticed that all the manhole covers said "city of new york, made in china," or "made in india" and started photographing them. they looked like tribal tattoos.

then on my travels, i went expressly looking for manhole covers of interest, and found they were everywhere!



it wasn't until i saw this grate warning me to "dump no waste" in cleveland that i was aware any city had taken so much consideration! in los angeles, such warnings are painted.


perhaps this is the reason why cleveland was so pro-active in protecting its water supply!



across the street from carnegie hall, dracula could slip quietly from the symphony into the gutter and hide from the sunlight. that would be a gotham dracula, of course.

Pedestrianation

its a word i made up. a noun with verb qualities.

"i go out walking after midnight..." and i go out walking at sunrise too. to catch the light.

i've been collecting images from my walks. its just odd stuff. but i like it.

it was in 1973 or so when my friend bill heiden, a wonderful photographer, and friend told me that you only needed a single roll of film to get all the great shots at a concert. well - we were teenagers then, and it was one of those grand statements that you make out of nowhere. a fact you made up because you could. but the idea of limitations and self-imposed restrictions rings true for me to this day.

available light is all i use. there was a time i used the flash - for actual photojournalism assignments or hopeful placements (and i was successful at this). but as you know, using a flash results in a flat image more often than not. i'm not talking about controlled lighting - i'm talking about that thing on your hotshoe.

available light on the other hand makes the game exciting.
here are some shots from twilight time... dawn and dusk.


daybreak over my backyard


bird houses at daybreak plus 5 minutes

these beautiful birdhouses are no longer there. the man who owns that house tore down his fence and covered the drive way with a wide swath of cement, making me think he's bought a boat and made a parking space for it. he still has those and dozens more brightly colored bird houses hanging on the wall in his garage. dare i ask him if i can photograph that wall?




flowers have long been a favorite subject for me. this was shot at daybreak as well and the photo looks so much better to me than the flowers, which were oozing with snail trails.

the whole purpose of my 6AM walking adventure was to photograph the union 76 ball before it was taken down.



that is gone now, too. where would our memories be without photographs?
there are more images from my 6AM photo adventure at pedestrianation.

no trespassing

if you think for one moment that i would obey this directive, then you don't know me. intrepid photographer. the hidden treasures on a late summer afternoon were pretty cool and quite worth trespassing.

urban CORN! lots of fruit trees, cactus, all in a city setting.

city? not quite.

welcome to the wine ghetto on california's central coast.

i have always loved that contradiction in terms - contradiction in california at least - of "wine" and "ghetto." sure "ghettoes" have winos, but here, we are talking about a kind of non-glamorous place where some very fine, fine wine is made. no touristy visiting the vineyard for tastings or anything like that...

yeah, california has napa for that. but i always liked sonoma better.

and those of us who hail from further south on the central coast have our own secret vineyards and vintners. from santa cruz all the way down to santa barbara, we have the same coastal fog, we have the same temperate climes (except for paso robles, with excellent wine yet hot hot heat), we have a few different grapes and different soil. we have lots of oak down here and our chardonnay is sublime. we have tons of fruit trees, making our syrah sublime, too (sorry, none of that aussie "shiraz" pronunciation around here, ok? petite syrah. c'est un mot grenouilleuse. froggie. french word). we have a marked LACK of pretension, however. no hard-to-get-into restaurants. nothing like that. yet.


no, it would not be california without palm trees.
i loved that you couldn't tell what year it was based on the cars!

i like old cars. they are quite photogenic. later, walking up the road, i spied this big ugly RV with a row of what appeared to be corn. i'm not sure if it is corn, or just looks like corn, but i'm calling it corn!


um... i'm not sure if this qualifies for the "ghetto" part of "wine ghetto." but its doing a good job of fulfilling a certain.... class aspect? or novelty. i saw plenty of this corn stuff, though! so much that it made me grab the camera.

this is an example of what i spied through a hole in the fence next to the house pictured above. cactus and corn! we are in the southwest, its true...as far west as the actual coastline.

i love the way the iron bar across the top of their wooden fence has rusted. the color is gorgeous. and the fence, with its charcoal grey wood, its painted white and painted red wood panels all serve to highlight the green of the cactus.

who knows if the residents of this odd place realize what a photogenic home they have.



this cactus was peeking over the same fence.




i was walking up the hill when i saw this distressed property.



just on the other side of the no trespassing sign was this inviting empty drive.


another beautiful piece of rust




lo and behold, if you keep walking, you will find that there is more urban corn!

yes, we look for photo opportunites

when sid vicious died in 1979, the one who told me about his passing was stiv bators.

he and sid were friends. in fact, whenever i was in the company of the two of them, it seemed to me that although sid was a member of the more famous and more notorious sex pistols, he was still quite a big fan of stiv's and the dead boys. others who knew sid would tell you that sid was also the world's biggest sex pistols fan. sid loved rock n roll and the people who made it. i think he was always a bit surprised that he was in the sex pistols for each and every day that he was in the band. sid used to hang on to stiv's every word and move with a sort of puppy dog like devotion, the same way he admired johnny rotten in the earlier days of their relationship in the band.

stiv loved the attention and the adulation. who wouldn't? but it is for all these reasons that i suspect it was stiv who painted this tribute to sid on the billboard for the big hollywood movie, heaven can wait, starring warren beatty and julie christie.

i was sitting around at home when stiv phoned and excitedly told me that there was a spray paint tribute to sid on the prominently placed billboard on sunset blvd., near the trendy chateau marmont. this was a photo opportunity that stiv wanted in on. so, i picked him up at his tropicana bungalow and, camera in hand, fired off a roll of film.

creem used the photo (without stiv in it) as the centerpiece of their sid vicious obituary. when i finally met creem's photo editor charlie auringer in person a few months later, he told me that the combination of "heaven can wait" with the "sid vicious r.i.p." was just great photojournalism. i thank stiv everyday for his keen eye for these things.




when hanging with the two of them - stiv and sid, i was regaled with sex pistols war stories such as the time that a texas cowboy called sid a "faggot" and sid promptly stabbed himself in the palm to show just how manly he was. in reality, sid seemed to be a pretty shy guy, but he loved to tell that story to anyone who would listen. its an example of the two distinctly different sides of his personality - not quite jekyll and hyde, but definitely, one side shy and quiet, the other side outrageous and prone to violent outbursts. i remember stiv and sid talked about music they liked and bands they had seen and girls they knew in common. they talked about solo projects they wanted to do. stiv told sid about the pre-punk days of cleveland rock n roll and sid was all ears. above all else, i will always think of sid as a big music fan, much more than as a musician.

those guys were no different than the guys i always hung out with, and still hang out with.

that sid was not such a competent musician is really irrelevant and totally beside the fact that he is a great anti-hero hero. its nearly a fairy tale that a band's great fan gets to join that band. what kid brandishing a guitar in his bedroom or garage doesn't dream of the same thing? his cover of "my way" - frank sinatra's signature song - is so appropriate to sid's life, as a young man and as a punk rocker, and ultimately a youth culture icon. he did, indeed do it his way...no regrets.