One thing that I’ve learned over the last year is that photography and music might very well go together more than any other two forms of creativity and art.
When I was younger and first began listening to bands like Metallica, Anthrax, and Slayer, I would routinely check out the metal magazines whenever I was near a bookstore or any other store that happened to have a magazine rack. Sure, I was drawn to the music first, but after that aspect of it I was also interested in getting my hands on as many images as I could of the groups (and keep in mind that this was a few years before the Internet became mainstream).
On stage, backstage, on the street, promotional shots…I really didn’t care what they were or where they were; if it was a photo of the band, I bought it.
Somewhere around 1993 or 1994 I discovered the maniacal genius of Ministry, and in particular its ringleader Al Jourgensen, who had absolutely no qualms about hooking up a guitar distortion pedal to his microphone even thought the guy can sing well without it, as evidenced in this cover version of the Greatful Dead’s “Friend of the Devil.” They performed the song during a 1994 benefit concert for the Bridge School, which helps kids with severe speech and physical impairments.
The reason I mention such a band is because they’re a good example of why I have no problem taking photo processing to the extreme, even if the original image is quite good on its own. The final product should be the most important aspect of whatever it is that you’re creating, and if that means that it’s something almost inaccessible, then so be it.
Because photography shouldn’t be some kind of competition—that’s what sports are for—we can simply look for whatever we happen to like, whether that means something really trippy or something more traditional like a basic black-and-white image.
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