Here’s a few more shots from Allan with a slightly different twist this time; none of them are live performance shots. We’ll let him explain.

I always like the challenge of doing something a little bit different; new artist, new venue, just change things up a bit. The shots featured below happened for a variety of reasons and the one thing they have in common is that they aren’t onstage shots. They’re all shot with available light and not really posed; it’s more about letting the artists arrange themselves and trying to capture the moment where it all works.

The Velveteen Orkestra @Pizza Express

This was a very, very impromptu shoot. I was packing away my gear after the gig and Dan asked if I could just do a few shots that they could use for promotion. He asked me where he wanted the band to sit and Sarah was already sitting under a downlighter where she was perfectly lit. The only thing I had to do was seat the band together and fire the shutter as they stared grinned and flicked the v’s. This is one of the two shots that I really liked from the shoot, because it captured something essential about all three characters.

Simba Jindu @The Camden Chapel

This was Saara Kaldma’s first headline gig. Simba has played drums alongside Saara in various line-ups, including Lisa Canny’s band and he’s great percussionist as well as being a genuinely lovely guy as well. When I shoot at The Camden Chapel, I always try to get a few soundcheck shots because the show lighting can be a bit under-powered; very atmospheric but challenging for available light photography. I tend to shoot low-key, high contrast stuff, but this shot works as a high-key shot, emphasising the optimism of Simba’s infectious smile.

KAT ‘Rise’ video shoot

Whenever I get a message from KAT inviting me along to a shoot I know it’s going to be interesting, whether it’s a gig or a video shoot. This was a video shoot for KAT’s song ‘Rise’ at a church in Hoxton where KAT played an angel. The lighting was a bit of a challenge, but I think we just about got away with it.

Belle Roscoe@Pizza Express

Another impromptu Pizza Express shot, this time in the famous Green Room. Julia Gurry popped her head round the door of the Green Room and asked me if I would take a few shots. As younger brother Matty will tell you, that’s not really a request, it’s a summons. Anyway, the light’s pretty good, so I was happy to have a go and I think the result was pretty good. It was a rush job that I missed the fact that the toilet door was open and you can just see the toilet bowl. You can also see that Brother Strut have left their mark – I included that deliberately.

Morganway@Green Note

The Green Note gig that sold out without any artists being announced. It was billed as ‘The Road to Madison Square Gardens’ (the one in New York and not the proposed monstrosity in Stratford) and it was Morganway supported by Isabella Coulstock. Kari Jones (the sensible side of the Jones partnership) wanted a few shots with Morganway, then we moved on to shooting the band on Parkway outside Green Note. I liked the city backdrop of Camden Parkway and the band always look great.

If you’re after an album that’s safe and unpredictable and you know exactly what’s coming next, then “Be the Media” is definitely not the album for you. Annabelle Chvostek’s fifth solo album moves away from the folky sound of her two previous albums “Rise” and “Resilience” to a sound that is lo-fi and embraces styles from indie thrash to psychedelia with several stops and detours on the way. It’s fair to say that with this album, you never know what’s coming next. Annabelle’s roots are in Canada, which may go some way to explaining the affinity to and parallels with Neil Young, who’s also had the odd change of direction along the way.

The album is built around live-band recordings with some overdubs added later and the raw, Stooges-like, power of the title song gives some idea of the direction the album’s taking, but there are still plenty of surprises to come. “Jerusalem” is mournful lyrically and musically with the added melancholy of some Middle-Eastern violin to season the mixture. “Black Hole” sets the controls for the heart of the sun with the simple, if bleak, message that we’re all irrelevant compared to the vastness of the universe, delivered over a soundscape that’s part early Pink Floyd and part Neil Young’s “Like a Hurricane”; it’s certainly dramatic. “This Night” is the closest the album comes to a love song, if you count ‘Your hand is the hand I hold to jump out of the burning tower’ as a lyric. Powerful yes: cheerful no.

“Carnal Delights” is the perfect example of the albums’s twist and turns. From a doom-laden minor key verse, the song bursts into chorus in 3/4 time that’s straight out of a sleazy 1930s cabaret routine; and yes, that is someone playing a saw (Lisa Gamble, actually). It’s an odd one, but the contrast works perfectly. “You Can Come Now” is probably closest to Annabelle’s earlier work with gentle electric guitar and a vocal that isn’t pushing at the edges her voice’s power; it’s very different from the songs it’s surrounded by. As if to cement the Shakey connection, there’s a stripped-back cover of “Like a Hurricane” featuring mainly mandolin and piano with a touch of guitar. It’s very different and it works.

“Inside the Scream/Screen” returns to the spiky guitars and claustrophobic technophobia of the title track before another change of pace to “Say it Right” which has a hint of Television-styled guitars and the album’s only example of swearing; one use of ‘fucking’ for emphasis and a bit of shock value is so much more powerful than using it in every sentence.

So Annabelle Chvostek, Tony Spina (drums), Jérémie Jones (bass and organ), Lisa Gamble (saw and backing vocals), Jordi Rosen (backing vocals), and co-producer Jeff Oehler have created a piece of work that moves from menacing to mournful to manic but never loses its grip on your attention; you may not know what’s round the corner, but you can bet it’s going to be worth hearing.

“Be the Media” is released on June 1 on MQGV (ABC123).