Oniracom, a Santa Barbara based new media collective/record label, has interviewed yours truly, doing a pretty good job at getting inside the head of a music industry photographer

You’ll even get to see me in action, and read about what it’s like being a “rock music photographer” today.

It wound up on their Solutions for Dreamers blog. Check it out here!

Solutions for Dreamers: INTERVIEW with Anna Webber

Anna Webber

Abimaro performs with Zero 7 at the Orpheum Theater

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The full band played the sold-out multi-leveled Orpheum Theater, performing a two hour set complete with a four-song acid jazz encore sure to make the seated crowd cross eyes, if not lose sensitivity in their backsides, during the louder-than-loud what-should-have-been techno trip-hop dance party earlier in the night.

Anna Webber

Zero 7 at the Orpheum Theater

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Never before have I seen a seated techno dance hall not dancing, but better they start sitting than pass out shoegazing or free-form seizing to the bursts of downtempo remixes. While harmoniums are not particularly catchy (about as much as a theremin or Eigenharp) last night Chaney’s instrument was completely dizzying, a sound that didn’t seem to be of this earth.

Anna Webber

Olivia Chaney and her harmonium

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Speaking of which, last night Zero 7 completely got pulled over by a UFO. The five male musicians — all clothed in white — began glowing hot pink, radioactive green and fiber-optic blue, raking in the industrial neon spotlights from above. They simulated what appeared to be a close-encounter 2010, and the piercing supernatural siren sounds pretty much sealed the deal: Those dudes are aliens.

Anna Webber

Are we watching Othello… Come on people! Where’s Lady Gaga.

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Then, suddenly, a lone mustached dancer popped up from the crowd rising – to bust out some hexed YMCA-like dance moves. Once the spazzing man with the short butt shorts in winter broke the ice, about ten more mind-warped antsy seaters joined in.

Anna Webber

Henry Binns onstage with Zero 7

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The whole thing was quite video-gamey. We weren’t sure how you even make some of those sounds, but a lot of the instruments probably don’t really even exist. Go to a Zero 7 show, and your ears will definitely hear some brand new racket they’ve never heard before. Sound refreshing? Don’t fall asleep slouching in your chair.

Anna Webber

Zero 7 at the Orpheum Theater

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Photos By Anna Webber

Dave Matthews was a little slow tonight. It was night one at the Greek theater, and whatever Dave Matthews usually melancholy self is like, this seemed to be a bit worse. There were times when it was easy to mistake whether or not he was actually sleeping, or if he was just – really tired.

His usual long drawn out folky folk songs lasted a regular 3 minutes, instead of the typical 10 – 15.

It was a good show. That’s all I have to say about that.

The Viper Room and Atlantic Records supplied the Open Bar and luncheon – however – it didn’t matter how drunk they got the guests, the music was phenomenal. By the first song, enough honest sweat was flowing out of his pores to mean he would not be letting up anytime soon – he’d done this before. Paolo has got the same Johnny Lang elated, scathing, rasp and quiver, mixed with Jeff Buckley moans and lingering “ooo’s” during the sultry ballads that were to die for. The timelessness of his music would throw a smile across anyone’s face and a chill down their spine as his boyish sincerity dabbled in motown and blues, reggae and barbershop bebop. As he picked up what appeared to be a watered down whiskey, smiling, he says “It’s the first one I’ve done of these things where everybody’s listening.” Not because he’s not extraordinary, but because he can be seen most often playing at big music halls, bigger concert venues, and music festivals like Coachella and Bonnaroo. And his giddy Scottish accent would sometimes sound more like a thick island one. It was adorable. In fact, all but one of the 6 piece band is from Scotland, and his 2007 record went platinum in the UK, and sold about 2 million copies. He played the single off of his last record, “New Shoes”, which Paolo is most notably known for. Keeping an eye on Paolo and awating the release of his next record out in June, he showed no deficit of talent Tuesday, no elevated ego.

Paolo Nutini @ Viper Room showcase (photo: anna webber)

[03:45] the prowl-dan auerbach

[06:18] Dan Auerbach live at SXSW 2009

(photos: anna webber)

Dan Auerbach of the Black Keys Live at SXSW’s Mojo Magazine Party at The Mean Eyed Cat

Danny boy Auerbach kills it again, slapping out the mean-eyed blues in the hot sun at Austin’s cherished Johnny Cash tribute bar. Hungover as we can so become after playing through a secret show till 5:00 the same morning, Auerbach still manages to thread together a thick dose of blues loud enough to stain any olfactory lobe within convincing reason. Chugging bottles of ice water, the globs of beard gum dripped quickly loose, hung, and at a moments notice landed if not on the high register, on one of us. He looses the tie fettered round his neck, and like mad, amounts to greatness. Though the delirium tremens clearly awoke the spins, he manages still to make good use of his loving arms (see below:)

It was an intimate gathering of saints, sinners, filthy blues and little or no upset. Backed by the San Antonio band Hacienda, Auerbach gave it as beautiful as always, his love for country and blues hardly unsurpassed. The girls were coming around serving ice cold Coronas, as if we looked like were lacking. They were happily accepted as we choked on our twelve bars of country twang, surely a day I had already concocted somewhere in dreams. It was the abrasions left on my psyche, applied by the unusual thing that is young Auerbach that convince me to remember it wasn’t just that.

Like a gentleman he took one of my photography postcards and stuffed it in between a few spent papers in his Moleskin. For a moment he had it rough and posed during a few photographs with the very tactile version of me, and, unsatisfied as they so become, he, along with Hacienda, had to bolt immediately for some tacos.

(Here are some photographs of the day. Click, they will become larger)

Looking forward now to Patrick Carney’s solo debut (drummer of The Black Keys duo), titled: Drummer. It  features Carney (on bass), Jon Finley from Beaten Awake (guitar/vox), Steve Clements from Houseguest (keys), Jamie Stillman from Party of Helicopters (guitar) and Greg Boyd from Ghostman and Sandman (drums). They are working on an album to be released in the fall on Carney’s label, Audio Eagle.

(photos: anna webber)

The Black Keys guitarist, Dan Auerbach, Solo Record

The Black Keys‘ guitarist Dan Auerbach has announced what was to me, a pretty surprising rescript… a solo debut! Keep It Hid, will come out February 10th on Nonesuch records. Though at this point it’s going to be pretty difficult to beat the Key’s last album Attack and Release, which was, in my gracious opinion, the best album released this year, right next to Radiohead’s In Rainbows, and Beck’s Modern Guilt. Auerbach is said to get up against the line of scrimmage, facing up with the drums, keyboards and six-strings — his uncle James Quine contributes guitar to “Street Walkin,” and his father originally wrote “Whispered Words.” “This record is a mixture of things I like to listen to, psychedelia, soul music, country harmonies,” Auerbach says in a statement with Rolling Stone Magazine.

Looking forward to this more organically homegrown record, partly recorded when on tour with the Keys’ and during the recording of Attack & Release in the studio with Danger Mouse — also responsible for the A1 fabulous Beck Album. Anything that man touches is turning into dddirty dangerous philly cheese steak sandwiches with a bucket of au jus positioned beneath to catch the drips.

Dan Auerbach’s Solo tour dates:

February 28 – Washington, DC @ 9:30 Club
March 1 – Boston, MA @ Paradise
March 2 – Brooklyn, NY @ Music Hall of Williamsburg
March 3 – New York, NY @ Bowery Ballroom
March 5 – Cleveland, OH @ Beachland Ballroom
March 6 – Chicago, IL @ Metro
March 7 – Minneapolis, MN @ First Avenue
March 10 – Seattle, WA @ The Showbox
March 11 – Portland, OR @ Wonder Ballroom
March 13 – San Francisco, CA @ Bimbo’s
March 14 – Los Angeles, CA @ El Rey Theatre

(i’ll be at the El Rey show shooting).