1, We have seen a lot of photos in which people have appeared accidentally, reflections, etc. Photos we didn't expect (or perhaps want) to be in. My question is: what is THAT photo you wanted but didn't get? The chance meeting with - insert name - when you didn't have a camera to hand, or that photo you took that didn't come back from Boots (or wherever) when you had the film - remember them? - developed?
2. Last week we were asked what we would like to change about the country we live in. I'd like to know what one, unique thing about the place you live in makes your life so agreeable that you think everyone, everywhere should get the chance to enjoy it?
3.If you could have been a fly on the wall in any recording studio at any time, which album recording sessions would you most have liked to spy on?
4. (Steenbeck's silly extra question) If you could have a superpower, what would it be? And once you were a superhero, what would you be called, and what would your costume look like?
Not many I know, but maybe someone will come along and do the real EOTWQ's.
Cheers. Maki
38 comments:
Well done you...
1 I failed to capture the expression on my grandson's face as his friends sang Happy Birthday To You on his 4th birthday this July. The flash wouldn't fire because I'd taken several (not so important) photos just before. I'll always remember how he looked pleased, proud and amazed at the same time - it would be good if everyone else could too.
2 The scenery - pretty obviously, as I live in SW Scotland. However, I want it kept quiet actually or everyone else will want to come here too.
3 Norman Petty's studio in Clovis, New Mexico in the mid-1950s, to see how much influence Petty really had on Buddy Holly's recordings. He did very nicely thank you out of letting Buddy and the Crickets use his equipment and his expertise in exchange for all those songwriting credits...But of course he didn't know he was going to at the time.
DONDS:
1, THAT photo
Photography is about light, right. One day at the campground I lived in, I stepped off the camp porch just as a stream of light touched a rose absolutely perfectly. I ran for my camera, but it was too late. Luckily because I lived there I could go back the next day. Never happened again. Who knows if the photo would have worked out anyway, but man I'd have loved a shot at it.
2. Unique thing about the place
All the green spaces. People walk right by and don't see them. little do they know how few places have so many little places you can talk the kids, walk the dog, go for a stroll....
3 Recording sessions
Good one. And I can't answer it 'cause too many come to mind. I think a John Peel session because I didn't know about him until after he had died, and i'd like to have had him introduce me to someone.
And thanks for this Maki!
Makinavaja, I have one question I'd thought of that's stranded on it's own in my brain. It's sort of silly, but I'd be glad to add it to your post if you don't mind...
Steen please do
Okay, but if you don't like it, I'll take it down.
Good question Steen.
Mrs Maki will be first to answer:
She would like to be able to make people think for a minute before deciding to do anything important and that in that time they could see the consequences of what they were going to do. She would be called "Credible Cassandra" and she would hold a shaft of lightning in her right hand that she would point at people's heads.
I love mrs. Maki's answer. So much that I read it to my husband, and he'd like to know what kind of car she'd drive. He guessed a Citroen C2V, but I don't really know what that is.
1. There are so many but one that really sticks in my memory is at an Ian Dury gig when my cousin (who is severely disabled) and I were invited backstage after the show. This was in the days that you were frisked for cameras on the way in. Not one photo of what was a truly touching occasion.
2. Easy really. The pace of life and the love and enkoyment of even the simplest tapa or meal out. Nearly always with all the family in tow, which I love.
3. I'd love to know who really played what on Never Mind The Bollocks.
Steen. Mrs Maki is so practical that she found a husband to do the driving. Our first car was a 2Cv, though, as it happens. Now she prefers taxis!
I promise to answer all the questions eventually, but I just wanted to say that David would be "Folly Man" and he'd wear a deerstalker costume and travel around helping people design architectural amusements for their lawns.
Or he'd be snack man. with a crumb coated costume. (Okay, I added that part about the costume.)
TFD. Your answer to Nº 1 has really touched me. I have just welcomed my first grandchild into this world and have made up my mind to take TWO cameras to every celebration just in case!
Great questions - we have our EOTWQ!!!!And newbies are definately allowed to pitch in - the more the merrier!!
1. Madonna was literally a foot away from me in Cannes. Hands shaking so much I fluffed the photo on my mobile. Rats!
2. Bottles of decent Bordeaux for under a fiver. Boosts my morale considerably with some nice cheese and fresh baguette....
3. Awfully unhip but the Sting album All this Time - the one with the jazz versions of his songs (Jason Rebello on piano I think Branford Marsalis on soprano sax) was recorded in the garden of his house in Tuscany one summer night. I just might not have refused an invite to that session...
4. Time travel. Clockgirl. With a huge Rolex oyster imbedded in my wrist.
Spare batteries for both as well, Maki!
4 Tartan Girl will make the sun shine on Scotland...the last few weeks Scots have been going grrr as they look up from accounts of heatwaves down south to see the rain lashing at their windows once more.
She wears a kilt (Mackenzie tartan) a Bruce Springsteen T shirt (Waiting On A Sunny Day) and hiking boots with thick socks just in case.
1. Can't think of any missed photos that really stand out. First thing that came to mind was a few years ago when the space shuttle flew over Vancouver - a blazing fire in the sky - lasted about twenty seconds. We got up in the middle of the night to watch it. Didn't think to photograph or film it.
2. Certainly Vancouver's scenery - mountains and ocean - stand out. That's only one part of the country but everywhere I have been, Canada has magnificent scenery.
3. The Travelling Wilburys first album - Orbison, Dylan, Petty, Lynne and Harrision all together jamming and recording - wow! That would be fantastic.
4. Super Power? Tough one. Maybe the power to make people polite. Politenessman. Maybe a colorful green outfit with blue Ps and Qs all over it - minding my Ps and Qs!
Following up on that - since Superman was big and strong and his alter ego was mild-mannered, and since my Super Hero is concerned with politeness, my secret identity would be someone who is rude and surly.
Cool, I've always wanted to be someone's alter ego
Yay! EOTWQs! Nice one Maki!! (and steen!)
1. I wouldn't mind a few snaps of The Prime Of Mr Blimpy McF - it was the days just before digital cameras and mobile phones.
2. People talk to you, and are genuinely nice and interested.
3. I'd love to know how MBV spent so much time and money making THAT record.
4. I always used to dream of flying. That said, I'd be GeekDadMan - able to conjour up huge lego landscapes with the wave of a paw, and be able to teleport and levitate just to amuse the kids
1)I have a few of these, but one I didnt have a camera for was the UFO I saw, while standing in a local graveyard at 10.00pm at night, when I was just 15. I would then have had proof for a story no adult was gonna believe. Wouldve needed a good camera mind.
2) This one's easy. Szechenyi Spa.
http://www.szechenyibath.com/
3) Also easy. Marquee Moon
4) I'd like to see through clothes - although my costume would have to be a dirty mac
maki - anyone can do anything on this blog, old new borrowed or blue. it's all a thrill on teh 'spill!!
1. I'm going to be the spectre at the feast here and complain in a very curmudgeonly fashion about photo-taking in general.
I may regret it when I'm old and senile but I prefer to go for a more natural 'live in the moment' sort of vibe and I hate it when functions are brought to a halt because all and sundry want to take a photograph of all the most mundane things that are going on like cutting a cake or the first dance etc.
I'll stand and (sort of) smile for family or formal photographs if I have to but I vocally object as it happens. Occasionally I have been caught on camera smiling but it is usually accidental which is how I like it.
One of the reasons I posted my mirror photo was because I think it catches me as I really am, no false smile, no looking into the camera etc.
Phew. Now that that's out of my system.....
2. A few times in my life I've spent enough time away in very hot, eternally dry, places that I've started to day dream about being back on the wet, drizzly moors between Lancashire and Yorkshire. I love 'em. This vision is usually accompanied by a virtual taste of Bury Black Pudding and a good pork pie.
3. Obviously, considering my musical taste, it has to be the recording of Deep Purple In Rock.
keyboardist Jon Lord saying 'but we just performed my self penned concerto with the Philarmonic Orchestra in the Albert Hall', Ritchie Blackmore saying 'this heavy rock stuff is the future', drummer Ian Paice saying 'whatever', vocalist Ian Gillan saying 'what have I landed myself in but here's some gobsmacking lyrics anyway' and bassist Roger Glover in the control room asking for tips on production.
OK so you have to know about their history to understand all of that but it's still one of the greatest albums ever...!
4. I'm going with fp's time travelling superhero. There are soooo many things in history I could sort out if only people would listen....!
1. The bane of my life has been the time lag on digital cameras. Not only does my old one take at least five seconds to take the picture, it also obligingly shows you the great one you thought you were getting, in perfect, crystallised amber, before juddering ever so slightly into the unfocused lump of a thing that has actually been preserved. So, in conclusion, most photos.
2. Its warm, flat, brown and usually comes in a big glass. Ideally with a handle. It is a fabulous creation and were we any other country on earth it would be revered and respected accordingly. Instead we call it things like Tit Radger or Binkle Flipper and leave it to the old men. I love ale.
3.I would very much like to see the recording of Station to Station, because if Mr Bowie doesn't remember having been there, then maybe someone should check out what actually went on...
4. We had a great idea the other week for an evil super villain: Doctor Uncomfortable. His sole power is to make you ever-so-slightly uncomfortable, be it a little too clammy, a touch itchy or maybe a trifle irritated by a stray fibre. His catchphrase is "That mustn't be very comfortable" and he will drive you nuts over time.
1. A frozen waterfall in Switzerland. Stood there for an hour in the cold, waiting for a small cloud to disappear before the sun. The sun came within 25 meters of the waterfall, then the cloud somehow backtracked & became bigger again, had to continue my 5 hour walk to get home before dark, leaving me with some rather grey, rather dull pictures in stead of something like this
2. The numbered waypoints bike route system (invented in Belgium btw....). Extremely simple, easy to use system, which gives you an almost endless set of nice bike rides in a relatively small, but beautiful part of this country....
3. Guns'n'Roses' Chinese Democracy: that would make me the longest living fly (on the wall) in history..... (as these are NOT the EOTWQ's, a music-related one is allowed I guess....)
4. Time travel: Would have loved to go back to that waterfall (see question 1) a day later, the most blue skies I've ever seen.....
Hi TonNl. Had no idea music related q's were off limits. Won't happen again, I promise.
1. My longstanding hatred of cameras gives me many options - there are some relationships I have no pictorial record of, which is a shame on maudlin nostalgia nights, especially when alcohol's involved. Really though, I wish I had some pictures of me as an adult with my mother. She died a few months ago after a long battle with cancer. Since I'd had a few years' medical training a while back, I quit my job to come home to help look after her, which made things easier for her and my father, at the very least in helping her keep some of her privacy. She hated cameras too, and once she became ill, taking pictures was not something anyone wanted. It's easier to remember her as healthy, and being with her healthy, I just wish I had some pictures of it. Hindsight . . .
2. I like the fact that in Ireland, you can have a brilliant night out with people you just met.
3. I'm with Blimpy, the 'Loveless' sessions, less for the time and money, more how the **** do you make those sounds with an electric guitar? I still haven't heard anything like that album, 18 years later.
4. I'd like to be Do-Over Man. I'd fly around the world taking people back to what they thought their biggest mistake was, and giving them a chance to do it again, differently. I think for this, I'd have to dress like an angel. And ohgodyes, would I use my powers myself.
I didn't really realise that people had such anti camera feelings, you would have hated having me around. I ALWAYS travelled with my camera bag with a couple of Nikons with motor drives, several lenses and probably at least a dozen rolls of 36 exp. Ektachrome. I would shoot wherever I went, at work, at concerts, backstage, onstage, with friends, with strangers, wherever, I'd frequently shoot 4-500 shots a week. This week I've spent several days scanning slides of children that I shot all over the world, as I did it I kept saying [to myself] 'that's beautiful, what a great shot' and I realised that the beauty was in the subject, I just happened to be there and to be ready, I've shot literally thousands of children pictures almost all by being discreet, standing to the side and shooting with a long lens. In more formal situations I would just become part of the scenery, I'd shoot as though I belonged there and after a while most people wouldn't even notice me, often I used a flash but I'd always bounce it and again use something like a 200mm lens. In backstage situations there were always request for 'take my picture with....' which I usually accommodated and sent them a print, similarly I'd always send the venue manager a copy of my best shot of of the featured artist since I'd been allowed the privilege of photo access.
Anyhow, that's a photographers point of view. Which brings me to question one.
I was in a very remote mountain village in Guatemala [Todos Santos - approx 11000 ft] I was walking alone down a quiet lane and I saw a young man about 10-12 walking towards me, I was holding my camera below waist level. He was a Cakchiquel Mayan Indian as were all the villagers and he like everyone there wore the traditional dress. When he was about 10 feet from me I dropped to one knee and fired off one shot, as I did this he bent over from the waist and looked directly into the lens, at that instant I said to myself 'That's the best photo I've ever taken' it was a fabulous shot and I immediately realised that it was out of focus! I immediately fired off another but by this time he'd straightened up and the effect was lost.
Since I'm still not clear on pasting pictures into comments I'll do a post with both photos in it.
Dinner calls, I'll come back to questions 2-4 later.
2. In the US there's a college football game every New Years day, everyone in the country watches it. [except me, I've never seen it] It's played in the Pasadena Rose Bowl usually in glorious weather, sunny blue skies, temps in the 80's, the crowds in T shirts and blouses whilst the majority of the viewers are muffled up in stuffy over heated houses where the outside temps are in many places well below zero and often with blizzard conditions. I've never quite understood the attraction of the great northern midwest where brutal winters often last 'til May. I don't really want them all to move here, we've got enough already, but I don't understand why they don't. May'be they haven't read 'The Grapes of Wrath'. And where I live grapes are THE only agricultural product, it's called 'wine county', vineyards everywhere, very beautiful scenery, georgeous coastlines and many small town communities. When I first moved here I'd usually step outside with a cup of coffee first thing every day and my neighbor would always greet me with 'Good morning, another perfect day in paradise'.
3. Any and all of the Beatles/George Martin sessions.
4. My superpower would give me the ability to vaporise Republicans, if they continued to act as stupidly as they currently are I'd give them one last chance to fly right and if they refused, Poof! they're gone! Not sure about my costume but it would have a 'vengeful' quality and I'd be known as the 'Enforcer'.
1. I'm with gordonimmel on photos. However, in 1978 my dad took me to the Open at HQ. There were photos taken of a starstruck boy with several golfers (there was amazing access- they just milled around like anyone else) including a middle-aged chap called Jack who went on to win the thing and a VERY young Nick Faldo.Oh and Denis Compton (he wasn't playing golf, just watching). The camera jammed and the film never came out.
2.Pubs. No-one does them like the British Isles. They are an endangered species these days. Also Ordnance Survey maps. Wow, that's sad.
3. Hanging out with Plant and Page in Bron-Y-Aur. Dunno about fly-on-the-wall though. Can't I drink cider and play tambourine or something?
4. Mahogany Desk Man. He has a big desk in a nice office (gets him out of the house). His super power is knowing the answer to any question no matter how trivial. Is there an interventionist God? Who plays kazoo on the first Donovan LP? Why do they make pickled onions round? I'm your man. I don't have to answer the question unless it will truly help others. I can't use my powers for myself unless it's in a pub quiz to wipe the smug grins off the faces of 'The Cricketers' team (actually they're mostly bankers and property developers). Mahogany Desk Man has no superhero costume but sometimes wears a nice pair of brogues he saw on Regent St that Elvis Presley bought him as a thangyoo present. I can't tell you why. MD Man is very discreet.
Snadfrod, you're talking about a compact digital camera, right? Get yourself a digital SLR. Press the shutter and that's the picture you get.
Mind you, they're a lot more awkward to carry around.
@goneforeign, I don't have a problem with cameras per se, it's just the way they get used and the fact that (like Schrodinger's Cat) their use actually changes events.
You could go around Paris (or wherever) with me with as much camera equipment as you like and I wouldn't mind. You could snap me as much as you like just as long as I don't know anything about it.
What I hate is being told to stand over there to have my picture taken and then....'wait till I change the lens....oh, the sun's gone behind a cloud......just move in a bit.....wait, somebody's walking accross the view....are you all still smiling (No!)....there's a bus in the background...'
By this time I'd have walked off.
And it's things like at weddings where you don't just cut the cake but pretend to cut it again and again whilst the person with 6 cameras takes a photo on every one. And the photo they're desperate to get consists of....somebody about to cut a cake! (wow).
There are some photos in existence where I'm smiling but they're usually off-the-cuff snaps. In a poised shot I can barely manage to turn the corners of my mouth up.
Auld curmudgeon ,me?
By the way, since you've been away from the UK for a number of years, I feel duty bound to warn you that if you come back here and start taking photos of kids in the street you could end up in trouble. We've reached hysteria level here. If you're lucky you'll simply be arrested. If you're unlucky you'll be strung up from the nearest lampost by a mob of vigilante mothers who will assume that you are a paedophile.
Oh, and don't take pictures of public buildings either. The Police will assume you are a terrorist and act accordingly. And don't take a photo of the arresting officer because that's also illegal under the latest anti-terrorist legislation.
Sad, isn't it.
Sad indeed, though I have taken photos of the officer arresting me and plenty of pictures of cops generally being a waste of time. Can't resist.
I'm with you 100% on the 'hold still and smile' school of photographers, I've never done that and I've volunteered to photograph several friends weddings where I shoot discretely and lots of pics, if they want cake pics I suggest they get a 'real' photographer to augment mine.
I've heard that the situation you describe re kids is becoming fairly widespread, there's been articles about it re. Guatemala where I've shot hundreds of pics without ever a comment; the times they are a changing!
1) I'm more-or-less with Gordon on the camera front, but that may be because I hate hate hate hate hate hate hate having my picture taken. Also, there are several parents of my acquaintance who have yet to see their kid's/kids' school play (or whatever) properly - i.e. directly - because they're filming all the time and only get to see things through the viewfinder (if that's what it's still called these days). I worry about them! (I wouldn't if they only did it ocasionally, or took it in turns, but they never ever ever get to interact)
I made costumes for everyone in my daughter's class for their Fasching fancy dress party, I'd have liked someone to have taken me a picture showing them all together.
2) I'm definitely with snadfrod on the ale front, but as I no longer live in England I suppose I've disqualified myself!
One thing I really like about Hamburg is that all summer long there are street parties and mini-festivals every weekend, where there's live music, usually some extra stuff for the kids, a bit of a flea-market - and all for the price of your drinks!
3) Pass. I'd have liked to be at one of the *great* jazz recording sessions, to see how the musicians adapted to playing in a studio, but I couldn't tell you which one.
4) I would be MOM, the Mind Opening Miracleworker, zooming in on cases of ignorance and bigotry the world over. Haven't decided on my outfit yet, but I fear it'll need to be able to withstand a lot of wear.
(Sorry if this isn't funny enough: I get like that sometimes)
1. Kind of with Catcher & Gordon on this one.
2. The weather, apart from ball-soup summers & hurricanes. Being here 6 months & somewhere else May to September would be more ideal.
3. Would imagine that, like making a film, there are long periods of waiting around. If I had to pick, would probably go with Can circa Tago Mago as they would jam & improvise for hours.
4. Think we've had this question before. Would go with teleportation as I like going places but not the process of getting there.
1. I've kind of come to terms with the fact that I'm not going to capture every beautiful moment I witness. It used to be an anxiety for me. But now I'm satisfied with witnessing it, and trying to remember. Having said that, though, I just got this iPhone, and I carry it with me everywhere, and I love the pictures it takes--they're appealingly grainy. I have a lot of ideas about the advent of digital cameras and video cameras and how they relate to film, etc, but I won't bore you with it.
2. The mix of urban and rural. I live in a very small city halfway between Philly and NYC. The city itself hasn't changed much since the 19th century, so though it's lots of brick, attached houses right up to the sidewalk, like in a city, none of them are above, say, 4 stories. And the community is small enough that you know most people, and they know your kids and will help to look out for them, but big enough that I'm always meeting new people. Despite the absolutely beautiful countryside all around, the town itself is very liberal politically, because so many people have moved here from big cities. THis whole area used to be an artist colony, and arts still thrive here.
3. I actually can't think of anything. I'll get back...
4. FLying or invisibility would be fun, but when I lie awake at night I'm worried about my children--keeping them healthy and happy. It feels like such an enormous responsibility. So I guess I'd like to be able to cure sick people. Don't know what the costume would look like for that.
I would have liked to have had a better camera when we went to South Africa some years ago. I have photos of the animals we saw but they're not very good - "see that blob there? That's an elephant / lion / rhino / zebra" etc. "No, really, it is." But the memories are there anyway and when they're not, it won't matter any more.
I'm with Snadfrod on the ale but I also love the fact that we have great freedom to walk in the countryside, and that we have a huge variety of scenery and wildlife to enjoy.
Not sure about the studio as some of it's live, but I would like to have been there for "Flashes from the Archives of Oblivion" (Roy Harper).
I would like to be the sort of mother who is patient, understanding, never suffering from PMT and able to persuade her child to eat / wash / do its homework / respect others and generally look after itself. So perhaps I could be WiseMum and my costume would be a pair of stay-clean jeans and a Top Cat T-shirt.
Nice one, Maki.
AliM, Flashes is a gig (mostly) so you're disqualified. I met someone who was there at another RH gig and they said the drunken/stoned supergroup at the end was a lorra fun.
Oh bum.
1. Plenty of football team photos which were never taken , lads i played with and proud moments (County teams , Uni 1st XI etc). Plus meeting people out and about but never daring to ask for a photo - Bowie in Paris at Place du Tertre etc).
2. Yorkshire : beautiful countryside , specialities (Yorkshire Puds , Hendersons Relish especially!) and also the friendliness evident whenever you walk around - thank god.
3. Would like to have been around any of the BMW recordings , especially the last album "Uprising" - that album always moves me.
4. My superpower would be to be able to flatten anti-social scum with just one icy stare. I wouldn't kill them as i suggested to Mr. Maki & Lambretinha last Friday but they'd get a 2nd chance. repeat though and they're doomed.
@AliM. Sorry, didn't mean to bum you out. Roy Harper is an odd choice of studio fly-on-the-wallery, unless you can inhale. What would you expect to see? Tony Visconti playing recorder?
Post a Comment