RIP Jerome’s – 8.24.16

If you have been a fan of Driven By Boredom for more than a couple of years you might notice that it’s not really a party photo blog anymore. I used to shoot parties almost every night and I had a blast doing it but things change. I got older and I priced myself out of doing it… I’m not gonna go shoot my buddies weekly party for $100. But one of the main reasons I stopped doing it is because there just aren’t a lot of places I want to go to anymore. I imagine that somewhere out there people are throwing amazing parties and doing crazy shit and I just don’t know about it, but if you walk around the Lower East Side it’s pretty clear that Downtown is dead.

Jerome’s was one of the last Manhattan bars where if I walked into it on a random night of the week I knew I would run into some people I knew. When I had friends in town I would have them meet me there if I couldn’t convince them to come into Brooklyn. My friends ran it, my friends DJd it and my friends drank there and while Jerome’s as it existed is a relatively new bar, the place has history.

I used to party at St. Jerome’s all the time. I met so many people there and did many shady things in those bathrooms. It was the kinda dirty rock and roll bar that existed all over the lower east side until a few years ago. When St. Jarome’s closed I was bummed but it was quickly re-opened under the new Jarome’s name and after a couple walls were knocked down the place was bigger and better even if it was (slightly) less shady.

But now two generations of Jarome’s are gone and last night they threw a hell of a party to mourn it’s demise. It was one of those occasions that brought everyone back out again. A big reunion where we all get together to talk about how we old we and how everything used to be. It’s a conversation that will be happening for the rest of time as more and more condos go up and banks replace bars and culture is pushed farther and farther out into the boroughs. Yeah we all got old, but it’s easy to look around and see that downtown Manhattan is no longer a place for art and music and creativity.

So last night was fun to reminisce and when it was last call there was a good 20 minutes of pure madness and New Yorkness, but then suddenly we all had to go and by 4:20am the party was over and another bar was gone to be replaced by some sort of cocktail lounge for finance bros who moved into one of the many giant buildings that have been built south of 14th street in the last 7 years.

So I shot proper party photos for the first time in months and it felt really good, but then I woke up this morning thinking about how I should probably just fucking move to LA like everyone else…

Rest in peace Jarome’s. It was nice to have you while we did.

Click here to see all the pictures from the last night at Jarome’s.

RIP Jarome's

RIP Jarome's

RIP Jarome's

RIP Jarome's

RIP Jarome's

RIP Jarome's

RIP Jarome's

Comments (0)

Fool’s Gold Day Off – 8.20.16

Yesterday was Fool’s Gold Records annual Day Off in NYC. I have photographed most of them and they are always a good time but usually they are in my neighborhood. This year the all day party was on a helipad on 34th Street which was a really cool idea. I was running late so I took a $20 Uber there and when I got there it had been moved to fucking Queens. I started walking up to the N train but I finally gave up and got another $20 cab. I got to Studio Square NYC two hours later than I had planned but I quickly got to work.

When I got there Meyhem Lauren was in the middle of his set. Probably my greatest skill in life is moving quickly through packed crowds so I got to the front by the time he finished his set and got a few shots. My homie and Fool’s Gold founder Nick Catchdubs DJd between sets and I took a minute to wonder around checking out the place and saying whats up to everyone.

Next up was Leaf who kinda killed it and brought a bunch of babes out with her which is never a terrible move. Leaf can rap, sing and is a total babe which makes the fact that I shot her Sweet 16 party kinda uncomfortable. Seriously though she was great.

After that A-Trak did his thing and invited out a ton of special guests including MadeintTYO, K$ace and my buddy Telli from Fame School who hosted the whole event. Towards the end of A-Trak’s set the crowd started chanting for Lil Yachty and started basically moshing between sets.

Unfortunately the crowd got a little bit too nuts and Studio Square got a little too packed and the barrier between the crowd and the photo pit started getting pushed forward. The bouncers jumped in and none of the photographers were squashed to death but they kicked us all out of the photo pit. Pretty much took the entire Lil Yachty set for them to reenforce the barricade and we only had this little tiny area to shoot from.

During Lil Yachty’s set I tried to get a few good shots and then get out of the way so the photographers who aren’t quite as good as pushing motherfuckers out of the way could get their shots. Unfortunately my shots weren’t actually that good and I sort of missed out on getting any good Yachty shots. That’s some amateur bullshit right there. Still, I got some pretty decent wide shots when I climbed up on a table and shot from the VIP area.

After Lil Yachty I found a spot in between two speakers and on top of a bass cabinet or something. Basically I shot the last two artists while being shoved into this tiny space that was constantly rumbling and I felt like I was going to shit myself from the bass. It was a pretty good time. I actually got my best shots from there despite the 45 minutes or so of that minor misery.

Juelz Santana from the Diplomats came out next and fucking killed it. I feel like someone from Dipset is at every other Day Off and I am never mad about that. Cam’ron fucked shit up two years ago and Juelz kept that tradition going. Real fun set.

Migos headlined and unfortunately they only got a couple songs in before the cops shut everything down. I don’t know exactly what happened but they probably ran late cause of all the bullshit with the barricades. They got into the crowd and kept playing but eventually they got shut down permanently.

Once again Fool’s Gold Day Off (NYC edition) was a blast despite the $60 Uber bill and collapsed photo pit. I shot a ton of photos so you should go look at em already. Enjoy your Sunday or something.

Click here to see all the photos from 2016 NYC Fool’s Gold Day Off at Studio Square NYC.

A-Trak @ Fool's Gold Day Off

Leaf @ Fool's Gold Day Off

K$ace @ Fool's Gold Day Off

Lil Yachty @ Fool's Gold Day Off

Juelz Santana @ Fool's Gold Day Off

Migos @ Fool's Gold Day Off

Meyhem Lauren @ Fool's Gold Day Off

Comments (0)

Mini Metlife Takeover – 8.12.16

It’s almost that time of the year again where I switch from misanthropic disaffected hipster photographer to bat shit crazy sports fan who spends hours a week screaming at a television and hugging strangers. People who meet me during the football off season often have no idea about my obsession so I guess it’s time to remind you.

I co-founded the New York City Miami Dolphins fan club, Dolfans NYC in 2008 with my friend Michelle. Together we have turned a group of about 30 Dolphins fans into the largest Dolphins fan club in the world and have raised tens of thousands of dollars for charity. We have filed paperwork to become a 501(c)(3) non-profit group and that should be official any week now.

We throw massive events every Sunday but our big event every year in both scope and outreach is the “Metlife Takeover” an event surrounding the Dolphins trip to New Jersey to play the New York Jets every year. We own the three largest group ticket purchases in MetLife Stadium history and two years ago brought 1200 Dolphins fans to the game.

This year, the Dolphins played their first pre-season game against the New York Giants so we threw a mini MetLife Takeover as just an excuse to see everyone and meet some new Dolphins fans.

Michelle has recently moved to Miami so it was just me planning this one and we just went ahead and let people get their own tickets. Fortunately for me I had a bunch of help from our crew who helped me out a ton and we set up a small tailgate. We had some burgers and beer and our signature inflatable palm tree cooler and we had a good time before the game and I ended up taking a handful of pictures which you now have to look at.

The game itself was pretty awful because preseason football is particularly terrible. But the Dolphins won and I got free tickets (thanks Justin!) and ended up sneaking down to the front row for the last quarter so it was a good time. Thanks to everyone for helping out and sorry to everyone who read this whole who isn’t actually a Dolphins fan… Now go look at a handful of photos from our tailgate!

Click here to see the photos from the Dolfans NYC mini Metlife Takeover when the Dolphins played the Giants in NJ.

Dolfans NYC Mini Metlife Takeover

Dolfans NYC Mini Metlife Takeover

Dolfans NYC Mini Metlife Takeover

Dolfans NYC Mini Metlife Takeover

Dolfans NYC Mini Metlife Takeover

 

Comments (2)

West Coast Road Trip Part 2: Lucy Everleigh

I should probably split this into two updates but I am not going to. I am going to give you way too many photos to look at and you should absolutely look at all of them because some of them are actually pretty good and the other ones at least are fairly interesting.

When we last left my West Coast Road trip I had abandoned April O’Neil in San Francisco and had driven to SFO airport and had picked up Lucy Everleigh. Over the next 9 days I would have to deal with Lucy’s love of ska and emo music, but also she was naked most of the time we were together so it’s hard to complain too much.

We immediately got the fuck out of San Francisco and started driving north as fast as possible Portland is 10 hours away and there was fun to be had there so we needed to get pretty close the first day. We made it within a couple hours of Portland with quick stops in Weed, CA and an actual store that sells weed on the Oregon/ CA border.

Lucy smokes a good bit and had to leave her weed at home but once you hit Oregon you can just walk into a store and buy it. Lucy stopped off and got whatever reasonable thing she got and I had a conversation with the person behind the counter about what would help me sleep. I think smoking is pretty boring but I suck at sleep and the few times in my life I have taken edibles they worked pretty well for sleep. I ended up with some tiny candy that the woman said would do the trick.

We got to a motel in the middle of nowhere and because it was after 10pm everything was closed. We ordered Domino’s because that was the only food option and Lucy smoked and I ate the candy. By the time the food showed up I was barely human and essentially was fucking helpless. Lucy and I have hung out a few times but it was probably not the best look to devolve into a baby the first time we spent more than a couple hours together. Lucy had a super early flight and went to bed right after dinner, but I woke her up to talk about the bread sticks. “What if bread were butter?” I asked. It was an interesting first night.

The next day we went to Portland and met up with my friend Chelsea who got a Driven By Boredom tattoo the day after we met because she is both insane and amazing. She took us to some sort of rose garden where we shot Lucy naked in public. Those photos are gonna be on Wood Rocket (NSFW) soon but I am including a few 35mm shots in this gallery. That night we met up with legendary alt model Apneatic (aka Amanda) who have known online for years but never met. Her and her boyfriend took us to a Tiki Bar where they were doing karaoke and our waiter was wearing a single fake tattoo sleeve. I wanted to murder them for it, but they made up for it the next day.

In the morning we met up with some cam girl friends of Lucy’s named Ivy Aura and Artemis Moon for brunch. I had made plans to shoot Amanda in the woods after brunch and Ivy and Artemis decided they wanted to come too. I shot all four girls in the woods and it was awesome and we didn’t get attacked by any wild animals. It was great.

Ivy and Artemis left and for some reason Amanda and her boyfriend thought it would be a good idea to go to an hourly rate hot tub which is an actual thing. Aside from it being insanely creepy it was also kinda amazing and I took some fun photos of Amanda and Lucy in the tub. Oh and then we drove to Seattle.

We got to Seattle pretty late and crashed with our mutual friend, cam girl Hunny Daniels. The next morning we went into the city and got lunch with my friend Steak who is amazing and runs the clothing brand Teenage. It was pride week and all the waiters were dressed as Rocky Horror characters and we got Frank N. Furter so clearly we got the best waiter.

After that Lucy, Hunny and I met up with my friend Romance and did a photo shoot in this mildly fancy hotel room we rented. Apparently hotels are cheap as fuck in the Seattle suburbs. We also got a bunch of mediocre seafood and had an awkward hotel party. Good times.

The next day Lucy and Hunny did their own thing and I went and met up with my favorite ex-girlfriend Kimberly Kane. She moved right outside of Seattle and has this new weird suburban life I had to check out and I got to play with her dog for two days which is pretty much the main reason I drove to Seattle in the first place.

The next day KK and I met up with Lily LaBeau who also lives in the Seattle area and we hiked (okay, mostly we just drove) Mt. Rainier. It was fucking beautiful and I almost didn’t mind that I didn’t get cell phone reception even though I complained the whole time. Lily and I did a fucking amazing shoot that will be coming to Wood Rocket soon too. Again I included a few 35mm outtakes from the shoot in this gallery but most of the good stuff I am saving for Wood Rocket.

The next morning I picked up Lucy and we made our journey back down the coast. We hit Portland and got matching bath tub tattoos because we couldn’t think of anything dumber. We met up with Ivy and Amanda’s boyfriend and he took us to some insane castle restaurant or something. Oh, and at some point on the trip we met up with another cam girl friend of Lucy’s named Hayli but I totally forgot about that until I just looked at all the photos.

Lucy and my last stop before we both flew out of San Francisco was a random hotel in the middle of fucking nowhere. I only mention it because it was next door to this little diner and we had to check in at the diner. The guy who checked us in was also the only cook and the only waiter and as far as we could tell the only employee of either establishment. It seemed like we were the only people on our floor of the hotel so we shot some naked photos in the hallway and of course did a bath tub photo shoot with Lucy’s bathtub tattoo.

Anyway, this whole trip was fucking amazing and I could write another 10,000 words about it but I am just gonna shut the fuck up and let you look at pictures. It was an awesome two weeks and was really great to get to spend so much time hanging out with April and Lucy and seeing old friends and meeting new ones and all that shit. I shot a bunch of great content for Wood Rocket and a ton of 35mm stuff for myself and I even got a couple digital shoots coming soon too.

I love fucking road trips and I just need to find how to get paid to go on them all the time because this stuff is all I want to do and I always get the best photos from them. Big thanks to Wood Rocket for sponsoring the trip. Now go look at the photos already.

This gallery has 98 photos in it, but there are 110 photos in the high res gallery over on Girls of Driven By Boredom. What could be in those extra 12 photos? You’ll never know unless you sign up.

Now click here to see the massive NSFW 35m gallery of photos from the second part of my West Coast Road Trip with Lucy Everleigh and friends! 

Lucy Everleigh

Weed, California

Lucy, Steak & Hunny

Lily Labeau On Mt. Rainer

Lucy Everleigh

Lucy Everleigh & Apneatic Hot Tubs

Hunny Daniels & Lucy Everleigh

Artemis Moon, Ivy Aura & Apneatic

Lucy Everleigh

Comments (0)

West Coast Road Trip Part 1: April O’Neil

So this has been a weird week for me. I got back from vacation and I was slowly getting my life together between getting ready for my band’s second show and a couple Tinder dates. But then the show got canceled and I managed to get unreasonably sick. I haven’t really left my apartment since Sunday. It’s been great. On top of that I dropped off my camera to get fixed (the top screen cracked) and they told me it would be 3-5 days and now it’s going to be a month cause of parts they need. I am going to get my camera back but I haven’t done it yet cause I am slowly dying.

Long story short is I haven’t even taken a photo a week and I haven’t put on pants in nearly as long. I am sick of being useless so I figured it was time to get some damn photos up and what better than the road trip stuff I shot at the beginning of all my trips that no doubt contributed to my downfall.

My west coast road trip started with five days in LA but that is sort of cheating so we are going just going to focus on the LA to Seattle and back part of the trip. Part one features the two days I spent with the amazing April O’Neil. She’s both one of my favorite models to shoot and really fun to hang out with so she seemed perfect for this sort of thing. I actually tried to get her involved in my epic Route 66 trip but it didn’t work out, but we did go on a pretty epic day trip with Shay Laren to Murphy’s Ranch.

April and I left LA and headed towards San Francisco. The plan was to make it to San Louis Obispo and the epic Madonna Inn via the Pacific Coast Highway. It didn’t seem like it was going to take very long but when you are road tripping and taking photos and buying amazing coats it takes a lot longer than expected and we got to the Madonna Inn pretty late. Still, the Madonna Inn was so fucking epic and we got to hot tub and watch people take line dancing classes and hang out with really loud frogs. We also did a pretty great photo shoot that is gonna one day end up on WoodRocket.

The next day we woke up made our trek to San Francisco which is a much longer drive. We unfortunately didn’t get to spend quite as much time on the PCH but we did get to do stuff like hang out on a giant fucking artichoke and see a huge patriotic clam and two different whales. Oh and there was some sort of egg vending machine and we hung out a bunch in Santa Cruz and April made me play pinball for an hour which I thought was a lot but then once we got to SF she made me play pinball for maybe 4 more hours and now I want to dedicate my life to the sport which should clearly be in the fucking Olympics. WHY IS PINBALL NOT IN THE OLYMPICS?

The second, and sadly final, night of our trip was spent sleeping in January Seraph’s dungeon. It was not nearly as scary as that sounds and it was honestly quite cozy, but she didn’t tell us that we only had a key to the top lock and I managed to lock the bottom lock and we got locked out at 4am and January was asleep so we got stuck and I thought I was going to go insane but then April picked the god damn lock because she’s the best human and we got a few hours of sleep before I had to go pick up Lucy Everleigh at the airport so she could join me for part two of this adventure coming soon!

So in this gallery that you are about to look at is a bunch of 35mm shots of April and the stuff we saw. There isn’t that much nudity actually but there is some. Hopefully you will dig it anyway. Sadly an entire roll of black and white film was lost and half of that was of April and that kinda kills me. But I also shot some digital stuff that is not in this gallery. Half of that digital stuff is the Madonna Inn shoot that will be up on Wood Rocket, the other half is going to be an exclusive set just on Girls of Driven By Boredom. It just seemed like the move to make. There are also a few (3) 35mm shots that are exclusive to Girls of DBB too. So like get on that shit.

Now click here to see the 35mm photos from part one of my West Coast Road Trip featuring April O’neil!

April O'Neil

Pacific Coast Highway

April O'Neil

April O'Neil

World's Largest Artichoke

April O'Neil

April O'Neil

Comments (0)

My Ever First Shoot With Janice Griffith

I spent 5 days in LA followed by a 9 day road trip. When I got back I almost immediately left again for Chicago Exxxotica. A few days after that I took off for the Gathering of the Juggalos and then right away I went on a much needed four day vacation in exotic Delaware. In total I have spent about 11 days in NYC in the last six weeks. Fortunately (or unfortunately depending on my mood) I am back in town for a while.

August is a notoriously slow month for me so hopefully I can tackle some new projects and maybe get a new zine ready for the NY Art Book Fair in September. I just dropped off my camera to get it repaired, cleaned and regripped and gonna take the time without a camera to finally unpack from the last few trips, do my god damn taxes and maybe finally build some really stupid websites I have in mind. But all of this is boring and you came here for the nudity so let’s get into it.

The first time I ever shot with Janice Griffith was in January of 2014. She has just joined the adult industry and I shot her for a magazine that (for reasons I will not get into) probably doesn’t want much to do with either Janice or I. I published some photos I shot of Veruca James from the same day and posted some (fairly graphic) shots I took of her and Janice together on Girls of Driven By Boredom but I never posted the Janice ones.

A few months later I shot Janice again and I ended up posting those, but then some shit happened and I couldn’t really post these older photos but they have been edited for well over a year. Well all the bullshit is over and I just remembered I had these and I figured you guys could see them. Plus I miss Janice so it’s nice to look at her rad boobs and I feel like you guys will feel the same way.

Also, I should mention that the set I posted on Girls of DBB is much larger because I shot these for  an adult magazine that is a lot more interested in the inside of vaginas than I am. So yeah, if you like that sort of thing you should probably sign up. God knows I could use the money…

Now click here to see the first ever naked photos I shot of Janice Griffith!

Janice Griffith

Janice Griffith

Janice Griffith

Comments (0)