On The Road Again…

I am in Vegas and LA for the next two weeks. I won’t be updating the main page while I am out of town but I will be making regular smaller updates over on my special Road Trip blog which I use when I am out of town for extended periods of time.

One of the reasons I am out of town is for the LA Art Book Fair next week and I will be updating this post once I have all the details about the events I am doing for that. In the mean time…

Click here for the Road Trip blog!

On The Road Again

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Antiques Roadshow – 8.9.14

This is going to be a pretty great update. I mean assuming you love Antiques Roadshow as much is I do which is probably unlikely unless you are a 65 year old woman from middle America. I am pretty much obsessed with Antiques Roadshow in a completely non ironic way. It’s sort of the perfect TV show combining great stories, educational information and a wide variety of subjects all with an emotional payoff at the end of each segment when they find out what their items are worth. As someone full of cynicism and hate I love watching people incredibly passionate and in love with stuff I never even considered interesting before. It’s led me to find beauty in things like stone pottery and Federalist furniture. I have watched probably hundreds of episodes.

The Antiques Roadshow finally came to NYC last Saturday for the first time in many years. I tried to win their free ticket lottery but had no luck. I tried to buy a ticket online but they were over $100. I decided to reach out to a friend I met at jury duty who works PBS and amazingly he got me a pair of tickets. My friend Pinky Guest is pretty obsessed with thrift stores and flea markets so I decided to bring her along. I was pumped.

What I failed to mention is that at the same time I was frantically trying to find a ticket I was also pitching the story to my editor at the Village Voice. He liked the idea but was out of town and didn’t try to request a press pass until two days before the show. I already had tickets at that point and I had given up hope of covering it as a journalist, but on Friday afternoon the confirmation came through and I was approved!

I didn’t know what to do about Pinky though, I felt bad just abandoning her there so I had an idea. She writes copy for advertising and has worked professionally as a blogger in the past and she also runs Ebay Shop Of Horrors so I pitched both her and my editor on the idea of her writing a story to go with my pictures. They were both on board and we set out on the greatest three hour adventure of our lives!

When we got to the Roadshow we were introduced to our media escort who would take us around the event since there are a lot of rules in place to protect the privacy of people who have won big money items on the show. For example we could only publish first names of the attendees we interviewed. Our escort also let us cut the line to have our items appraised!

We each were able to bring two items to be appraised by a Roadshow expert. Pinky brought two pieces of her mom’s old jewelry and I brought a terrifying unicorn taxidermy (that Pinky found while searching for Ebay Shop Of Horrors items) and a belt buckle that I bought at a flea market for $5.

Our first stop was to the jewelry appraisers who told Pinky that her first item was worth a couple hundred dollars but could be worth more if she could find a photo of her mom wearing it at Studio 54, a frequent haunt of her mothers back in the day. Pinky was a bit disappointed with that but was excited to learn that the biggest stone in her second item, a bracelet, was a yellow sapphire and not citrine as she believed. It ended up being worth as much as $2000!

I took both my items to a bestashed gentleman at the “Collectables” table. He seemed very excited about both my items and told me that my unicorn was probably made as a souvenir in the 60s in China and might actually be made of dog hair! He told me it was worth $250 which annoyed the hell out of Pinky since she told me about it and I won the ebay auction for $35. “How could your unicorn be worth more than my necklace!?” My belt buckle seemed to be the real prize though and my appraiser seemed to be in love with it. It’s a folk art buckle with an Easy Rider style chopper on the front with an engraving from a father to his son on the back. I found out it was actually made of silver and he showed it to another appraiser before telling me it was worth $75. I was sort of surprised at how low the appraisal was given his level of excitement but considering I paid $5 for it I still left a big winner.

After our appraisals we wondered around the convention center talking to people about their items. Pinky interviewed about 25 people while I took pictures. We met a guy who paid $50 for a rifle stock that he found out was worth $10,000 and a couple who live in artist Red Grooms’ former loft and their collection of his art was worth $15,000. We also got to interview the dreamy Roadshow host Mark L. Walberg and talk to one of my favorite appraisers about antique fire arms! It was pretty fantastic. After that Pinky and I watched the 100 Foot Journey proving that we are little old ladies trapped in 30 year old hipster bodies.

Pinky wrote a fantastic article about our trip for the Village Voice that I am pretty proud of… you should click here to read it right now.

After you look at that, take a look at a rough draft of Driven By Boredom’s new photo gallery system. There is a new Driven By Boredom update coming sooner or later but we had to rush things a bit because I broke my old galleries accidentally. They will still exist as they are now, but moving forward we are going to be using WordPress’ internal gallery system. There will be a new design to it, but for now it’s a little clunky. It’s better than the old galleries, but it will get a lot better soonish.

Now click here to see all my photos from the Antiques Roadshow at the Jacob Javits Center in NYC!

Leslie Keno

Antiques Roadshow

Red Groom's Taxi

Antiques Roadshow

Leslie Keno

Antiques Roadshow

Antiques Roadshow

antiques-roadshow-5

Antiques Roadshow

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I Have No Idea What’s Going On

Hey guys. I meant to update yesterday telling you all about the Superchief art show at Culturefix but I have been on a road trip for no reason and I was staying at a random casino in Southern Indiana and I could not even begin to explain why. But anyway, I had two big 20″x30″ photos in the show, as seen below, that you could probably still go look at if you happened to live in NYC and wanted to go see them. Culturefix is a bar too so you could get drunk while looking at them and then get so drunk you buy them. Good plan.

Okay, so yeah I am on this random road trip and right now it’s 1:45am I am in Bowling Green, Kentucky which is something I never thought I would say but there is a Corvette museum here and while normally I wouldn’t care, they had a sink hole open below the museum and I want to see it before they fill in the hole. Seriously, it’s just a giant hole in the middle of a museum. I am gonna check it out tomorrow morning and then from there head to Nashville and then the Unclaimed Baggage Center in Alabama, then hit Atlanta and hang out with a Coathanger or two and then try to make it all the way to South Carolina. Five states in one day isn’t bad. I should be back in NYC sometime Sunday and then I head to the Gathering of the Juggalos on Tuesday. Yup, it’s that time again.

In preparation for Juggalos I have some naked juggalette photos I still need to get up from last year. It’s a long story and I will share that with you Monday (or perhaps from my hotel Tuesday night). I also have some lovely Shay Laren nudes that are ready to go but for a reason I can’t quite explain at this moment I can’t quite post them yet.

Also, today I took some insane photos at the Creation Museum and I can’t wait to share those with everyone but I can’t real with that until I get back but I probably won’t actually have time to deal with that until I get back from the Gathering so just be on the look out.

Long story short, I have no idea what’s going on, but I have a lot of stuff happening and a lot of stuff ready to go up but that won’t actually go up quite yet. In conclusion below are the two photos I have int he Supercheif show, one photo of a juggalette, one photo of  Shay Laren and one from the Creation Museum. Just to make everything weirder I am going to post the photos out of order so you are going to have to use your deductive reasoning skills to figure out what is happening right now. The answer mostly involves lack of sleep mixed with sleeping pills.  See you bastards soon.

Kayvon Vand

Shay Laren

Veruca James

Creation Museum

Gathering Of The Juggalettes

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Things! And Stuff!!

First of all, happy Mother’s Day! Check out my mom at her wedding in 1978!

Do to one of my best friends weddings and a strange series of coincidences and cancelations I haven’t touched my digital camera in weeks. I couldn’t get into the (first day of the) NFL Draft and I even had a dentist appointment postponed. It’s been a weird month but it’s been a great excuse to start getting my life together. I am in NYC until the end of this month so I am going to use these three weeks to hopefully get a TON of work done.

I have two big projects that I am going to take on while I am in town. I am working on a series of food books as I mentioned way back in November. Finally I am going to really get my shit together. I have a pretty good edit and a great idea how I am going to do it. Hopefully by June I will have at least a layout done.

The second big project is building a damn portfolio site. Not sure why I don’t have one or why you would even care, but hopefully me organizing thousands of photos will end up being good for you somehow. Moving on.

Back in the day on Driven By Boredom I used to post links to websites I thought were cool and things like that. I don’t really do it anymore, but here is one link you should really check out: a group of people are trying to create a road out of solar panels. It’s an amazing project that could completely change the world as we know it. It only took 35 years to build the interstate highway system. If this road actually works there’s no reason we couldn’t see a complete end to gas powered cars in our lifetime. Go donate some money now. 

In other news my Tumblr just hit 10,000 followers. It was my first social network to hit 10k followers and it features a ton of my 35mm work and just random shots from my daily life. Check it out if you haven’t already. My Instagram would have hit 10k if it hadn’t been deleted the first time. Go follow my new one already…

Hmm… What else? Oh! My web series Road Strip has a new episode coming out this week. There are a bunch of good ones coming up so catch up on the whole series already! Very not safe for work!

Last bit of news is that NYC’s own Superchief just opened an art space in Los Angeles and they are having a big show on Thursday for the grand opening. I have at least one photo in it (I gave them a bunch of stuff to choose from) and a bunch of artists I love are in it as well. My buddies (and amazing photographers) Tod Seelie and Brock Fetch are two of the featured artists and other people I dig like Lee Trice, Eddy Segal and Prettypuke are in it as well. So if you are in LA go to the opening on Thursday. If you can’t make it the show will be up until the end of July. Hopefully I will be able to make it out there to see it myself! Really psyched to be in this show!

So check out the flyer for the show and I will be back Tuesday with some photos you do not want to miss…

Superchief LA Opening

 

 

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NSFW Week! New Road Strip! App Exclusives!

So I was on the west coast for 10 days and I am finally back and recovered but now I am immediately leaving town to go to one of my best friends wedding. The problem is that while I was on the west coast all I did was photograph cute girls and shot only the one event in Vegas. So now I am going to basically be super busy and not shooting new content for another week and it just doesn’t seem fair to just not post stuff. So instead I am going to use this week to post a bunch of old nude sets that need to see the light of day!

So along with the Catie Parker set from a few days ago and this App exclusive set today I am going to have three more updates of cute girls between now and when I get back next Monday. It’s been a long time since I have done a “Not Safe For Work Week” so get excited! I edited sets of Angel Beau and Arabelle Raphael that I shot last summer and I have a set of Belle Noire that I just photographed a few days ago. I feel like I will run on a Monday/Wednesday/Friday type of schedule but I don’t want to promise anything except for a bunch of fun pictures over the next week.

Today I have for you a new episode of my Wood Rocket web series Road Strip. It came out a week ago but I didn’t have time to do a proper update about it when I was out of town. It’s the second episode starring Sidney Scarlet and it features a ton of footage of her swimming around naked. Plus we take you to exciting places like Cozy Dog (home of the corn dog!) a “giant” watermelon statue and Tall Paul the giant holding a hot dog that I currently have tattooed to my leg! Plus we got her naked in a Target while the power was out. These are things you need in your life!

I also have an App Exclusive set of Sidney that we shot in the shower and outside our hotel in Springfield, IL. The photos are high resolution and ONLY available on the Girls of Driven By Boredom app. You clearly need this app in your life.

Now click here to see the new episode of Road Strip and I will see you guys soon!

Sidney Scarlet App Exclusive

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Return Of The Road Trip Blog

Last summer I left town for 31 days on a cross country road trip and I came up with the idea of creating a specific Road Trip Blog. It was a way for me to create smaller daily posts that I could get up very quickly from the road. That way there would be constant new updates but I didn’t have to spend all day in front of the computer to get them up. I then brought the blog back when I was at the Gathering of the Juggalos last year because the internet was so questionable. Once again, I am bringing it back.

Today I am in Austin, Texas for my 11th straight trip to the South By Southwest music/interactive/film/comedy festival. I will be here for almost two weeks and starting Friday I will be shooting constantly. The first week I will be shooting mostly SXSW Film related stuff with some interactive or comedy stuff thrown in. On Tuesday night I start work for Sailor Jerry shooting the Sailor Jerry House at Gypsy Lounge all day every day for 4.5 days. The next day I am getting tattooed my pretty much my first tattoo artist every and then I will be heading the fuck home on the 18th. Should be a crazy trip. So follow along!

Click here to view daily updates from South By Southwest!

 

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Driven By Boredom Turns 13!

In February 2001 I was a sophomore at Penn State University. I had recently been destroyed by the first love of my life and I was a straight edge punk kid in a city full of nothing but drunken frat boys. I had a few friends (all of whom I somehow still stay in touch with) but I didn’t have much to do. I had no interest in partying with bros and hitting on these preppy college girls and I was so fucking bored all the time. I spent a lot of time on the internet.

Penn State had broadband internet and my time on it wasn’t restricted by how many hours I had left on my dial up AOL account. Napster was invented and I was downloading massive amounts of music and hanging out in my dorm room coming up with shit to entertain me. I started selling funny shit on eBay, I was re-captioning Family Circus cartoons, I was making terrible music with early versions of programs similar to Garageband, I was making weird videos and I was of course taking photos.

The problem was that YouTube didn’t exist yet. Flickr didn’t exist yet. Blogs didn’t exist yet. I had all this content but I didn’t know what to do with it. I was mostly emailing stuff to friends one by one if I wanted to show them what I had made. Fortunately my brother introduced me to a community of websites called E/N sites which stood for Everything/Nothing meaning they would post about anything they wanted or just ramblings about their everyday lives. They were the first blog sites as we think of blogs now.

On March 1st 2001 I launched Driven By Boredom into the world. By mid 2002 it was an incredibly popular blog and I got emails from fans every day. It was really amazing. Unfortunately my site was hosted by a guy who hosted a bunch of E/N sites. One day all of the sites went down and my site was down for months before I gave up and started over almost completely from scratch. It wasn’t the same after that and when I started managing a band in 2003 DBB took a back seat. By the time I moved back to NYC in 2006 DBB was pretty much dead.

By the end of 2006 I had been shooting parties with a point and shoot digital camera just for fun and people kept asking me what website I was putting them on. Last Night’s Party and Cobrasnake had just come out and everyone thought I was a party photographer. So I said fuck it and brought DBB back from the dead. On April 25th 2007 I bought a flash and started taking nightlife photography seriously and on December 23rd 2008 I  got laid off from my last job became a photographer and blogger full time.

It’s been a long and exciting 13 years for this blog and it’s amazing that it still exists and is somehow my actual job.

To celebrate DBB’s 13th anniversary I am having a party tonight at The Flat! There will be free DBB tattoos, cheap booze and naked babes. If you live in NYC you should come out! But if you don’t live in NYC I have something for you to look at anyway.

As a present for my blog I created a new Tumblr site called Fuck Yeah Driven By Boredom! It’s a Tumblr compiling fan signs and Driven By Boredom tattoos and sightings of my stickers and anything fun I can think about that has to do with this blog! It’s probably of marginal interest to anyone who is not obsessed with me or this blog, but I think it’s going to be a lot of fun to catalogue all this stuff. I hope you dig it!

Fuck Yeah DBB 

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Driven By Boredom 13th Anniversary Party!

This web site is turning 13! I cannot believe this fun thing I started in my college dorm room in 2013 has somehow become my job. Since 13 is such a punk rock number I decided I needed to throw a party! It should be a wild time.

Firstly, it is at The Flat in Williamsburg on March 1st from 6pm-11pm. It’s an early show and there will be happy hour prices until 9pm so you can use DBB’s website as a reason to get drunk before whatever else you are doing on Saturday night.

Secondly, it’s going to get weird. I have Tim Acupunx doing free Driven By Boredom tattoos! Seriously! I know you want to tell you friends you got tattooed in a bar right? Plus I am doing naked photo shoots live at the bar. I feel like it’s mostly going to be hot tattooed girls, but if you or your grandpa want want to get naked and pose for photos I am not going to stop you! Let’s ruin lives.

Lastly, I got Roofeeo, Prince Terrence and RekLES DJing. It’s a great line up of DJ’s that have spanned my entire New York history. I have known RekLES nearly the entire time I have lived in NYC and I have photographed so many different parties he’s thrown up to his wildly successful Friday night Girls & Boys party at Webster Hall. I met Prince Terry a few years into my NYC life when he started DJing one of my favorite parties ever, High Voltage, when it moved to Annex. Since then he’s become great friend and I went to the god damned Kentucky Derby with him and slept on his grandfather’s couch. I met Roofeeo a few years ago when he was the drummer of the Death Set. Since then he’s started drumming for TV On The Radio and DJing for comedian Hannibal Burress. I do a lot of events with him for Sailor Jerry too. All three of them are great DJs.

In conclusion there will be good music, tattoos, naked people and cheap booze. What more do you need? Oh, you need a really amazing flyer? Done. Click it for the Facebook invite.

Driven By Boredom 13th Anniversary

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Housekeeping

I got a bunch of random small things to mention to you guys so I figured we would do it all in one post. It’s not very exiting content wise but I gotta get the word out. Let’s do this.

The big thing I need to mention is that my site works again. This site does massive amounts of bandwidth. This site gets around 100k visitors a month but the average visitor tends to spend a lot of time on the site and looks at a lot of photos so we are talking of MILLIONS of page views every month and every one of those page views has at least one picture on it. I was on a shared server and when I would get a big link or something my site would just stop functioning or move really slowly. On Monday my awesome host Constant moved me over to my own server so the site is super fast now and hopefully we won’t have any crazy errors popping up any more. They really hooked it up on the price but it’s still nearly twice as much as I was paying so if you dig the site and want to support it you can help me out by signing up for my app, buying me some film or you can email me about advertising or buying prints. Any of that would be awesome.

Secondly I should be announcing the release info for my Route 66 book tomorrow. I am just waiting on a flyer. I can give you some of the info now though. The book is called “Get Your Kicks” and the book release will be in LA at the new Mishka art gallery above their LaBrea location. There will be a big solo show to go with it. There will be a smaller NYC release at the Brooklyn Mishka store with free booze and stuff but no art or anything. I am so excited for this I can’t even tell you.  A few books will be available online after the releases and if you donated to the fundraiser they will be in your hands by the end of the month!

Thirdly I threw a big party at Slattery’s Midtown Pub on Monday for this DolfansNYC thing I run. It was Monday Night Football so we went big on it.  I know people hate it when I post Miami Dolphins photos on Driven By Boredom so I am only going to mention it in this post in case anyone is interested. The Dolphins got killed but we raised over $1200 for charity through raffles and ticket sales. It was pretty amazing and my dude DJ Tropic killed it DJing during breaks in the game. You can check out all the pictures here! 

I also wanted to mention the B-Sides section of my site. I launched it a while ago but I haven’t really promoted it. I thought my site would be redone by now and the B-Sides are going to be a major feature of that, but we are way way way behind schedule on this thing and the B-Side blog has taken a back seat. I did update it the other day though with a really weird video from my friend Teddy Blanks that was directed by SXSW Film darling M Blash.  Check it out.

I gotta leave you guys with SOME content so rewatch this video about how awesome  and important I am. It’s the right thing to do.

[vimeo]https://vimeo.com/30523163[/vimeo]

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