Okay! This is the last South By Southwest update and the first one not typed up in Austin. Usually it’s the exact opposite but this was a very different SXSW for me this year. I didn’t do much and I am not too mad about it. I didn’t see a lot of bands but I did see a lot of friends and I did some pretty great photo shoots including a fairly epic one with two babes on the last day of SXSW instead of doing SXSW things. Anyway, let’s talk about Fader Fort.

Fader Fort is one of the biggest events outside of SXSW at SXSW if that makes any sense. It’s not an official event that happens every year and everyone goes and it’s a whole thing. I have covered it a lot but I haven’t been in a couple years because I was working too much. This year I didn’t actually RSVP but fortunately I was with my Playboy editor Leila when she was going and she got me in. We walked in right as Playboi Carti was playing and so of course she had to interview him because of the Playboy/Playboi thing. I shot a few photos of him live and him with his surprise guest ASAP Rocky and then we went back stage for the interview and a took a couple portraits. I shot Lil Yachty back there too for Playboy and got a few shots of him live as well.

A couple days later I checked out Fader Fort again and the only artist I saw was a dude named Super Duper Kyle who has a song that I had heard but I don’t really know anything about him. He put on a hell of a show though and I had a good time. At the end of his set he actually crowd surfed on an actual surf board. It was pretty amazing honestly.

So yeah, Fader Fort went for several days and I only shot three artists so this gallery isn’t that impressive. To make up for it I have a second gallery filled with some random shots I took along the way. Most of it is just stuff I shot in the streets. There’s a few shots of LA Riots DJing and a shot of Hannibal Buress and his grill which matches nicely with Lil Yachty’s grill so that works well for the images below. Anyway, just look at the galleries right below this paragraph and shout out to North Face for the free jacket even though it was the wrong size.

Click here to see all the photos from the 2017 SXSW Fader Fort!

And click here to see the random SXSW photos I had left over!

What’s this? Another SXSW post while SXSW is still happening? Yeah, that’s a thing but this one is gonna be way shorter than the last. Yesterday I finally got to work for my favorite client Sailor Jerry. I have shot the last few SXSWs for them but this year we only did the one event but it was a fun one.

The Austin Chronicle throws a party every year called Hair of the Three Legged Dog named after their office dog Hank. Bands play and money is raised for Austin Pets Alive. Sailor Jerry sponsored and so did Fleshlight which was kinda amazing.

I wasn’t there the whole time but with two stages I got to see a bunch of bands. Think No Think was playing when I got there and the end of their set was real fun. My friends White Mystery played after that and they are always fucking great. Black Lips played after them and while their band has changed a bunch since the last time I saw them they were still a good time. Creepoid played inside after that. I met them last year after seeing them play for like one song so it was cool to see them play a full set. And finally I caught Telle Novella play on my way out. Good vibes all around. Oh and Al Lover played a bunch of records.

Plus as an exciting bonus for you guys shot a couple of portraits Sailor Jerry brand ambassador Daniel “Gravy” Thomas as well. Okay, enough delicious 92 proof spiced corporate branding, let’s look at some photos!

Click here to see all the photos from the Austin Chronicle’s Hair of the Three Legged Dog SXSW Day party at Barracuda! 

I had plans right now but she’s apparently hung over and moving slowly so it looks like I have time to get up some more SXSW photos.

Thursday I didn’t have any actual work to do so I took it pretty easy. I started my day by seeing a movie. The SXSW Film Festival is pretty wonderful and I have covered it several times in the past, but this year I only got to see one movie but it was a good one. The Big Sick is a new film by Michael Showalter of the State & Stella. His movie Hello, My Name Is Doris was at SXSW a few years ago and I loved it but not nearly as much as the Big Sick. The movie was written by Kumail Nanjiani and his wife Emily Gordon about a real life incident where she got really sick and ended up in a coma. Kumail plays himself and it is so god damn funny and sad and amazing and I spent 80% of the movie either laughing or crying or both. I met Kumail about a week after he moved from Chicago to NYC after seeing him to stand up. He did one of the funniest sets I had ever seen and he was just in the audience of the show. One of the comedians was running late so the host Seth Herzog put him on and he killed it so hard. After that I saw him probably a dozen times before he moved to LA. For a time my two favorite comedians in NYC were him and Pete Holmes and Pete now has an amazing show on HBO and Kumail is in one of the best movies I have seen this year. Amazingly both of those projects came from a SXSW live podcast taping with Judd Appatow who produced both projects and told the story about that meetin in the Q&A.

Speaking of the Q&A one of the people to ask a question was fellow Chicago comedian Hannibal Buress. I didn’t even realize he was in town so I hit him up and he told me to come by the MTV Woodie Awards because he was giving out an award. I took forever to get there and I got there just in time to see him give the award. I got to see Rick Ross play too which was not awful. I went with Hannibal’s crew to Mohawk for the House of Vans party and saw a handful of rappers that were all from Chicago (to continue on the theme). I got to see the Cool Kids for the first time since probably 2008 and finally French Montana played.

So yeah we finally get to the point of this meandering name dropping post. French Montana (who is not at all from Chicago) headlined the Vans party. I was sort of near the stage so when he stared playing I took a few photos. Then A$AP Ferg showed up which was kinda funny because the day before I shot Playboi Carti and A$SAP Rocky showed up. Seemed like A$AP Mob was following me. Then the next song Rocky showed up again. After they left I shot one more French Montana song before calling it a night.

Don’t worry this post is almost over. I didn’t shoot a ton of photos yesterday but here are a handful of photos of French Montana and friends. The end.

Click here to see the photos of French Montana, A$AP Ferg & A$AP Rocky at Mohawk. 

This has been one of my weirder South By Southwest experiences. After 14 of these things in a row I am very used to working 20 hour days and not sleeping for a week straight and shooting thousands of images a day. This year? Not so much.

I have a few jobs this week but mostly I have been just hanging out, seeing friends and eating food. I was pretty upset when the jobs I thought I had lined up fell through (especially because I didn’t bother to get a press pass or RSVP for anything) but honestly it’s been a lot of fun and super stress free which is not something I ever thought I would say about SXSW.

I even had time to do this update while I am in Austin, so let’s catch you guys up…

On Tuesday I did my first ever shoot Playboy which was kinda great. I’ve wanted to shoot for Playboy forever so it was kinda a dream come true. In my high school year book they did one of those “In 20 years…” things and mine was “Playboy photographer” which I beat by a few years but shout out to whoever on the yearbook staff came up with that.

On Wednesday I went down to Fader Fort with my Playboy editor and she interviewed Playboi Carti because how could she not and we did a thing for Playboy’s social with Lil Yachty. I shot photos for that stuff and shot them performing live as well. I will get that stuff up later.

Anyway, on Wednesday night I hit the IHeartComix showcase at Clearport ATX because my friends and current favorite live band Ho99o9 were playing. They are one of the most insane bands around and they have a new album dropping soon so I had to go hang and shoot them. When I got to the party Sad13 were playing and I got a few shots of them.

Pomo was next and they played super smooth dance music. I dug it but I couldn’t imagine what people were going to think of Ho99o9 after grooving to Pomo. Sweater Beats was DJing after them so it was a really weird idea to put an insane punk band in between that stuff but shout out to Franki Chan for booking it. I love shows like that.

When Ho99o9 got on the place exploded. A mosh pit broke out even before they started playing. It was fucking wonderful and it lasted for all of two songs before a fight broke out and a bunch of kids rushed past the bouncers working the door and suddenly it was complete chaos. The club had no idea how to deal with any of it so they just cut the music as club security dealt with a mosh pit like people were rioting.

So the show got shut down after 5 amazing minutes and when we got out side kids just started tearing down all the Ho99o9 posters and took them all home before the cops even  showed up. Good times.

I didn’t shoot a ton of photos because I was mostly there to see Ho99o9 and they only played for a second, but the photos are probably worth looking at anyway. I mean if you read this far down the page you probably care enough to spend a few more minutes looking at 30 photos right?

So click here to see the pictures of Ho99o9 and more from the 2017 IHeartComix SXSW Showcase.

I am back from my two week LA & Vegas trip and ready to get you some photos. I do this trip nearly every year around the Adult Video News Awards. I think I have shot the AVNs or at least the events around the AVNs every year since 2008. The trip is how I got started photographing people in the adult industry and now it’s become a good way to see friends, meet new models and make some money… plus with only a few hour drive to LA it’s a good excuse to hit up LA for a week without having to pay for a flight.

Given that the AVN Awards happened over a week ago I am clearly a bit late on these photos, but I shot them for the LA Weekly and posted that link everywhere so I figured that if you really wanted to see my AVN Awards coverage you had plenty of opportunities to do so. That being said, my edit is much bigger than the LA Weekly gallery and of course you don’t get to read a long, pointless, poorly written blog about it.

This year’s AVN’s were pretty cool because a lot of my friends won stuff. Adriana Chechik won Female Performer of the Year, Greg Lansky won back to back Director of the Year awards and my friends cleaned up the acting awards. Best supporting actress went to Joanna Angel and Xander Corvus won best actor. Best Actress went to Kleio Valentien who I actually helped get into porn many years ago after sending this 2009 photo shoot to Burning Angel! (Update: That gallery is broken for some reason but you can find it on Girls of DBB!)

Also it was hosted by Riley Reid (and Aspen Rae) and a bunch of other friends won awards too like my LA landlord Abella Danger who won best Star Showcase. Holly Hendrix won Best New Starlet and we aren’t friends yet but we talked about shooting soon so hopefully we will be by next AVN.  Oh, and Sgt Kabukiman NYPD was there and he’s pretty much family.

Okay, let’s get to these photos. My shots from the Adult Entertainment Expo will be up ASAP too.

Ps. Donate to my Kickstarter. Many AVN Awards winners are in the book.

PPs. Did I mention Flo Rida performed? He did. We got low.

Click here to see all the photos from the 2017 AVN Awards at the Hard Rock in Las Vegas, NV.

1) My punk band is playing our second show ever on Saturday at Otto’s Shrunken Head. Okay, technically that is not even close to true… they have been around for a decade but this is only their second show with me in the band. Okay, that’s not really true either because they played a show when I was in LA last month without me but whatever… it’s only the second show I have played since my last band broke up in like 2012 or something so I am excited about it.

The show is free and we play at 10. It’s the 28th anniversary party for a band called Iconicide. Not sure why a 28th anniversary party is a thing but that’s a long fucking time to be in a band. The last time I played a show with them I gave the singer the mic to do a Black Flag cover with me and he kinda screamed all over it and I was wildly drunk so I decided to flip him over and he hit his head into a cinderblock that was keeping the drums from moving. He was a good sport about it and I am real excited to play with them again. That show was fun as hell.

2) The Driven By Boredom Christmas Card is almost here. You can get on the list for one American dollar. In the past I haven’t charged but if I do it through Etsy it’s super fucking easy for me to deal with it. After the fees and price of the cards and postage and shit I am not making any money I assure you, this is just the easiest way for me to deal with it.

If you aren’t familiar with my christmas cards they are pretty epic. I did make a half assed one a couple years ago but the first two were real solid. The most recent one is pretty great although I must admit they weren’t printed very well. That being said if you want to horrify your friends and loved ones there’s nothing like having one of my Christmas cards on your refrigerator. Also it says Happy Holidays on it instead of Merry Christmas because I am doing my part in the war on Christmas.

Plus if you have all three you can watch my life fall apart in front of your very eyes! Who is that nearly tattoo free babe with the incredible ass? Look at that long luxurious hair looking so slender (in comparison to the Fat Jew)? Oh god, who is that 30 something on the new card? What has become of his life?

GET YOURS NOW!

Oh, and I got some new postcards made at the same time as the Christmas cards that are for sale now if you care about that sort of thing…

Another day another zombie crawl. I have been covering Doug Sakmann’s NYC and Brooklyn zombie crawls twice a year for nearly a decade and this year was no exception. I keep thinking all this is going to make for a good book that I can sell to nerds one day but I feel like by the time I ever do anything about it no one will care about zombies anymore… At least they keep making episodes of The Walking Dead…

This year the crawl started out at The Continental. I got there a bit late and they were already gone. I started walking towards Otto’s Shrunken Head (the first stop) and I ran into them about 6 blocks north of where they started. After a quick stop at Otto’s they crawled to Beauty Bar for the after party.

The after party featured music by J & The 9s and Skeletal Life, “undead burlesque” from Liberty Rose and some sideshow madness from Dr. Claw. Also a bunch of clowns showed up and some people from Troma including Will Keenan who played Tromeo in Tromeo and Juliet which if you haven’t seen it is maybe Troma’s best film and it was written (and maybe directed) by James Gunn who wrote Scooby Doo 2 (and also some other stuff Guardians of the Galaxy for example).

So go look at these photos if you feel like you need more zombie crawl photos in your life. These pics are kinda NSFW cause of the burlesque, the painful to look at sideshow stuff and one topless photo at the very end.

Click here to see all the photos from the 2016 NYC Zombie Crawl.

I never thought I would ever shoot a music festival themed around Kid Rock but when Sailor Jerry asked me to come to Nashville for two days I wasn’t exactly going to say no. The hot chicken alone was reason to make the trip but I had no idea what I was getting into with the 2nd annual Kid Rock Fish Fry.

I should start by mentioning that there were no fried fish. I mean you could get a couple fish related items from the many food trucks but apparently the “Fish Fry” thing is some sort of inside joke or something. People kept asking me where the fish were. But, there were two people dressed as neon green guitar playing fish which was easily the best thing to happen to me all weekend. I mean how can you not love confusing fish mascots?

I also thought it was pretty interesting that the music lineup was the same for both days. I don’t think I have ever seen that at a festival before. Kid Rock played both nights and his set was exactly the same. He said “I have some good news and some bad news. Good news is that we have a badass set for you tonight. Bad news is that it’s the exact same show as last night.” His gave his reasoning behind this explaining “You never met a motherfucker quite like me.”

I was there with Sailor Jerry and so I spent a lot of time in their “Norman’s Garage” set up. Norman “Sailor Jerry” Collins is the tattoo legend the spiced rum is named after and they built a garage with two hair cutting stations and had a documentary about Sailor Jerry playing. You could come in and get your hair cut for free (I got my beard trimmed) and watch the documentary. I liked it because on Saturday it was hot as hell and the garage was a great break from the sun and then on Sunday it got suddenly unreasonably cold and it was a good excuse to hide out since I was wearing a t-shirt. They also had live painting from tattoo artist Mathew F. Scott and Daniel “Gravy” Thomas was there with the custom Sailor Jerry Ford truck that he brought on the Pawn Stars spinoff Counting Cars.  He and the truck got recognized several times which was kinda cool. I haven’t seen it yet but I kinda love those History Channel reality shows.

I took a TON of photos so this gallery is huge. I didn’t shoot much of the bands (although The Shrednecks were pretty good and have an amazing name) but I did shoot a million crowd shots. If you liked my juggalo photos you are probably gonna like these. They aren’t as crazy of course, but there are some wild mother fuckers in this gallery with some of the craziest outfits I’ve ever seen.  ICP and Kid Rock are both from Detroit and have made music together so it only makes sense that their fans would share some of the same sense of not giving any fucks.

So click here to see all the photos from the 2nd annual Kick Rock Fish Fry at the Fontanel just outside of Nashville, TN.

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.