tea leaf green

For this week’s B List, we present a two-part series penned by HT photo editor Jeremy Gordon in which he shares his ten best photos and more importantly the stories behind those photos.

Someone once said, “A picture is worth a thousand words,” and perhaps it is.  But often a photo without context conceals the greater story behind it.  A couple of months ago, my editor at Hidden Track, Scott Bernstein, asked me if I would like to share the stories behind 10 of my favorite photos.  I jumped at the chance, hoping to impart my tale and perhaps a little wisdom to our readers and my friends.  What you’ll find below is mostly true and mostly accurate,  so take it all with a grain of salt.

1. 15 Minutes of Fury

[The Flaming Lips at Central Park SummerStage]

Generally, three songs or 15 minutes is all you’re going to get in front of the band.  In that time you’ve got to get close-ups of each member of the band and hopefully shots of them together, interacting with energy and excitement.  Sometimes the lighting just plain sucks – there’s actually a joke that the bands purposely under light the first three songs because they hate photographers – or the bands are uninteresting to watch and it becomes a frustrating mess. But then you get to shoot The Flaming Lips.

The show begins with the band being born out of a giant light – or a replica of a vagina – on stage before the lead singer jumps into a  hamster ball to crowd surf the venue. Dancing girls are dressed in alien costumes (if dressed at all), giant bears and fishes join in on the fun, and confetti streams down from the rafters as 20 to 30 photographers push, shove, and run around trying to get a photo of anything they can think of. It truly is 15 minutes of fury and, except for almost going berserk on a fellow photographer, I loved every minute of it.

READ ON for four more exquisite photos and interesting stories…