My friends from Dear Reader are in Europe now busy touring the launch of their new album which is amazing (heard in studio during the recording process) and I am so excited for them. I shot some portraits of them back in South Africa before I left and they came out quite nice. I don’t want to give away too much as they haven’t been published yet so these are 5 that I like quite a lot.

They are super cool and are going to be in London for a few days next month so we will doing a shoot in and around London Town. Exciting.

Please keep an ear out for them and support them if you do.

I shot new photographs with the Dear Reader crew last week and as always it was really natural and fun working with them. I am moving to the UK tomorrow and my plate is completely FULL so I will only be able to work on these later but I thought that I would just upload one while I was sorting out my hard drive and making sure everything is backed up.

I cannot wait for their album to come out. Check them out if you haven’t already.

Dear Reader just arrived back from what sounds to be a super good trip throughout Europe and they just sent me these 2 scans of my photographs with them that have been published in Les Inrocks Magazine. These are them.

I will be shooting with them one more time before I leave to the UK and will blog those images soon so look out for them.

I shot this photograph of Darryl Torr a while back and he asked if he could use it for something so I just saw it again. I really like it. Darryl Torr is an amazing producer, sound engineer and musician and really just a really nice guy with more passion for the music industry than anyone else I have ever met. He has been in the music industry for ages and played in some amazing bands and is also the CEO of Openroom Productions which is responsible for many really good albums that have been released in South Africa. He also just won himself a grammy for producing the Soweto Gospel Choir.

Visit Openroom Productions on www.openroom.co.za

I took these photographs of Dear Reader (formerly Harris Tweed) a few weeks back but I just realized that I hadn’t put any of them up yet.

I really like them a lot especially the second one.

Hope you having a good week, Marcus

My friends from Harris Tweed are currently in studio working hard on their new album so today we went passed to see how it is going and shoot some photographs. It’s all sounding bloody amazing as imaginable so this blog is to wish them good luck with the rest of their time on this.

We are shooting the new album photographs quite soon so I will keep you posted on them as we go along.

I shot photos yesterday for my friends from the band Harris Tweed. I had an idea a while back for a shoot that I wanted to do with them but I have been so worried that it wouldn’t work out the way I had imagined. Anyway, yesterday we gave it a bash and I really like the results a lot. These are just a few of the favourites but there are a lot more that work well too.

On saturday night, Harris Tweed played one of the best shows I have been to before. They did something different and it really worked for them. I am pressed for time so I am only going to upload this photo of Cheri so you can see how amazing the set and lighting was. Check these guys out, they’re in a different league that this country isn’t used to

These are a few images I shot of Alan playing with Harris Tweed on saturday night. He reminded me so much of Slash from Guns and Roses (without the funny bushy hair and the smoke in his mouth). I really am enjoying watching this guy play.

I rushed all my processing today cause I shot a lot of photos over the weekend but decided to work on one properly and convert it to black and white to keep it raw. I really like this photo. Cheri is a good lead and although it must be stressful playing live to a big crowd, this shows she still enjoys it.

My friends from Harris Tweed were one of the opening bands for Fall Out Boy at the show on friday evening. As always they were amazing and it seemed as though everyone there thought the same. I really think they are going to go far and make it HUGE soon. Check them out, watch them live, buy their CD or do something to make sure you get to know of them.

This is Darren from Harris Tweed. He is a proper funny guy and every time I see him, he is happy and laughing. I shot this during their sound check on friday night. I really like this photo a lot and think it shows him the way he is. Fun bags.

I have been friends with Alan for ages and he really is a guy with such an amazing mind way more mature than his age. He plays guitar for Harris Tweed and every other time that he can. I have been wanting to shoot a photo with him for quite some time now and had an idea in my head but we just haven’t got around to actually doing it. They played with Fall Out Boy at the Dome this passed friday and there was this couch in the Band Room so I shot a few just to pass time and although they aren’t what I was wanting to do, I think they show him quite well. Watch out for him, he has more passion than anyone I have ever known.

Again, this is one of those photo’s that just got forgotten about before I went away. Just saw it now and really like it a lot. It is of my friend Cheri, from Harris Tweed, playing their final song of their set at the last show I saw of them. I tried for long to get a shot framed this way with her in the right place and really think this one is right.

I forgot that I shot this photo before I went overseas. I actually shot a few photos like this but I thought I had to put this up now. This is my buddy Alan and he plays for the band Harris Tweed and I love love love watching him play. I like this one ….

Whenever I go to the beach, I promise not to shave the entire time I am there. The problem is that I have been at the beach for some time now and really am starting to look a bit rugged. Anyway, Alan decided to join me in my venture and I shot this photo to show him at his peak. I could be wrong though, maybe, like me, he still looks the same or worse now. Al’s the man.

On my last night with the Tweeds in Cape Town, I shot this photo of them all together being funny on a couch outside the Independent Armchair Theatre. It was an amazing show and out of the 60 shots I took of this scene, I think this one works the best. They are an awesome bunch of people.

I am trying to sort through some photographs from the last month and two weeks ago today I drove down to Cape Town with my friends from Harris Tweed. We stayed at friends of Darryl’s parents in the middle of the NO where in the Karoo and this photo we shot as we arrived there on monday evening. Darryl guided us on a hike to see some awesome bushman painting’s that we never ever saw. Either way, it really was such an amazing setting. We like …….

My friends from Harris Tweed were recording the day before yesterday so I went passed to hang out and just enjoy the studio and their company.

I had 3 ideas of the career I wanted to one day follow and these were photographer, sound engineer and chef. I even job shadowed Darryl for a bit and we were laughing cause if I had’ve carried on with sound engineering, Darryl would’ve been my REAL boss. However, I chose photography and I still have plenty to learn, but I do really enjoy music and the studio so much.

Anyway, I shot a whole bunch of photographs in the studio but for some reason I am having MAJOR problems today trying to convert the raw NEF files and it is going to drive me mad so I am just going to put these ones up for now. Haven’t shown the band yet so hopefully they will like them. I want to be in a band, or play music at least. It really must be the best thing. The Harris Tweed posse really inspires me a lot.

Good friends, good music, good fun, good times and a lot of talent and laughs. Check them out if you haven’t yet.

I shot a bunch of photographs for my friends from Harris Tweed last year at the Levi’s Rage for the Revolution event and never really looked at them much until Alan’s sister asked me for these photographs for her to scrap book with. I had a look at them and really liked these two. Al is one of my favourite subjects.

I cannot believe it, we got Darryl (Boss) to smile while rocking out with his bass!!! Actually, I am just taking the piss and it was super funny having everyone tease him about his concentration on stage. That night, he let go and busted out better than anyone before. I like this shot of him doing sound check standing in front of the stage so that he can listen if the sound guy is actually getting it right or not. Funny trailer crasher.

Seeing as I shoot the Tweeds a lot and enjoy working and hanging with them, all the boys sat down and spoke about lighting for a bit. They let me set up the lights the way that I wanted for their show at Zula Bar in Long Street and I shot some photographs of Cheri (Harris Tweed) to show them what it would look like. Anyway, these two photographs were shot with the exact same lighting and camera settings within minutes of each other but just at a totally different angle. Isn’t it crazy how much lighting can effect the way we see things.

Cheri and Darryl played a chilled set inside the Mega Musica Store at the V & A waterfront and because they never needed to set up, we shot some mess around photographs just outside the store. Show was a rocker. Coffee, buddies, good music, Alan’s ass, ice tea, Police Academy DVD’s for R49.95, comfy tables and cool gear. Awesome…..

For those of you who don’t know, tomorrow is the Night of 1000 Drawings exhibition. It is all for a charity and definitely the coolest way to raise money ever. Basically people submitted drawings, photos and just other random art peices on A5 and they will be sold for R100 and the money will be used to purchase a bakkie for the charity. You can read more about it all on their blog at http://1000drawings.blogspot.com but anyway, these are the ones I submitted. Whoo hoo.