keithcurrams

[keithcurrams]

A Night of Sonic Carnage

Three events on a Sunday night in the Déise, 30-4-17

Sitting in the house sharing a few drinks and chats ahead of a night of music in Waterford City. First up is Rusangano Family (with support) organised by Labyrinth Mgmt and Events in St. Patricks Gateway Centre. After this a short stroll down the Quay and into Jordans American Bar for a swift half to catch the vinyl players spin their finest, then out the door and up the lane to Central Arts for the Sonic Dreams promo night. As we were getting ready to call a taxi we received news that the much anticipated Rusangano gig had been postponed. We discussed the situation over another drink, then headed in for the rest of the night's revelry.

Jordans was well attended; the front bar full of the grey and the good with a younger crowd out back. In the bottleneck between bar door and smoking area vintage tunes were bapping out through twin tops; the vinyl wearing its age with clicks and pops and crackle with the occasional skip to the dismay of the DJ. Patti Smith's 'Horses' brought people in from the beer garden to dance while Ian Dury held them there as more heads got up to skank and bop. Midnight soon came and a quick few steps brought us out the door and up the steps to the SAW fundrasier.

Ollie cueing up another one

Put my pint down in the jacks, eh, which one is mine again?

Amy, Dan and John

Friendly faces greeted us upon entry, Dan and John on duty outside with good vibes waiting within. We had missed the previous acts of MANTLE and SOMA, and Dave Mono could be heard pounding through the door with beats that gets in under the skin to make the bones jump and jangle, no standing still allowed. His set was full of well crafted peaks and dips, the music was always going somewhere. Every build-up had a pinnacle followed by a gentler bit to sway to and catch your breath before going through it all over again. Up and down, in and out, building and building like waves onto a shore, our bodies buoyed on the incoming tide of this beautiful and savage mix.

Dave Mono weaving his magic. You can listen here: Soundcloud

Steven Stubbs informed me that my dancing was captured for posterity on his multicam broadcast of the event, which you can see here: Linky

Dave brought us in to land, the lights came up, sweat still glooping from the skin of my back as I sat to put my boots back on. Familiar faces passed by as we filed out into the night to stand and talk on the path a while before heading home. 

Two days later and my legs are still in bits from it. I hobble around the house and every time I cringe as I stand up it reminds me of the manic hands in the air dancing on that bank holiday Monday.

Where's me boots! I swear I grew a tail while I was in there.

The afterparty awaits. 

[keithcurrams]

Glóry Be!

On tour with ‘Johnny I Hardly Knew Ye’ at the Glór Theatre in Ennis “See colour, See differences, Take chances, Before it gets too late” – Delorentos

Eugene’s got it covered

25 hours after I last left my bed with even less sleep this time and we’re on the road and on our way to the Glór theatre in Ennis. Today sees the third performance of the 2017 tour of ‘Johnny I Hardly Knew Ye’, written by Jim Nolan and produced by Garter Lane Arts Centre, and we’re up for the ride along with the production. The main road from Carrick was closed due to an accident the night before so we took a detour via the R680. Part of a slow convoy now, headed by 2 lorries travelling along a winding R road through Kilsheelan with woodland on each side. Leaf carpeted paths can be seen through the tangle with glimpses of forestry roads marked by yellow barriers. Intermittent houses with well kept plots nestle in the deciduous woodland affording views of the snow dusted Comeraghs that grow large on the horizon until we eventually pass them by.  

About an hour later the Glór Theatre come into view dressed in stone and clad in corrugated black metal with plate glass windows. The lines of the building broken up by slender silver splinters of Birch; the ladies well spaced along the curved path out front, reaching to the sky with their fine fronds. We came round the rear of the building just in time to see Lippy (lux), Martina (SM) and Michael (Prod Mgr) lined up on the loading bay beside the truck. We parked and entered via the huge stage doors and into the scene dock off stage right overlooked by the open balcony of the green room. 

Amy and Mike carrying through a flat

A few short steps and I was on the wide stage, looking out onto retractable tiered seating with a sweeping dress circle overhead. Lighting bars & trestles descended from the ceiling; rows of fresnels, parcans and spots suspended like jagged black fruit on the boughs with Lippy passing between them changing filters and making adjustments. Meanwhile Martina, Amy and Michael brought in the flats and lay them against the back wall ready to be assembled in place.

Lippy in his natural environment

With some guidance from the tech manager I wandered around the spacious purpose-built structure. Sun streamed in through the big windows of the public area out front, the exhibition on the 1st floor sprawled past the bounds of the gallery space down to the bright and spacious common areas of the atrium and café out front. Eddie, the part-time go-to of the Glór approached us one by one once the bulk of the flats had been carried through “Are you a tea or a coffee man?” he asks, a presumption I love.

By 11am the bright café is already starting to echo with chatter and the clink of morning teas, meanwhile not far away in the dim theatre Amy and Martina are on stage marking out the back line for the flats while Lippy & Eddie set the lights, the room clad quiet except for instructions passing to and fro. By 11.30 the flats start going up, Mike and Ger accompanied by the vvvvvt of screw guns and the world starts to take shape. At 2pm Lippy is on the Talloscope passing between the flats focusing the lights.  By 15.49 the last few repairs are being made to one of the desks, the stage all but ready for the imminent arrival of Jim Nolan (writer and director) and the cast.

Mike and Ger assembling the flats

Lippy at his station and Eddie who knows the string that binds all things 

Martina dressing Coyne’s desk

Time here passes with a smooth efficiency, not in staccato seconds but in fluid hours and unnoticed minutes filled with activity and endeavour. One by one the actors arrive; gathering for a quick press shot for next week’s papers in Dún Laoghaire. Lippy and Jim Nolan run through the audio levels ahead of the show. Backstage the light smell of cigarette smoke wafts in from outside signalling a rare break for the crew, and the low murmur of actors running their lines comes from over the balcony of the green room.

The stage is set. There is a stillness in the theatre, like a beast languid with deception but tensed and ready to move. Around 7pm Jim starts topping and tailing the scenes, running entrances and exits and transitions. A quick skip through the play with lines delivered out of meter, a curt and informal exchange between familiars. During all of this I was hunkered stage left, moving between the blacks and the shadows shooting the performers and Martina, now wearing her stage manager’s hat. 

The trick here is to provide minimal distraction, to be caught is to be executed on stage. Keep the head down and move quietly. The Fuji X-T10 I acquired last year is an absolute game changer for me, the electronic shutter and compact profile of the camera allows me to shoot in ways that were just impractical 6 months ago, and the f2 lens gives me the aperture I need to get the hitherto unseen shots.

Ema waiting for her cue

Behind the set I see the wait before the first entrance, light spilling from the aperture in the flats, the impression of a long hallway just an arch of wood with the form of an actor draped in a character’s skin waiting for their queue. The least seen moment before the most public one. The core of the matter. Theatre is a spectacle and a fabrication of reality. A world rests on a few lengths of 2 be 4. 6mm of plywood and paint looks like a 60 year old room ripped from a building and transposed to the stage for the characters to inhabit. A spectral space where humans become imaginary beings woven from the mind of the writer. The duality of actor and character; they are at once both themselves and the other. And just like a fabrication of the imagination, the whole construct comes down with a few well places motions in the physical realm; to be packed and moved into the mind’s eye of another theatre space. Half an hour to house. 15 mins to house. The sound of vocal warm-ups and stretches on stage, whoops and yawns and arpeggios. The illusion is set yet it is hard to leave by the door we came in through, to hit the road and head home. Garrett passes us in costume giving a small wave en route to the stage. The job feels unfinished and stepping out into the night feels surreal, like when engrossed in a book if you were to pause to look around; for a moment the two worlds kinda bleed into each other and you straddle the realms. We will accompany this tour to a few more venues, and will soon make up the hours in the strange thin temporary space between reality and performance.

[keithcurrams]

Sound Kapital - Labyrinth Management and Events

St. Patrick’s Day 201

A secret gig for St. Patrick’s Day? In a barn not too far from the city centre? How could I resist.

I was tipped off to this event by the landowner over beers a few weeks back and was asked to give a hand setting up lights for the event. We put in a few evenings getting the place together, but  in truth the space was ready to rock; Well versed in the ways of the session all it needed was a once over with a sweeping brush but we decided to give it a bit of extra attention by rigging some lights, painting and extending the stage and adding a few new features.

The space was divided into 3 open plan areas; seating, performance, and at the far end a bar. Overhead the open balcony of a storage loft ran the length of the building , outside a single-serving latrine with sink. By the time people arrived this was complete with a red bulb and Vivaldi on loop from a small stereo.

Decided to plug everything in on Thursday to see how it fared out. Hot air blowers upgraded from being circuit board blowers in time for the gig. Try finding a ceramic fuse on a bank holiday Friday.

The acts started to arrive mid afternoon and soon the whooshing of hot air blowers was overlaid with chatter, the room was populated with bodies and black flight cases filled the floor. I left to come back, nipping home to eat and change and arrived back before 8pm. I could hear quiet chats and the clink of cutlery from the far end of the room, the musicians clustered around a table by the bar finishing their dinners, talking about songwriting and the events of the day  “…don’t think of it as a song when you’re writing it…” and I began to pick familiar faces out from around the table. The hitherto unknown ‘Bana Rua’ comprised of several knowns, Waterford is like 1 degree of separation, it’s quick to network here and guaranteed any new production is going to have at least 1 person from a previous, the same faces occur in a new context, producing new work, striving and pushing forward with their creativity.

The sun goes down, the house lights go off. The bare floors and many many couches are lit by fairyight, candles and a few well placed spots. Our pridefully extended and painted stage is a mere amp riser for the kit heavy acts, the frontline extending the length of the dancefloor and coming out half the width from the back wall leaving a narrow channel for dancing and movement between the areas. Soon after 8pm people started to arrive in 2’s and 3’s, taking seats along the long wall. Stephen Butler sat on the stairs to the storage area checking people in, allowing them to filter through to the performance area and crowd in around the bar. The venue filled fast, the 1st act not even on yet, revellers coming over from the city draped in flags and carrying cans.

The first plucked note from Toucan (Conor Clancy) hushed the crowd and the room’s attention turned to the music, Conor’s voice and general demeanour captivating the assembled.

Some spirit of fun resides in this shed, welcome and ready for the feast of St Patricks. A feast of drink and tunes.  The democracy of the crowd, some moving closer to the performance area to move to the beat, others hanging back to talk in groups scattered about the space. Walking around there are even more familiar faces and reunions, people I’d not seen in months all fresh and full of life for the night that’s in it.

The mood is infectious, such a party vibe like the sessions of my youth, booze, music and a concrete floor. Down by the bar I paused among the crowd to watch, to just be amongst the bodies and was drawn into an engrossing conversation that ranged from music to film to literature, topics punctuated by a sip of whiskey. It was one of those conversations that could easily have gone on all night until drink rendered us senseless and it reminded me that real chats still exist outside of my bubble. 

The mandolins, guitar and banjo of the second act Bana Rua take the floor shortly after Toucan, informing the crowd that “Bana Rua are gonna do a scabby few aul wans for ya” and count into a bawdy pub ballad. Vocals harmonising and the instruments come in greeted by a ‘rrRRRRRYEAH!’ from the audience seated and standing mere inches from the singers. Bana Rua’s performance was just beautiful, at times the four singing in canon, completely a capella, each songs’ end met with cheers and whoops from the crowd.

Bana Rua

With all the kit laid out ready to go, turnaround between acts was swift. Around 11pm Key Regimes took to the stage. As in they actually used the stage, which was nice to see. From the crowd I could just about see the 2 heads behind the wall of equipment; keys with cool tropical banner draped down the front topped by a midi triggered light bar, the familiar chic of handcut plywood and electrical flex.

Key Regimes

The cool uplifting funkiness of the Key Regimes is like a well-produced soundtrack for a party in a film and their live performance carries the same tone and texture you’d get from their recorded material. I found myself looking around for the rest of the band, this is a sound that should not be emanating from 2 people with just guitar and keys, so full and rich; pure soundtrack music with songs seeming to flow from one to the other.

Time passed and people danced. Around 12.43 ‘Between Ourselves’ had started the final slot of the night. The trio moved bopping behind an array of sequencers, synths and unknown apparatus glittering with buttons and lights that when manipulated delighting the crowd. They shifted up through the phases to bring the sound in the room to a great crashing crescendo, like a high hat strike that just keeps on ringing without a tail. Beats and samples queued up to be the next to rise through the mix, sloping troughs and frothy silvery peaks all kept in line by a solid yet shifting beat. They dropped elements into the mix then strategically pulled them back, soloing and jamming together with the same dynamic you’d see in any band. The three moved amongst each other, arms reaching across to adjust a dial, eye contact and flow, the likes I’d not seen since the late heyday of Untz with Dave, Muc and Petshop occupying one mind with 6 arms manipulating the mix.

Between Ourselves

The music builds and flows, sweaty bodies and hands are in the air, the concrete floor wet with slopped sups, I see a sea of bobbing smiling happy faces. Some other heads a bit the worse for wear, sat in corners tapping a foot to the music and leaning in to speak to each other.

The musicians finished up and the crowd thinned as the bulk of the revelers passed out into the soft night. Someone dutifully took on DJ duties, the remaining crowd singing along and dancing to ‘Stop Making Sense’ projected on the wall. Even though it’s a rip streamed from YouTube it is still a hairraising experience and  it  feels weird to applaud  a recording from decades ago but yet we do. Beyond the bobbing heads Dave hops up on stage pirouetting with a can of glitter, scattering golden flakes out over the remaining dancers in a graceful cinematic display.

Hours later now, the blueing sky is in danger of being overpowered by the twinkle of fairy lights. “It’s early days, it’s only 25 to 7” comes a voice from across the room. This is the warmest time; hearts are bared, the BS stripped away though anyone still standing has few layers left to peel back. All the demons are danced out and just a few assembled stalwarts herald the rising sun from the couches. Plastic cups of Captain Morgan and Coke are handed round and a toast is called: “May you get half an hour in Heaven before the Devil finds you”. Soon after I get the urge to go. I don’t really want to go, but I know I need to. I walk home in the bright morning sun, picking up some blaas and beans from the Spar en route and find myself momentarily bathed in stank from a passing lorry on it’s way from the abattoir. I awoke many hours later, the sun heading for the opposite horizon and me feeling more than a bit seedy but allover good after a few hours of sweaty tossy-turny drink filled sleep, a hunger on me for salty Tayto and Meanies washed down with about 2 pints of tea. The camera full of blurry mnemonics, and 6 pages of chicken scratch notes to transcribe.

[keithcurrams]

Derby Day in Dublin

Gareth, Erica and Myself

After a Saturday morning meeting with a client I grabbed a toasted sandwich from the Centra and headed across town to my friend Gareth (aka Gearóid yer Mudder). He and a few others from the Waterford Viqueens roller derby team were going up to Dublin to attend an All-Ireland mixed scrim (friendly match) in the Ballyfermot Social Centre with members of Limerick Roller Derby, Waterford Viqueens and Men Behaving Derby. 

Arriving at Ballyfermot Sports and Fitness Centre

We picked up Erica (aka Rayquadza) from her morning training at the Cill Barra Community Sports Centre en route and we got on the road. Barrelling up the motorway the wind whistling like a banshee as it passed over the vehicle and the familiar landscape unfolds slowly on the crooked horizons.The car shakes slightly in the crosswinds as Erica and Gareth explain the rules of Derby to me, and we were mostly done with the basics by the time we passed Junction 9 for Kilkenny.

The Basics

Two teams of 5 skate counter clockwise on an Oval shaped track. Each team is made up of a Jammer (who wears a star ‘panty’ on their helmet) and 4 Blockers. The Jammers job is to get past the opposition’s blockers, and then earn points by subsequently lapping the opposition blockers. Points are only counted when the Jammers hips pass the opposing Blockers hips. Meanwhile the opposition Jammer is trying to do likewise.

The Blocker’s job, funnily enough is to block the opposition Jammer or knock them outside the track bounds using their shoulders, hip checks and tactical skating. Elbows, head shots or anything below the mid-thigh is not allowed. In addition, each team has a Pivot (with a striped cover on their helmet), which is someone who can become a Jammer if the Jammer successfully pulls off their star helmet cover and hands it over to them. The game is played in two halves of 30 minutes each, with a  halftime break of 10 – 15 minutes . Each half is divided into several ‘Jams’ of 2 minutes or less.

All of this played whilst wearing roller skates. Try sumo wrestling in socks while simultaneously running laps on lino and you’re a teenth of the way there.

The trip was short and we parked up outside the complex. The sports centre was spacious and well fitted out, chlorine in the air as we passed the pool, the gym, up the stairs and into the high ceilinged  indoor sports hall. The floor of a mesh of different lines of tape and paint for the bounds of the different games, poured concrete walls polished by the impacts of a thousand sweaty bodies.

There were about 25 attendees in the hall already. Everyone was changed quickly and soon the space was filled with the irregular hollow clock of kneepads on the floor as the group did their warmup and I set up my flash trap. The first scrim started soon after. White team vs Black team, boys vs girls.

Despite the briefing I got on the rules I have no idea what’s going on. As I watch it appears like some kind of rolling shifting shunting scrum. Intense bursts of jostling, Jammers breaking from the pack and gliding gracefully ahead and around the track before slamming into them again from the rear. Slipping through, or not, falling, picking themselves up, shouting. All the while a referee (oh yeah, there’s like 7 refs) circling inside the track pointing out and following the lead Jammer with 1 hand, and holding up fingers to indicate the points scored with the other. The rumble of a few dozen wheels on wood filled the spacious hall, all this apparent chaos punctuated by the shrill patterned whistles of the referees.

 The 3 hours passed fast, substitutions rotating with the 2 minute intervals, the nimble wheel clad feet deftly accelerating, turning and toestopping. Grace and brutality all in one motion, it is really quite engrossing to watch even though I don’t know who was winning from one moment to the next. The energy is infectious and I juggled lenses and cameras, adjusting the flash to try and catch something to visually represent what was going on.

The day wrapped up, the winner declared and the hall emptied in minutes, a few staying back to have a skate and do some drills. We piled back into the car, a subtle umami pong from the gear in the boot as we drove home in darkness, the ride home filled with talk from the days’ activity and the history of derby, how it transitioned from some kind of violent costumed show on wheels to an athletic mixed gender sport of rules, leagues and governing bodies. The Alt girls on wheels image is instantly identifiable in the public mind yet despite how long it has been going it is still quite an underground sport, and hopefully one that will develop and give an athletic opening to those who just wanna skate every damn day.

Know what I love? A group that knows how to pose for a group photo

[keithcurrams]

Grandma Eat Me Out (a misheard lyric in the middle of Longford)

I’d arranged over Facebook some weeks prior to accompany Dundalk’s Third Smoke into the Transmission Rooms Recording Studio as they worked on their EP. I came across them at last year’s Vantastival festival and they absolutely blew me away. We’d chatted a few times back and forth on messenger, but it wasn’t until the Tuesday before the session that I actually spoke with Hugh (lead singer) on the phone and got the full rundown on the plan for the weekend. Rocking in Saturday morning, working until late that night and another 8 hours on Sunday doing overdubs.  Two days’ work for one track. The plan was to catch the atmosphere of them all playing together, to get the interaction and buzz in the room down on the takes.

Previously I’d been with El Hígado No Existé in a dingy disused factory in Waterford using manky mildewed mattresses for baffles, and then the pristine subterranean cavern of Temple Lane Studios with Susan O’Neill and the Low Standards. This was something different, and it’s incredible for these guys to allow me access during the recording process. They don’t know me, we’ve spoken only a handful of times and they’ve seen my images. And on the strength of that here we are in Longford’s Transmission Studios at the most sensitive and expensive time for a band.

Amy and I decided to make a weekend of it. Friday travelling, Saturday me in the studio with the band while she watched the rugby. The rest of the time to be spent sightseeing. We gave the car some love with fresh oil and €35 of fuel and we got on the road around 2pm Friday. 

The light shifted, the day dimmed and we neared our destination. Heading west now towards Mullingar, fields and trees stretched away to meet a soft yellow pastel sunset which suddenly gained intensity as the sun dropped low below the edge of the cloud blanket above. Trees and grass hued amber on the bank to the right, everything else sepia and shade. This golden hour of travel gave way to high contrast dusk driving, headlight and lamplight. Eight counties later we arrived in Leitrim to a warm welcome and a warmer cottage, a spread of homemade bread, scones, cream and jam left on the table for us by the owners.

Sunset over Lough Owel

The following morning we set off on the 35 minute drive to the studios. One very grumpy dog and an hour later we were still driving up and down the roads between Drumlish and Ballinamuck trying to locate where exactly the studios were. We pulled in to a wider part of the road outside a house to consult the map, moments later a lady appeared out of nowhere, a much friendlier dog in tow. We were literally 50 yards from the studios, two unassuming bungalows tucked in behind a high ditch and a bent stop sign. Self-catering cottage on the left, studio on the right.

We parked up and I approached the one that looked less like a residence, and could hear faint piano music. Niall the pianist saw me first and came to meet me at the door, Hugh appearing moments later to show me the lay of the place and introduce me to the band & engineer sat inside the control room.

The studio was like a thrift store of rock ephemera. Amps stacked by the door, 3 high and 2 deep, a rack of guitars tucked In between the piano and the wall, behind that a rack of keyboards . Framed posters, Signed set lists and albums, Shane McGowan and Geldof staring out at us from the cover of mid 90’s editions of NME and Hotpress, Some framed with inserted scraps of autographed paper, the blu-tack holding it in place staining the page with old oil. Song books and Osbournes bobbleheads, the smell of incense.  Down the right hand side glass windows and a sliding door isolated the control room where the band was sat. From the rear of the studio the sound of bags being unzipped, rustles and hard clink as Karl Odlum moved around setting up mics. From the control room the searing roar of a soccer match on a laptop could be heard, over this were snippets of a piano refrain, discussions about tempo changes and the thock of a digital metronome. 

The day drifts. The room is patient. The stones in the wall older than the shape they’re cut to and vibrating with their own low frequency. Nothing is expected, this is a place to do your best with the time you have. The slow preparation & discussions on how to shape the sound, Hugh and Karl teasing out various issues with the different members. In and out, back and forth, adjust, tweak. Looking around now the floor is full of cables and the energy is slowly winding up. The wait hungers the appetite.

Chris and Hugh talking it out

This is a RAW space, where musicians are naked and their work is in pieces, an engine disassembled and each part scrutinised then tested for optimum performance.

It is fascinating to see how the parts of the song fit and run in this machine that idles in the minds of the band. I catch elements of what I loved from their live performance in the snippets they play through while setting up, a building power that is reigned in at the last, the energy of the track circling back into itself rather than exploding  out.

Joe, Tim and Hugh

A jag pulls up and all I can see from my position through the vignette of the studio door is a leopard print glove reaching from the interior. This as it turns out, is Mary, the Ban an Tí who I met when I went in to the cottage to make a cuppa for myself. She had swapped her print gloves for marigolds, to take out the bin and sort the recycling. Chatting with her briefly she told me how her family is 300 years on the land, and that her 2 sons set up the studio. Karl had joked upon my arrival that we’d be the talk of the area, driving up and down like that. I mentioned to Mary the trouble we’d had finding the place and she said she responded “Oh yes, I’d had a text alert that someone was looking for me”.

It is nearly 4pm now. The studio has bodies, everyone at their station with headphones and a dynamic of eye contact.

A segment had been removed from the song to make it less dark, but it also facilitated a tempo change. The band are reworking the song in the fresh, exploring ways to bridge the two ends while capturing the energy in the room. I silently watch the group pull towards this collective vision with patience and care.

The last snap of the drums leaves a dull squeal in my ears audible in the pregnant silence that follows, which is peppered with a few words then a chat and another run. Boop Boop Boop Beep. I can hear the digital metronome through their headphones so I know we’re recording.

The bright day cools to a blue hue. The air is light and the mood good during the listen-backs, the lads singing quietly along to the take with feet crossed on knees tapping the air. The playback stops occasionally to talk about the dynamics and segments of the song, momentum and chords. Over dubs.  Additions to lift the track without losing it. All these really intense discussions as they work through the language. Clarifications and definitions. Which bit? How so? In what way?  Teasing out all the sticky bits, in the words of Karl “Getting away from the root for a moment to pull this thread”.

Hugh and Karl  

We broke for dinner around 9pm, spinning into Drumlish for chips with a round of cupcakes for desert that Amy had left for us when she dropped me off.  Everyone ate quickly in the house and went straight back across to the studio, the mood jovial and rearing to go. The last few takes of the night were full of fun, catching each other’s eyes at the end of the take, riffing and skitting in the knowledge that they’d done good work. The interpersonal dynamic of the band comes through in the music, sounding tight and bright through the monitors.  

 L-R: Hugh, Joe, Tim, Niall, Chris and Karl in the control room 

After a few good takes, Chris, Tim an Niall retire, leaving Joe to end the day with some guitar overdubs, Hugh and Karl listening intently in the control room. I sat with them, the silvery shimmering sound searing and ear-splitting, the uncomfortable intersection of hertz and volume and beautiful in the mix of the days’ work. With these takes locked down, Amy arrived outside to collect me and I stepped out into the frigid night, a bright half-moon on its back and every star brilliant in the pristine depths of the Midlands.

I awoke the following morning to find the earworm riff of ‘Maya’ had burrowed in deep while I processed the day’s events. A slice of the process, a few hours spent amidst the unseen process of recording, a private moment for a public execution that is the forthcoming EP ‘Maybe in Time’ which launches in Whelan’s on the 18th March.

[keithcurrams]

28 Hours for Waterford Youth Arts

Sat 21st January saw the 2017 edition of “28 Hours for Waterford Youth Arts” fundraiser. This year saw 80+ volunteers made up of actors, writers, directors, techies, production and filmmakers come together to create and perform 10 new works to a live audience in Garter Lane Arts Centre.  This bi-annual fundraiser starts with the 4pm news bulletin on Friday 20th Jan with the performance 28 hours later on Saturday at 8pm.

This year I took a step back from this process. The piece I made spanned the 28 hours, checking in with the different practitioners at different stages of the process.

Ciaran Murphy being interviewed in Geoffs

I filmed through Friday, edited a little Friday night, grabbed another interview and worked until about 1am and got to bed by 3am. Back up at 9am on Sat and I filmed a little then edited a little, and in this way I passed through the day so that come showtime I was pretty much there. As the first piece was on stage I was in the tech office on my lappy, dropping names into the timeline along with the last few shots of people arriving to the theatre.

I’d been Buddhist calm up until now but the nerves had been steadily building over the past 2 hours, and continued to do so as I hit ‘export’ I think somewhere towards the end of the first half.

At the end of the interval it was at about 80% and I had a beer so was  feeling a bit better about things.

I sat glued watching the progress of the render, waiting for something to go wrong. I remember dancing from the office into the techbox giddy with nervous energy because the render had ticked past 50% and started its second VBR pass, half way there. As soon as it hit 100% I copied the piece to a card and handed it to the AV operator. I was confident. And totally agitated at the prospect of something going wrong.

Inside the techbox, no idea what Amy is whispering to Paul there

I stood in the corner of the techbox next to the projector, watching through the window until my piece screened. It occurred to me at this very moment that only I had seen any of this up until now. A few seconds into the screening and I saw in my mind the perfect flower I created wilt as I watched, transitioning through its life cycle.

Maybe it’s the utter transience of it. As soon as the screening began, the last piece in the show, it was irrelevant. Just within its best before date. I think that’s it. The actors get to act; their work is forever locked in that ephemeral moment and recalled by the faulty memory.  Acting is the performance; it is all in the moment. Theatre is experiential and unique, every performance different for many reasons. Actors never get to sit and watch what they created with their voice and actions, and more importantly they never get to watch that moment pass. They are IN that moment. Film however, is in the moment but it is of the ages, the filmmaker gets to stand back and look at his work, held in time as the world moves around it. Time peels away layers of relevance, and the fire that forged the piece eventually dies and you’re left with a static artefact.

Film is an artefact and performance, a thing to be experienced and also kept, that’s the dichotomy of it. It can last forever, a permanent testament to transience.

That is what it means to wilt. Wilting is not the end, it is just what happens after the blossom. Fruit follows flower and all things are cyclical. Strange to experience the whole go of it, planning execution edit and screening in such a small window. In one way it is easy, because there is no precious attachment made in that time. Taken from my hands before I can fully know it or smother it with revisions.

As the piece finished, the cheers and smiles make me see it is good and beautiful in its short brilliant life. I am changed for it and I would change little. So after all the talk here it is, 28 Hours for Waterford Youth Arts 2017.

[keithcurrams]

Excirah but not Delirah at the Lyrath

9th December 2016 Another dull December day with the slightest wash of blue visible below the densest grey cloud. The same scenery passes as we head out of town; Waterford’s New Bridge skewering a low cloud and the M9 mostly clear with occasional overtaking cars throwing up a fine mist.

We exit at Junction 9, passing carpooled vehicles scattered in the hard shoulder and just a little further down the road the Lyriah Estate Hotel becomes  visible through the trees. The stately facade sitting atop a green lawn guarded by stone lions and three fluffy retrievers.

Today we’re in Kilkenny to attend an event set up by the new South East Creative Corridor. We pass through reception, down the hall and into the conference room, long and low with tables full of chatting groups.

This event is being run by The Entrepreneurs Academy who are doing a series of workshops and mentoring programmes over the next 12 months. This event is the free bootcamp designed to give an overview of the course, and a taster for what’s on offer. The speakers explained that the Audio Visual area in Ireland has been identified as an area for significant growth and their mission is to develop any existing AV industries to meet this new demand. There was a push from the opening speech for people to pony up €150 and register for the 12 month course. The hard sell promising that the coming tide will raise all our boats, and that we’d best moor to their pontoon.

The course content spans a film summit in Nov/Dec 2017, training workshops, mentoring, business planning and a pot of funding for 1 lucky entrepreneur. This was the first thing that leaped out at me; with such a strong emphasis on networking and developing each other’s business, why would you then dangle a cash prize that turns everyone in the room into a competitor?

We’re split into pairs and given an exercise to learn about the other person, and then pitch them to the room. The place erupts into a din of chatter as people take turns talking about themselves and asking questions. Time is called and the mic is passed around the room as we listen to everybody introduce the other. Sole traders, media companies, operators, photographers, props, directors.. just by being present we were rubbing shoulders with so many sectors of the industry. This was a great event if only for that, the opportunity to meet people in the industry. For example  Ross Costigan, a Kilkenny photographer whose work I am familiar with and got to spend some time talking about what we’re doing in our creative practices, and where we want to go, and if this course is really right for where we are now. Later in the day I spoke with a person running their own video production company. I picked his brain about my current plan to diversify, to split up all the different work  I do under different banners, essentially establishing 5 different businessess and he turns it on its head telling me to consolidate, bring it all together. “As long as people can see the unifying thread running through what you do it will make sense”.

The morning passed quickly and we broke for tae and pastry. Upon returning from the break, I see that flyers for one of the attendees businesses have appeared at each table. “Video worth watching” apparently. In the second half the facilitators talk about Demand and Margin, and the laser focus needed on these 2 variables. Increase demand, and increase profit margin. Is what we’re doing a business or a passion project. Well, is it?

Maybe it’s the tiredness, but I’m unable to properly engage with what is happening here today. I keep hearing echoes of the Innovation Academy (….scaaale faast  and fail faaaast… ) but it is like an empty repetition of well-worn phrases.  Everything I learned at the Innovation Academy rests on the idea being viable by providing a solid Value Proposition for the client. This however was a more visceral experience than the ergonomic corners of prototypes and elevator pitches. This course seems to be some hybrid with the head of creativity and the bloodied talons of business. The dirty world of brass tacks without the eloquent joy of the pivot, success measured solely on profit margins. This is business at the end of the day.

They spoke of the “Power of the Network”, as if by sheer numbers something amazing would happen. There is certainly power in the network, and value in the room, but the room is noisy if no one knows how to listen and small important things are passed over in favour of the brave and the loud. I felt myself buffeted about by the talk of this perfect business storm, my mind clouded and focusing inwards at the next steps I needed to make to get strong enough to compete instead of opening out to be present in the experience. I’d had enough of this and couldn’t wait to go. It was school all over again.

At the end of the day a facilitator asked ‘Any photographers here’ and hands went up. The next question was ‘How many of you have a camera with you’ and I left my hand in the air. Thinking to myself “I’m probably the only one here who brought a camera. And I was. Or at least the only one dumb enough to admit it. He announces to the room “Great so if you wouldn’t mind, we’ll get everyone together and grab a quick group photo, and you can send it on to us we’ll credit you in the papers”. So out we went through the fire exit and stood on the lawn, watched by a couple in their balcony hot-tub as I duly took an awful group photo. The same facilitator stood beside me taking the same photo on his phone.

My not so great group photo. 

One of the other attendees, a photographer of 25 years, came up to me as we filed back in “It’s not right what he did there, he shouldn’t have done that like that”. 

And he’s right. And moreso I shouldn’t have acted like a sap and gone along with it. But I did. I think he went onto have a word in the facilitator’s ear, because a moment later the facilitator was at my shoulder:

“I should not have asked you to do that like that. If we needed a photographer we should have booked one weeks in advance, it diminishes your work asking you to do that. I need to  make this right, how can I make this right” I replied something like “Well maybe just remember this for next time and don’t do it again-“ “I know” he says “ what if I give money to a charity on behalf of you.”

With that he stands up on a chair and announces to the room “I’ve done a bad thing, by asking *what’s your name again* Keith here to take this photo, I’ve undermined him and devalued his work. What I’m going to do to make up for this is donate money to a charity on his behalf”

Everyone claps, packs up their things, and on the way out a few people come up to me saying  “If he wanted to make things right he should have paid you”

 Look at the handtowels by the sinks. Posh or what! The Lyrath Hotel is a classy venue with great facilities, couldn’t fault them in the least.

This public act of attrition was more penance than apology and this encounter was a crummy end to the day. But this shouldn’t reflect on the core ethos of the Creative Corridor and Ireland’s potential for a new industry. It was great to see people from all over the South East in the same room and I got to talk to some genuinely interesting individuals over the course of the morning. And I didn’t come away empty handed, I got to think more about the businessey aspects of the industry, and at the very least it reaffirmed where I am now in terms of prototyping and customer discovery.

I’m excited to see what becomes of the creative corridor and intend to stay in that loop. Having seen the nascent film industry in Limerick with Troy studios I’d love to see the same for the South East of Ireland. To be able to look outside my own front door for work instead of the other side of the country or the globe would be a fine thing.

[keithcurrams]

The language of Innovation

A wet and breezy November morning greets us as we get into the car.  We join the dual carriageway, sloping and broad as it passes through Ferrybank and the day begins to open as we smack into stagnant morning traffic. Commuters filling the 2 lanes, red tail lights going round the bend and choking the roundabout I cannot yet see as they attempt to enter the City.

  Beside us in the creeping traffic Loftus Demolition are dropping the last remainder of our 1900’s industrial history, the old Flour Mills on Waterford’s North Quay.  Just the one R+H Hall building will be left to mark the expansive site. We are outpaced by a pedestrian. 20 minutes later and we’re about to cross the river into the city, and once we got past this we soon arrived at the palatial Faithlegg House Hotel with its rolling greens and manicured bushes.

We are heading to Starting your Innovative Business, Organised by South East Business & Innovation Centre in the Faithlegg House Hotel.  A fellow graduate of UCD’s Innovation Academy messaged me about this, and thought  it might be a nice chance to reconnect and refresh what I had learned earlier in the year. The UCD course really excited me, the cut and thrust of innovation, market research, failing fast and pivoting to meet the newly found needs of the customer. The class was filled with Entrepreneurs, we are ten a penny, running on the excess energy and time the collapse of the Great Celtic Tiger has afforded us. Moving fast to exploit a niche and grow like a sapling in the light left through the canopy by a fallen oak. The theory of innovation is beautiful, and the reality of it really rather tough.

 It’s the attention to detail, even the bog roll is well presented

 The room was already humming with the chatter of the early arrivals. I am not a lover of generic networking, preferring to have specific chats with specific people. I bypassed the nodding heads and handshakes, got myself a complimentary tea (which was in fact an accidentally poured coffee), scone, and sat down.

Michael Maddock

The day opened with a warm and welcoming speech by BIC’s CEO Michael Maddock, as he explained what the BIC does, and a little bit about the 4 parallel talks happening that morning. “Ideas don’t start at 9.00am on the 1st January…it depends where you are in your journey which event you should attend”. The BIC is basically the stepping stone between the Local Enterprise Office for new businesses, and National and International sector funding. “Time is valuable, money comes and goes, ideas come and go, fail fast or scale fast” he continued. This might sound like a lot of rhetoric, but it ain’t. This is innovation. Is your idea any good? Is it going to work? Is it repeatable and scalable? Or is it an ugly baby only a mother could love.

The first session for me was on Business Modelling with the BIC Asst CEO Aidan Shine, talking a bit about Business Plans where you “identify and mitigate risks”, and how they differ to the Business Model Canvas in which you set out your Value Propositions, and how the different aspects of your business intersect and work together.

It’s all fun and games until you wanna run a video in Powerpoint. 

Brendan Cullen of Survey Guru

A short tea break later and I went into the second of the day’s events for me “Market Validation” with Brendan Cullen of Survey Guru. Nice bit of a refresher in setting up a survey and asking the right questions, and how to avoid the wrong  ones. The Q&A with him at the end was very enlightening. I asked him about validating unknown markets, when you think there’s a market but you don’t know how to reach them. He says, start with what you do know, and find out as much as you can about them. 

 As I said earlier, I like specific chats with Specific people. Such as the MA in Photography I ended up sitting beside, and we talked a bit about how the industry used to work, and where it was now.

People stood and talked in 2’s or 3’s as I pack up and do my own little bit of selective networking on the way out to the ‘real’ world, or as ‘real’ as my fairly comfortable existence gets.

I love all this stuff, I lap it up. Such a vibrant atmosphere, fearless, communal, and sometimes full of people more interested in pitching the ear off you than in talking about where your fields meet.  When I studied at the Innovation Academy the language of innovation really excited me, BMC’s, Pivots, breakout sessions and fireside chats. But now a year later the same terms are still being bandied about and I can’t help but feel it a tad ironic that the language of innovation is becoming standardised. The concepts of disruption are expected and a breakout session is scheduled.

That said innovation is a mechanism of survival. It is the ability, tools and mindset to adapt and change to better fit the needs and layout of the world. The old and established structures have changed; opportunities are many and failures almost as much.

Innovation is evolution, it is survival, fail fast and adapt, pivot to offer a new solution. Research and market validation are the new tools of accelerating evolution, powered by will and tenacity. Your own success is restricted by your resilience to failure and willingness to change and flex.

The old models seem to be gone. Photography as a medium has become incredibly cheap and transient, even more transient than the moments it captures. Back when I were a lad, becoming ‘good’ at photography meant working with film. Mistakes took time and were costly, and you learned fast or wasted money. With the consumerism of Digital Photography a fairly small investment enables virtually anyone to achieve a passable standard and the advances and ease of post production enables even the most cack-handed the ability to produce reasonable images at zero additional cost. Photography  as a thing fills a role now as a tool of content generation for Facebook and social media. Any entrepreneur or small business has a studio in their hands thanks to advances in this field. The images need not stand up to any real scrutiny, just long enough to garner a like and an online sale.  Those who would employ cannot generally afford to. So where does the Photographer as a skilled practitioner fit in this new commercial landscape?

The game has changed, as games often do. Innovation is a mechanism for survival. It is the mindset and tools we use to find and validate our new path.

[keithcurrams]

Day Trip to Troy

The brightening of the 6am sky was barely perceptible as we headed down the dual carriageway; the swollen river Suir reflected the streetlights along the quay and above this Waterford's waterfront roofline was silhouetted against a low cloud yellow with light pollution.

As we drove along the periodic street lights made a slow strobe of strange silhouettes across the interior of the car, obscuring and revealing my notepad as I wrote. Amy slapped at her face gently to keep refreshed as she steered us towards Granagh, and then onto the N24 to Limerick.

Today is the film industry open day at Troy Studios, a newly established venture to revitalise the film industry in Limerick and the surrounding areas. We were lucky enough to get added to the list of attendees, and only found this out a few short hours before our shit-o'clock start Saturday morning to make the 8.15am registration.

As we headed along the N24 the sky behind us gradually turned pale straw with the rising sun and ahead the road appeared a mottled black/blue, the wetness from last night's thunderstorms reflecting the changing light. Fog pooled in lowland areas adjoining the road, hanging in serene drifts in the middle of fields and gathering above the treetops in the distance. The route was populated with HGV's and morning speeders, presumably used to the twists and turns of the road and not at all observant of the generous speed limits.

Passing through Tipperary Town, we swung into the Applegreen and were served teas and buns by two chirpy members of staff, a refreshing encounter on this tired morning. We sat to a table and viewed the sun rising behind a steeple beyond the rim of a cup. Registration had already started at this stage, so as soon as we were fed and watered we got back on the road.

Ten minutes outside Limerick City we hit dense fog. Oncoming traffic emerged suddenly from the opaque air a few metres ahead of us, behind them other commuters just vague shadows before resolving into an identifiable shape and colour. Minutes later it resolved into a crisp and bright winter's day as we approached our destination .

We reached the entrance to an Castleytroy industrial estate, and on direction of the pink jacketed stewards we parked up outside what turned out to be the long closed Limerick Dell factory.

                                                                                                    City East Plaza

We followed a path of two abreast paving slabs (typical of any industrial estate in the country. You know the kind) around the side of the building to a loading area half unfinished with walled-up loading bays and fenced off rubble, detritus and rebars. At the far end of this area a huge loose crowd of attendees were standing in groups, talking or sitting at the tables in front of the 3 food vans parked outside.

We went up the ramp, through a roller door, and transitioned from squinting into the low morning sun to the warm and cavernous darkness of 'A Stage' of Troy studios. I could sense scale of the room we entered and as my eyes adjusted I saw the queue for registration, and past this row upon row of neatly laid out folding chairs facing a stage with screen and podium. The stage set with red couches and lit by Tungsten studio lights; an island of features in the vastness of the empty factory space, the room spartan and ready for battle. Electrical conduits snaked along the sprayed and cladded walls, painted black to suck up the light and giving the sound a slight roll off without the distortive echo you'd find in hangar-like industrial spaces. The concrete floor was smooth and grey, above a gantry was suspended amidst the parallel span of RSJ's. The gantry must have been 8ft wide but the sense of scale was totally lost with the height of it.

As my pink wristband was being fastened the MC announced the first session of the morning. We took two spare seats a row apart in the dense crowd.

“...and for anyone on twitter, today's hashtag is #FilmLimerick” continued the speaker, and with this I suddenly became aware how far I was from my pool and the breadth of the wider community. Sitting in the midst of this mostly young crowd (at 30 years of age, I consider myself mostly young) I wondered how many had travelled since dawn to be here, how many had stayed overnight to attend.

Those who did secure their places and made the trip were attentive and the mood was light. An audio problem with the promo being projected elicited banter from the MC and drew a wave of laughter from the crowd.

Following this was an interesting discussion with the main people behind the recent film 'The Young Offenders' – Peter Foott (Director) & Julie Ryan (Producer). They spoke about shooting on the fly, working with a small crew and sourcing their actors. They also spoke about how they mocked up a load of cocaine for the film (a mixture of flour and castor sugar), but had bought waay too much flour initially. Peter's mam, an avid baker, ended up with the excess and had managed to use up the last of the 'Cocaine Flour' in time for the premiere a year later.

After a short interval this was followed by 2 panel discussions featuring industry professionals from a range of fields. They spoke about their path and their roles in the industry, and then answered questions from the floor. These talks were riveting, they had picked genuinely interesting people to speak about genuinely interesting topics. This was evident by how large the queue for the portaloos was during the short interval,  and how non-existent the queue was during the talks; not a soul outside or an empty seat within to be seen.

The Rubberbandits rounded off the last section before lunch, creating an interesting and unexpected (though not uncharacteristic) counterpoint to the technical and industry talk which sandwiched their slot. Blindboy opened by saying “This talk is going to be as broad and awkward as a 40 year old at a debs”. The rustling of plastic came with each word he spoke, Mr Chrome watching on from the couch stage right. He began off by talking about  their ongoing performance of socially engaged art termed 'Gas Cuntism' (so called because we're gas cunts!) which sought to make art that could be discussed and didn’t alienate the viewer. They referenced the Dadaism that existed before art “crawled up it's own hole”  and spoke about Hyper Realist art that can exist outside of conventional time.The crux of it all though? Creativity and our emotional and mental wellbeing as creatives. 

Something really resonated when they talked about Carl Rogers' and his 'conditions of worth'. The need to separate your identity from your work in order to be happy. What You Do is not Who You Are, and if you produce bad work that doesn't make you a bad person. If you create and at the end of the day all you have is a bundle of mistakes that is not failure. You can learn from these mistakes, and the real failure is in fact to do nothing.

A light went on within me listening to this, as I realised that I had in fact failed so many many times, for months on end through procrastination and self-doubt. Rather than just producing the work, learning and moving on I would instead sit on it, because if it is never finished it can never be judged, and vicariously I can never be judged.

In their own words “Embrace fuckin' failure!”                            

https://www.facebook.com/TheRubberbandits/posts/10154526516982200       

This section of the day was just so perfect after the inspirational industry talk that preceded. Emotive and frank and honest, heartfelt and nourishing the emotional level of the community. It's not all about the gear.

                                                                 could not stop taking pics of this thing.

The morning's talks felt like a day that passed in an hour, the massive space cozy like a living room, the sound perfectly balanced and the crowd around me melted away as the speakers were projected large and life-sized on the screen behind them, giving the impression of proximity.

The programme directed us to 'B Stage' for the afternoon demonstrations. On the way there we passed Troy's main reception so we ducked in to have a firk. We found long empty corridors, massive bare rooms viewable through security glass, and a map high on the wall showing where we were, and how it connected to everything else. Facilities for make up, green rooms, tech rooms, stores, all the amenities laid out around the edge of the site with empty spaces in the middle. 

We headed onto the 'B Stage', another massive room verbatim to the first but half the size and with an ubiquitous murmur of industry chatter. Displays were set up along the walls and people gravitated around their particular areas of interest; Costume construction, costume design, prosthetics, model making, camera & lighting from the ETB in Tralee, Post Production VFX & AR/VR filmmaking. Studio lights pointed every which way, a massive jib held a camera half way up to the ceiling, C300's and Reds sat clamped onto dollies and sliders as nearby mannequins were dressed in period finery.

Even at an event of this size, we still met a few familiar faces. A sign of how small the community is in Ireland, and potentially how simple it is to join the dots. I got the opportunity to speak with Paul Gererd O'Connor, a photographer who had transitioned into being a Gaffer. He told me about his experiences and what worked for him, leaving me with many things to think about as the crowd thinned and we made shapes to head home.

I took in more of the details on the way out. Externally it looked just like any derelict factory, but within a perfect space to create magic.

 What was a hollow reminder of the blow to the region when Dell closed in 2009 now housed a nascent venture with international appeal that might yet fill the huge facility with life.

                                                                               once more on the way out...

Easy to find the car in the now empty carpark. I took the wheel for the home leg

                                                          Long queue for one of the panel members

[keithcurrams]

Vantastival 2016

We started June groggily but by 6.35 am Amy and myself were on the road, her at the wheel me keeping an eye on the satnav, heading for beautiful Beaulieu House (pronounced 'Bew-lee’) in Co. Louth. The sleep fell away from us like the miles of Motorway as we left Waterford, the sun already high and hot on another model summers day. The car was full of hats, coats, food, cameras, cutlery, blankets; loaded as if we were moving house not just heading away for a few days. Coming up on Naas, we ignored the googlemaps suggestion of a diversion to avoid traffic and slowed into a tailback of merging traffic just outside Naas. Soon after we stopped into the Lusk services for a snack breakfast before the final leg to Beaulieu House. As we rejoined traffic, birds of prey could be seen holding air above the road, nothing but fields and farms and a few houses for miles in every direction.

 It was just coming up on 11am when we pulled into the driveway; through the white Iron gates, over a small bridge. Boutique camping on one verge and the conservative yet stately Beaulieu House ahead of us.

Benny was the first friendly face to be seen striding across the lawn, and he gave us a warm welcome. I asked about the festival this year and he replied “It's smaller than before, but it's definitely Vantastival”. We pitched up and I went to explore the grounds. 

 The Yard

The Gardens

Through the field's gate, past the stables and it's curious mares, across the drive of the main house and the vista that opened up stopped me in my tracks. To the South a broad stepped lawn rolled down the shallow river valley, the arena occupying an elevated field, the Boyne beyond. A cool breeze came up from the valley, and a saw could be heard screaming through wood in the distance. I headed down the path towards the arena, a few hugs and happy reunions en route. Passing through the wooded glade of wild garlic and fern I came upon a post and beam stage constructed from whole hefty boughs, the sides paneled with offcuts from planked trunks. The stage was not long constructed but it looked like it had sat in the forest for years, exploiting the natural incline of the landscape for tiered seating. Just beyond this was a new footbridge constructed around the same time, heavy planks underfoot and natural curved and contoured branches supporting the structure. Crossing this I was back out into bright sunshine and the main arena with it's barn adjoining a Moroccan tent, and on up on the Western horizon the big blue main stage.

  VW Main Stage

The Firestone Stage under construction

When I had shot my fill I put on my work duds and spent the afternoon bouncing around the trails of the site in a 6 wheeled John Deere, helping put up some security fencing and judiciously shooting a few stills as we went. After a few hours of this we finished up and went back up to the crew kitchen (soon to be ViP bar) just off the main house, fixed myself some cobbled together carbonara (pasta with an egg cracked into it. That's essentially the same thing right?) and sat in the sun with a mug of tae.

I washed up and went on a stroll with Todd through the evening arena, still busy with construction. This  stroll soon became an open-air nighttime drive along an increasingly narrow dirt trail through the woods. Swinging arms don't last long around here, and a trailer of fence panels needed to be left for securing the perimeter in the morning. We headed up to a side gate, a hape of fences in tow and found the gate locked. I was left me to guard the trailer in the dusk ditch as the lads went to find the key. I climbed up and lay on the springy mesh of the fence panels, looking up at the arching branches above me that sliced up the dimming sky, wondering would they be back soon or was this part of an elaborate joke. About 15 mins later I heard an engine and saw headlights bouncing up the trail on the other side of the gate. We hitched up our load and carried on. I thought we'd be eaten alive by midges but they don't like fast food. The trees we passed between now blocked any hint of the darkening sky above us and bugs pinged off my face as we jostled along. We dropped off the trailer and, much lighter now, flew back up the trail, through puddles, over humps and around fallen branches. We took the first junction we came to, heading away form where we came in. “Where does this come out” I asked “we'll find out now” was the answer.

“Have you had food yet” was the first and only question upon entering the kitchen when we'd finished our nighttime jaunt. Meal times are very much first come first served, but the kitchen makes sure we're all fed, there is always more food cooked in advance and frozen, ready to go with a quick re-heat. I headed to bed shortly after, the camp quiet and dark. Only a horse could be heard whinnying intermittently in a nearby field under the cloudless night sky.

Thursday brought more bodies in more places, the site being populated with new arrivals as the day went on. Each time I passed through the arena more things had changed; Fences, giant toadstools, statues, signs. 

This day was spent photographing and editing the previous days shots in the quiet kitchen. This was the old kitchen for the main house, the contoured ceiling designed to scoop away steam and heat and expel it through vents hidden high in the shadows. Sun streamed in the high circular window yet the room was chill compared to the warmth outside the heavy and ancient walls. The high curved ceiling made it oddly silent, any voice reverberated around, meaning the speaker had to listen to themselves like on a bad phone line.

   Geoff of Jack Coady’s brewery installing a new tap

Below in the arena tasks overlapped as the Firestone Sound Stage and installations were being brought towards closure. Jack Coady's Brewery van was pulled up at the rear, the doors open while beer lines and taps were brought into the bar in the Moroccan tent. Outside site vehicles criss-crossed between gennies parked on the green, above at the main stage the PA was being installed and soundchecks and snippets of music soon echoed around the site.

The smell of wild garlic in the forest now mixed with the warm earthyness of fresh mulch spread to deaden the footfalls of the weekend revellers.

Later that night myself and Amy sat on a bench at the entrance to the walled gardens, drinking a prazky while overlooking the site below. The barn was all lit up, and beyond that red and green lights blinked out of time atop stone plinths marking the edge of the river Boyne.  

The irregular kachunk of a staple gun came up from below, then a chainsaw solo. Different engine revs harmonised with the metronomic hum of the light tower generators that underpinned every activity.

The hum continued up at crew camping as I sat in the dark car editing images, and when the lights were finally turned off I killed the engine and the occasional flustered snort of a horse was the only sound to disturb the peace.

Overhead a conversation about foraging int he woods at one stage, 

I guess it was for a love potion.

   Imogen weaving a rabbit hole

Friday morning brought even more new neighbours, tents popping up around the field and more bodies on the ground.

Getting the signs together for the kids area

I headed down to the arena, poking around to see what's new and seeking to tick a few shots off my list. I passed the Riddim Tin, a caravan turned into a mobile DJ booth, speakers embedded in the bodywork and decks installed within. (saviour of my Sunday night last year, bopping away to his tunes, steam rising from my clothes as I dried out in front of a flaming barrel). I then caught up with Geoff of Jack Cody's brewery to get a shot of him and the Vantastiv Ale tap they had just installed.

   Geoff of Jack Cody’s Brewery

I grabbed  a few snaps of kids playing alongside their weekend homes, waiting for the gates to open. I also wanted to get a shot of a VW T2 pulled up outside the main house, I figured it'd make a nice promo image. Bringing a camper up from the public site was not gonna happen. I spied Yvonne (one of the festival organisers) crawling about the site in a black 4x4, radio headpiece in one ear and always another person in the other. She suggested I stand out on the road and flag down a camper as it passed. 20 minutes later I was still stood in the ditch, watching the horizon of the road for any oncoming vehicles. Imogen pulling bales of soaking willows from the moat at the top of the drive.

Jeep. Jeep. Hatchback. Taxi. Then a pristine type 2 crests the hill, deep metallic brown with majestic chrome and cream trim. I flagged them down and found the driver obliging. They swung into the drive, positioned themselves for the shot. From here it was a few paces to the wi-fi rich main house to do some editing.

I met up with Noel Bailey, the tour guide for Beauliu House to allow me access to one of the rooms to work in. One of the many features he pointed out to me on the short journey was the painting of the Boyne by Willem Van der Hagen which was set high in the breast of the fireplace, similar to the one he painted of Waterford. He led me through to the fabulous dining room, and I set up shop beside a ceremonial sword and hat, generations of landowners gazed benignly down on me from the walls through the centuries as I worked.

Heading back to the arena a few hours later was weird, the festival had just kinda slid into existence, the empty field was full of tents and campers, the site which was only yesterday a construction yard was covered in people drinking, chatting, playing and sunning themselves, the Firestone stage full of people sitting and the vendors vending hard.

   Firestone Music Station

I swung over to the VW Main Stage to catch Sample Answer. My first time seeing him perform, I was instantly taken by his dirgy solo acoustic set with electric augmentations, occasional loops and synth pads. His guitar was given a tombrous boost on the strum, and with a voice akin to Devendra Banhart he was a real winner for me.

   Sample Answer

I was recommended to check out Third Smoke, the all male multi-instrumentalist Dundalk 5 piece. They filled the stage, well turned out in black attire. Their sound was that of a modern ballad, long chords and strong punchy drums yet uplifting and danceable, not a slow waltz. Vocal harmonies swapped about and dropped into punchy rock riffs,  the energy building throughout the set but never exploding, always tempered and channeled with some held back for a future encore.

   Third Smoke

Dusk now as I cross the site. The crowds are constantly milling about swapping and exchanging members, laughter across the green, incense on the breeze. Bunoscionn singing about wanting to be a stoned hippie, their sound rumbling and throbbing around the arena.

I had to nip back to the tent in crew camp and from this far corner of the site I could hear 'Black Svan', pounding and powerful on the main stage. I hurriedly got what I needed and headed down to the main stage. The members of the band played hard amidst the smoke and lights. Savage and sailing and heavy as you like, they have a fantastic contemporary heavy rock sound which delighted me.

  Black Svan

I wandered up to the woodland Golden Plec stage to see Elephant, everyone sat on the slope chatting and ready to be spellbound. A few songs in and the chatter continued, some unwilling to be bound, while others happily went under. The duo played my favourite cover of 'Dancing in the Moonlight' with its looped finger clicks backboning the track. I got chatting to the lads after the show and helped them lug gear back up to the van. Tiredness overcame me and I settled into my sleeping bag as the Hot Sprockets lifted the roof on the main stage.

  Elephant performing ‘Dancing in the Moonlight’

Saturday now and the mood is low. Kept awake by people who think camping is for socialising, (seriously, the field is essentially a big bedroom, tents afford little sonic insulation and there's a WHOLE FESTIVAL happening to go and chat at, but no, your pokey tent is totally the session capital of crew camping). and of course the only way to sing when playing guitar at 2 in the morning is at the top of your lungs. Eventually I must have slept as I woke up in the turgid oven that the tent becomes once the first rays of light peep over the perimeter ditch. Walking down to the busy production area to de-skank myself at a sink I find that the water has been shut off (burst main in Drogheda), and that I've also missed breakfast. I went to take some shots of the kids playing in the sunshine of the walled garden and it lifted my mood a bit. 

There was a real carnival feel down there, within the walled garden an Alice in Wonderland themed popup tea party was entertaining the children with lawn croquet, face painting and circus skills. Entertainers showed off magic tricks and juggling, parents sat by prams, dozed in the shade, friendly dogs panted in the heat. After this I headed up to eat at the car, and went to the new ViP bar (previously kitchen, another new installation to discover) and set myself up to edit some photos before heading down to the arena, intermittently chatting with Phil the barman and half listening to the stories and conversations of people dropping in for a pre-show tipple.

in case anyone got confused

The small wash area behind the bar with it's unique side light, as the 4pm sun hit the structure opposite, and reflected horizontally through the small kitchen sink, softly and cinematically sidelighting anyone who went to wash a plate or fill a kettle. 

    Anto

Fangclub are a no nonsense straight up grunge influenced 3-piece rock. Solid and sweaty, as Paul McLoone said 'for anyone who doesn't remember this sound the first time round'. And that's not a bad thing. It's a good sound! And they do it so damn well. At the end of the set Stephen (lead vox) placed the thrumming guitar gently on the stage and left with a wave, the other members filing off after him. Backstage Kevin the sparky  was 'fancying up' Badly Drawn Boy's caravan, (i.e. giving him leccy).

   Fangclub

Kevin fancying up the VW Main Stage

The arena outside the main stage was like a public park, people sitting in groups on the grass, families, friends, couples and kids, people with dogs, coolers, sun umbrellas and picnics blankets. The lack of seating in the arena meant there was no real 'natural' gathering spot, people were quite evenly distributed in loose clots depending on how close to music, food or shade as they wanted to be. I went to redeem my crew food voucher at the Firestone Stage. Seating was a commodity and people swarmed over them, I ended up sitting back to back with a friendly stranger as I ate my vegan dinner, our derriers taking a half each of the tyre converted to a seat.

    Tasty food served here

  Beaulieu House overlooking the main arena

The weekend had a similar vibe to continental open air street music festivals, moreso than the often experienced in-a-tent-with-music way. I guess the good weather affords us that option, to sun and chat or dance in the shade, rather than just hiding from the rain. A real Lifestyle festival, all different lifestyles coming together, camper van enthusiasts, classic vehicle lovers, music enthusiasts, families...

I caught the end of Elm filling the wooded glade with their sweet sound and the crowd sat attentively on logs on  the inclined forest clearing, as the evening sun slanted through the trees.

Coming back across to the VW main stage Mutefish's trad infused wash of sound played to a small crowd within the tent, a larger crowd still sitting out in the last of the day's sun. A few songs later and the tent was full of bopping and swaying bodies and the group of madmen played just as hard as they had been.

I accompanied Amy as she went down amongst the campervans, as she went about collecting the last of the money for campers using the hookups. Children ran and screamed and tumbled in the flattened long grass, people sitting by their vehicles in deckchairs, happy to chat and pass the time; “With the craic down here it's hard to leave and go see music.” A few minutes later another camper enthusiast eulogised about how great the festival is, how good a time they're having, the kids area “that's worth the ticket price alone” and how this is the highlight of the summer.

Later I found myself at the top of the site again, but the main house. Reunions on the path crossing the main lawn; bumping into Victor and his daughter who I'd met at the very first Vantastival I attended.

  Victor and daughter playing with the huge chimes

I caught a bit of Badly Drawn Boy and bumped into The King Kong Company lads backstage getting ready to come on with their extended soundcheck, Stress and Tom surrounded by gear side of stage, deftly poking screwdrivers into unknown pieces of equipment. 

Maddog was here, adding credence to the rumours of the grand finale, a descent from the top of the tent on ropes, Jolly Roger flags flying as King Kong Comapany played below. As the crowd within the tent sang along to to Badly Drawn boy Maddog was laying out his ropes in preparation for this spectacle, then someone came over and had a word in his ear. I saw the change on his face as planning turned to disappointment and figured I'd best point my camera elsewhere. For good or for ill the call had been made. He unhappily complied, and began wrapping his ropes back up.

 I went in to take a few shots of Badly Drawn boy, the crowd enamoured as he played the hits. He had the look of a man thoroughly bored, his playing spot on, but felt polished and perfunctory, without spontaneity and fun. Maybe this is part of the stage persona, perhaps inside he's elated, I don't know. The crowd were loving it though, and that's the main thing.

After Sunset I went to take some long exposures and joiners of the Woodland, Goldenplec stage and Firestone stage. I could hear King Kong Company starting up so I finished what I was doing and crossed the field. The lights strobed out from the open edges of the main tent dense with people, shadows thrown long on the green area leading up to it. I came around the back and started shooting. Chimping the shots I thought 'wow, that stage smoke is really dense'. I looked up and saw only a light haze hanging on the stage, and turning my camera round I realised my front element had totally fogged up with the humidity of many bodies dancing. A few wipes and 10 minutes later we were good to go again.

King Kong Company just go from strength to strength, and that's not just hometown bias. They add new costumes, sequences, visuals and audience interactions.Standing at the side of  stage I struggled to not stand in Trish's way as she changed for the next setup, a giant eyeball, monkey mask and a suit, crash-test-dummy.

  Trish coming off stage as Maddog waits for his time

My Vater earplugs, (best investment I ever made) protected my hearing but my insides turned to wobbly jelly passing the speaker stack at the front. (I wonder about the longterm effects of this vibrating environment on the lens elements..) The band danced and jived in the dense smoke, struck through by lights, backlit then strobing. A low red wash between tracks, blackout for visuals then an atomic blast of warm tungsten light as the next track kicks in.

 Maddog came bounding on stage in a crocheted balaclava and hairy overcoat, pirate flag in hand amidst the dense fog and light mix as they finished out the festival in spectacular fashion. The crowd screamed out for more encores which they didn't get, and eventually dispersed happy and cheerful.

"Get...Down...Get...Down...” 

Later, back at the ViP bar, Maddogs grinning phisog could be glimpsed atop an accordion through a wedge shaped gap in the crowd that gathered around one of the long dining tables to watch people play. Looking around I also glimpsed Rob and Todd, as well as a few others, the musicians together in a small pool of light beneath a single bulb, walled by swaying happy bodies. The floor wet with slopped pints and smeared traces of muck. The gentle jostle as people passed to and from the bar. 

Standing at the bar a fella comes up, orders 3 points, turns to me and says 'one of them is for you' says to the barman 'and one of them is for you', takes his drink and disappears into the night.

the woodland area at night

That night in the bar was loads of craic; conversation and nutters abounded, dancing and jiving, shunting and drinking. A singer rapped to a 5 piece acoustic group, music drifted from trad, to acoustic folk, to ska, and back again. Some members from earlier having swapped out, now a double bass, cahón, and trumpet. This was the arrangement until dawn with the trumpet player not letting anyone rest for long. They stopped intermittently, fresh pints laid in front of each, shoulders slumped and faces tired, bewildered, as the trumpet's bright brass cut through the chatter and the  members looked on in apparent disbelief before begrudgingly joining in for another few rounds.

7am and my compatriots had hit the hay, I decided to do a quick clean-up of my immediate vicinity.  Though mostly just empty cans and plastic cups, the fanciest litter I found was a half empty champagne flute beneath a manicured tree beside an old arched stone gateway to the 1800's graveyard. Coming back to the vacated bar I found Yvonne and Benny cleaning the kitchen and Bar area, a neat stack of empty poly-kegs out the rear door, binbags full of refuse stacked and waiting to go, the floor swept, beer evaporated, music silenced. The last die-hards sitting in the new day outside. I passed Louise in the site office, an early start (or maybe a late night) overseeing the dismantling of the weekend's fun.

Walking back to the car, past the security guard and the 2 cheeky robins who visited him, I swear I have stink lines coming off me.. I fixed myself a snack, and was visited by a friendly unnamed hound begging for scraps.

   ‘Heeeeey’

Happily we'd parked in the shade of a tree. I hung some blankets and t-shirts in the car to block out the day and slept in the passenger seat for 2 or 3 hours. I was awoken by a phonecall to re-submit different images for the Times cover (sounds awesome right? It wasn’t, they didn’t use any of them) so I went and sorted that out. My office was significantly less fancy this mauldy morning, a picturesque windowledge by a portaloo within wi-fi range.

We broke down, packed up, said a few goodbye's en-route and hit the road. We passed through Drawda (as Jack Cody's Brewery would say), under a viaduct silhoutted by hazey afternoon sun, dense black smoke billowing from a flaming car on the street, through some estates (sat nav takes any opportunity to lead us through us through a leafy council suburb) and then out onto the motorway. We pulled in at the lusk services with their endless running water and tea on demand and I felt even more filthy for the cleanliness of my surround. Sitting in the car munching a heavenly triple decker ploughmans and a muffin, I looked up to have my vista of carpark and trees filled with the side of a caravan that had parked in the spaces in front of us. 

The long drive back to Waterford was filled with the post match analysis, discussing the huge mix of emotions and events that come with big gatherings of people. The crowd was friendlier, the sun was shinier, and the line-up was a best-of from the past 6 years of festival fun and it soon felt like home. The pastel sunset filled the sky, and soon the silhouette of the new bridge could be seen as we approached the edge of home. The scale back was a good call, a smaller Vantastival this year, with less of everything and more to go round.

Another thing to come out of this weekend was helping to decide on new equipment, whether to go for another cropped sensor (7D mkII) or maybe the full frame 5D mkIII that I so utterly fell in love with while shooting 'Sisters' earlier this year out at the Arthand in Bunmahon. Several times during the weekend, particularly whilst lying on the ground in front of the mainstage,  I found myself thinking “If only I could just get a little further back...”...I think the fullframe is the way to go, get the most out of my 24-70mm Tamron and then throw my new 70-200 on the 7D and I think that's me well covered. [EDIT I’ve since re-thunk this after seeing the MK3′s low burst fire rate and the 7D mkII is back in the ring...decisions decisions]

Strange now after just a few days, to not have the distant din and the scenic vistas in every direction. No unscheduled encounters with site dogs (probably spent as much time talking to any dogs I encountered as I did people) and the smell of pine mulch rising with every step under a shimmering green canopy. But on the other hand, shower, bed, and a wall somewhat good at repelling sound.

You can see more images on Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/KeithCurramsPhotography/

[keithcurrams]

Home Made Go Pro Frame

So I bought a Go-Pro a while back, and have had great fun recording from odd angles, doing timelapse, and planning my own mod projects. Here's the first one. So the idea was to make one of these: http://gopro.com/camera-mounts/the-frame  I salvaged the plastic and metal for this from a broken digibox.

1+2. Made a wrap-around cardboard template of each side of the GoPro. Check to make sure the holes all line up.

3. Laid template out on a bit of sheet metal (the housing from a broken digibox) and carefully cut and drilled it out using a drill, anglegrinder & dremmel (Aldi's finest..). Precreased the corners with a hammer and flat screwdriver and carefully bent it into shape.

4. Check the fit, cut away any bits blocking access to buttons and card slot, and sand it all smooth

The plastic for this stage was salvaged from the face of a busted digibox. It happened to be flat, and also 3mm thick, just the right thickness to match the GoPro mounts/buckles.

5. I made a little foot for the frame, so that it would be compatible with the GoPro mounts.

6. I cut 4 strips from the plastic, 2 of which were gently heated over a flame and bent at right angles, then shaped and drilled to match the GoPro mounts (you can see the 2 prongs are off-centre. This is to match the length of the locking bolt). I then laminated all 4 pieces together using superglue and left clamped for a good hour. Once set, i used a file and sandpaper to clean up the edges.

7. Two small screws with low profile heads (robbed from an old harddrive mount) hold the foot onto the frame. It has also been superglued in place for added security.  Superglue is an invaluable tool.

8. Round off the two 'ends' of the frame, and sand smooth. Drill a hole to to fit a bolt and wingnut.

8a. When the frame is around the GoPro, there should be a small gap between the two 'ends'. When the wingnut is tightened this will allow the frame to pinch the GoPro, holding it in place.

9. All sprayed up and bolt fitted!

10. The finished product Review: Any slight gaps between casing and camera can be reduced using a few layers of electrical or gaffer tape on the inside of the Frame. The plastic foot on the Frame fits all the mounts I have except one, which won't tighten properly on it at all. I can see that the 'tines' on the foot are ever so slightly thinner than the official GoPro ones. But this is only causing a problem with the horizontal quick release buckle.

[keithcurrams]

Rigout Productions comprises of a group of musicians that have engaged themselves and other talented artists to create this original piece of work.

Nick Bankes

The project came about as a result of Éadaoin Breathnach’s wish to carry on her work after the success of...

[keithcurrams]

Protocol of Status (Last but not Least)

So often in live gigs, the gig is about the headline act, and the support acts are just warm up acts. Nervous kids with guitars, bands who've got no stage presence. They are literally just there to fill the time between the doors opening and the main band playing. And if people are not showing up till late in the night why would you waste time sourcing quality acts that nobody is going to see? And sometimes the support acts are jaw droppingly awesome, because the booking agent has actually gone and found deadly support acts, and the venue is only half full, so no matter how well they're playing, nobody sees them.

The Noisy Plug sessions confounds this standard practice. It started one October afternoon with a call from Ger in Murphy's. He had this 'mad' idea of setting up two PA systems in the bar, one for the singer songwriters, the other for the band.. “we set up two PA's in Murphys. And people will go, wait, how the hell did they fit TWO stages in that place?” (and people did).

Such a neat idea. Two PA set ups at opposite ends of the bar. One for bands, the other for singer/songwriters, and bounce between them a la Jools Holland.

[keithcurrams]

New DIY Lights

EDIT: This method worked kinda ok, but I ran into a few problems as you'll see at the end. I've since redesigned and rebuilt the housings. --------------------------------------------------------------- I'm a big fan of DIY lighting, and modifying existing lights for new purposes. When I used to do the Speakeasy gigs, we had 2 LED cans on either side of the 'stage' and used to use small clip on spotlights with paper diffusers to fill in the shadows. It worked well enough. Starting a new series of gigs, The Noisy Plug Sessions, I wanted to do something I'd been planning for ages, and this was the push to do it. 

   The venue is small, dark, and awkward to shoot in, so using big lights wouldn't work. There's not enough distance to control the fall off of light, and also I didn't want to ruin the atmosphere of the venue by lighting the shit out of the place. So I built these.

The Method:

The supplies:

1. Twist-ties (got 'em in the pound shop) (€1.49 ea)

2. Plugs (€1.49)

3. Empty bean tins  (upcycled)

4.Disused light fixtures (free, we'd replaced a load of lights recently)

5. Bulbs! What I bought were Halogen energy savers and a CFL stick (€8 ish). Both were useless, as they spread their light laterally from the bulb, and I wanted it to go in a beam. I then got some 60w bayonet spots (€2.50 ea) which are really powerful (too powerful) but what I ended up using on the night were old fashioned 60w clear lightbulbs (80c each)... ...Yeah i spent like 20 euro and a few hours comparing bulbs.Learning curve...

6. 6 metres of 2core .75 elecrical flex. (€2 ish. I cut this into 3 lenths of 2m, but you can use whatever length you wish)

Next I marked and cut the bean tins. The hole is big enough to fit the thread of the lampshade holder through (shown). I used a Dremmel with an abrasive wheel attachment for this, and took the edges off with a milling bit. Also sand off any rough edges inside the tin from where the lid was removed.

Next I rewired the lights. Unscrew the cap to reveal the terminals in the bulb holder. Remove the wires and rewire each bulb holder to one of the 2m lengths of electrical flex. Then fit the bean tins as you would a lampshade.

So now you have 3 of these:  

The bean tin acts as a snoot to channel the light. These get HOT when they're in use so be careful where you put them that they're not near to something flammable, don't burn yourself,  and ideally only run them when you need to. Keep an eye on them! Next I attached the flex ties.

I used 1 Twist-tie per light. The tie is bent like a hairpin, and attached to the wire using electrical tape. (I chose this because it's easy to get off if you need to modify the light). It looks a little crappy tbh, cable ties would be neater. Work in progress!

You can see here on the left that the Twist-ties stop short of the bulb holder. This led to the problem in the middle, where the light head just flopped about. I tried using a rigid piece of polypropylene from a food container lid to splint, (a grade 5 plastic that is strong and good at withstanding heat.) But this didn't work. I ended up moving the Twist-tie up closer to the bean tin, and strapping it directly to the bulb holder (blue tape pic on right). I was reluctant to do this, in case the heat melted the Twist-tie, but it works grand. Then wire on the plugs following the wiring instructions, and you're done!

Here's one of the lights in action, wrapped around a roof beam in Murphy's.

The Twist-tie allows you to attach the light to a variety of places, and also allows the head to be positioned in any direction.

The next modification is to put a metal snoot and barn-door attachments onto the bean tin in order to better control the light.

Dissection:

These worked very well, but are no substitute for the kind of lighting you'd get in a big venue, I was only using 40 - 60w bulbs in the holders (instead of, like 500w parcans). The venue I was shooting in was small, so there really wasn't the space to use a big light setup. That's why I favour these little rig ups. They're rough, but they work). I initially used 60w clear bulbs, and then swtched to 40w CFL spots which worked quite well. The tape holding the twist-ties to the bulb holder eventually slipped, and while I could still use the ties to wrap the wire around a beam they weren't much use in controlling the direction of the light.

These units get HOT. Be careful using them, keep an eye on them that they don't begin to smoke or burn, or that there's nothing near them that could catch light. I had them running for nearly 3 hours and they were fine, but I take no responsibility if doesn't work for you. Same with the wiring, don't go rewiring plugs if you don't know how, ask an adult or an electrician for help. Don't electrocute yourself, don't set your house on fire, and don't give yourself 3rd degree burns trying to handle them right after you switch them off, let them cool down. Be careful! all that aside, happy modifying!  POSTMORTEM. Don't do this. The cans work fine for controlling light spill, but the heat buildup inside them made shit of the bulb mount, totally perishing the plastic! 

The plastic screw mount crumbled to nothing when I tried unscrewing it, and the O-ring had fused to the lower part of the bulb holder. I had to cut the can off! Also the blue electrical tape (shown) holding the twist-ties to the bulb holder eventually slipped, and while I could still use the ties to wrap the wire around a beam they weren't much use in controlling the direction of the light anymore. I've since redesigned and rebuilt the bulb housing, and will post that up in a bit.