Lead by the ever-intense David Draiman, Chicago’s hard rocking alt-metal sons Disturbed delivered a crushing set as one of the headlining bands on Mayhem Fest 2008.
Following high-energy sets by Mastodon and DragonForce on the main stage, Disturbed brought their heavy sound to the roaring masses, delivering old fan-favorites like “Down With The Sickness” alongside new tracks from their 2008 release Indestructible.
Photographer’s Notes:
For me, this set was one dominated by frontman David Draiman, who’s bellowing delivery on vocals was matched by a fantastic physical presence on stage.
Overall, the lighting for Disturbed was among the more atmospheric of the festival, with mix of hot, high-contrast light from high above accenting deeper, multi-hued tones and plenty of smoke.
End Notes:
This entry was posted on Monday, August 4th, 2008 at 10:54 pm and is filed under Music Photography and tagged with 2008, Dan Donegan, David Draiman, disturbed, down with the sickness, fest, festival, hard rock, indestructable, John Moyer, mayhem, metal, Mike Wengren, tour. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
[...] tremendous performances by Disturbed, DragonForce, and Mastodon on the main stage, Slipknot came to deliver the deathblow with an all [...]
[...] http://ishootshows.com/2008/08/04/disturbed-mayhem-fest/ Mayhem Festival August 5th 2008 [...]
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My name is Todd, and I love the rock show. My work has appeared in publications such as Rolling Stone, SPIN, the New York Times, Alternative Press, Metal Hammer, Entertainment Weekly, and Billboard Magazine. I'm available for worldwide travel for editorial and commercial assignments.
Todd, this is one HECK of a set man. So many sweet shots as well as great lighting work. I love the shots of the bassist and guitarist just drenched in blue. So cool. Awesome atmosphere.
Hey Keith, thanks for the feedback. These guys were a lot of fun to shoot, weren’t they? Draiman especially had fantastic energy, and the set as a whole had no shortage of mood/atmosphere to capture.
Man — 2 and 5 are so rocking. [2 actually reminds me of one of Keith's... go figure, haha]. And the one of the guy head banging his sweat right into your front element (and I imagine your face…*shivers*) is so crazy amazing (hey — we do what needs to be done to get the shot, right?). The one right after it seems really flared out with contrast and a little “too” clipped, but at the same time I feel it kind of adds to the atmosphere. The lights look really nice — fromt the white ones on Draiman and getting into nice red-orange hues [but not too bright to affect colour] on the bassist. And, although I feel a little torn on this shot , I feel like it has a lot of energy and was still great to add to the set.
Keep these sets COMIN’! Can’t wait for more, Todd.
Hey Chris! Thanks for your picks, #2 is my favorite from this set. I think it must have been made at the same time as Keith made this shot, though Keith was a few steps to my right and went with a wider angle.
About that sweat shot, part of me was recoiling in horror while the other half was moving in as close as I could against the stage, ha.
The lighting was very high contrast and much of the white light came from spots pointed nearly straight down, as you can see in some of these shots, which lent a very “hot” feel to many of the images.
I do like that jump shot you picked out, maybe I’ll add it into the set. Thanks again.
This set is all kinds of awesome. Disturbed ain’t bad either. I really like the comp in #9 and the lights in #11. Some really sick captures here man, really sick. Nice variety of shots, excellent use of lights.
Hey Zach, thanks for the comments and your picks. On #9, that was later on during the set – while most of the lighting had some white light thrown in, that was a really interesting mix of deep color washes.
I know one of the lighting designers who was working this tour, maybe he can chime in on this set. He and his crew did a fantastic job with all the effects, all the main stage acts looked great.
Thanks again.
Ouch, I heard you won a free bath somewhere during a concert… :P At least you got something out of that. A great shot indeed and as already said, the overall of this set is just amazing! What where the overall values?(ISO, Aperture, Shutter Speed)
Best Regards.
Hey Celso, thanks for the feedback. I’ve given up on trying to baby my lenses, I figure I will have to clean the 14-24mm eventually. The front element of that lens is starting to look like a Jackson Pollack painting.
Regarding the tech stuff, I shot the entire set, so the exposures were quite varied. What I can say is that light was not a problem for this set, especially for Draiman. I was able to stop down and keep very comfortable shutter speeds, all at ISO 1600.
Good job in what looks like less than ideal light conditions! Did you have to do much work afterwards to brighten images, etc or is this pretty much how they came out when shooting?
Hey Keath, thanks! I didn’t do too much post work on these. I don’t really have time to make many corrections and try to nail exposures at the time of shooting.
I do convert all my images from RAW and will tweak the exposure if necessary, however.
This whole set is amazing – especially that blue light! I can’t wait until you post more on Flickr so I can favorite them :)
Hey Tasha, thanks! Yes, there was a lot blue during this set, which worked nicely with the background smoke. Just posted a few more to Flickr and I’m sure I’ll make public a few more over the next week.
Now I just have to get to the shots from Lolla…
Does that mean there will be no slipknot? :(
Ha, I’m working on the Slipknot write-up right now, in fact…
Just a little while longer!
What?! C’mon Todd, god forbid you take a week or so to post shots! You only spent 3 days in Chicago spending your hours photographing bands, and you only have another job you need to work — they shoulda been up right away! Haha :P
Ha, Chris! I am multi-tasking, actually, simultaneously processing shots from Lollapalooza and also writing a sentence or two for the Slipknot write-up.
What can I say, I’m a slacker. ;)
I’m determined to finish processing all the shots from Lolla tonight, though, so you can expect write-ups to start rolling in from those performances late this week or early next week!