Tuesday, June 16, 2015

brooklyn june festivals

The past two weekends for me have been jammed packed with attending shows. And thankfully the little hole in the wall shows that I have been meaning to find since I've got to the city. Two weekends ago was Color Me Bushwick, part of the Bushwick Open Studios and a whole big celebration in Bushwick, a neighborhood of Brooklyn. I had seen a thing about Bushwick Open Studios's launch party on Friday night on Facebook and so I decided to go check it out. I popped into the place, jammed pack with people and roamed around a bit. After I left I had heard a live band across the street and decided to check it out. This little location, Pickthorn had transformed into a DIY venue for the festival and was packed with people. I got in right before the second to last band of the night, The Gradients was about to go on and decided to stay and watch.


After them there was one band left, The Nuclears so I decided to stay and watch, might as well. The Gradients were chill and stayed in their spots throughout the whole set. But when the Nuclears placed a mic stand in front of the stage right in the front of the crowd, I knew this set was going to be good. The rock band had the crowd moving the whole entire time and the lead singer and lead guitarist continuously were running into the crowd (I don't have any images from their set since it was shot on a roll of film I haven't developed, but there's some pretty great ones).

Since I decided that Color Me Bushwick was a pretty cool festival, I decided to come back the next night. I got over to Bushwick at the right time to see the last two bands: Whiskey Bitches and Honduras. Whiskey Bitches got the crowd pumping and ready for the last night of the band, but I also noticed all the fans in the crowd singing along to their songs, they were definitely killing it. 


The next band up was Honduras. Like so many bands, they had a great stage presence, the band members were throwing themselves around and getting into it. I decided to go for it photography wise and since I had my 28mm on my camera, I was trying to get some pretty cool close shots of the band. And they put on a fun show, which any concert goer asks for. 





This past weekend, Northside Festival took over Williamsburg area. Thursday night bands started playing at some of the dozen of venues around Brooklyn. I attended a show at Shea Stadium to see a two piece band Diet Cig. It was one of the first nights that was really boiling. I finally found the venue and climbed up the stairs and entered a sauna. There was one fan, windows open, and A/C running - someone needed to figure out what they were doing. When I walked in Rivergazer was still playing their set. They were a mixture of calm and collected and then there were a couple songs that would just get you dancing; I'm glad I arrived early! 

As Rivergazer finished up their set, Diet Cig took the stage and I waited in the heat. 

Diet Cig is a two piece consisting of Alex and Noah. Alex is a tiny little ball of energy, she was bouncing all over the stage playing guitar and singing their slop pop tunes. I should have been able to tell by her voice from their recorded tunes, but it was tons of fun to watch Diet Cig, they had a real good energy. 

Saturday night I went to another Northside Festival show, Lazyeyes at BlackBearBar. I was happy I came out and talked to these guys, they have a real stage presence and their tunes are really good. 




I'm going to a show tonight a band, Current Joys, my boyfriend showed me. Very excited because they're good as well. And I've got a show scheduled on Saturday. I'm packing in my free time from work with as many shows as I can!




Friday, June 5, 2015

New York: 2 weeks complete


It's been about 2 weeks since I have been residing in the big apple. I'm currently staying in a NYU dorm, so I'm right near by Greenwich Village, East Village, Union Square and the whole NYU campus. Actually I am in the perfect place for everything. I'm 10 minutes from work, and since work is right on 6th street, all the shopping is right there too. And if I want to hop over the East River, the L is 4 blocks away so that I can head right over to Brooklyn. 


A photo posted by dominique (@domgphotography) on

Last week I got to see an old friend from high school. She was visiting her roommate from college, who lives in the suburbs. I joined in on their adventures of midtown, the upper east side, and the upper west side. We got to deal with rain and traffic, but at the end of the second day we hung out at Lincoln Center for a bit and watched the fountain and all the attendees of the ballet. 



A photo posted by dominique (@domgphotography) on

This past week has been my first week of work at Hook and Loop. Hook and Loop is the in house creative think tank for software company Infor. I remember my uncle telling me that this company was doing big things and they were at the top of their market, I sort of just agreed with him, not knowing any better. But after this past week I'm blown away by how powerful the things that are being made here are. The ideas that float around this office (that's freaking cool) are some super bright ones and I am so glad I am part of this community now. 



A photo posted by dominique (@domgphotography) on
Here's a view from the lobby of Hook & Loop's office. We were filming executive messages in the lobby the other day, and I snapped a picture.