LANY fans : Minneapolis

Minneapolis LANY shows hold a special place in my heart. It was in Minneapolis (this same venue actually) that I saw first LANY, opening for Oh Wonder in June 2016. That was also the same day I went on my very first adventure with Blake. My only camera was a disposable; I didn't even know that was a LANY "thing," but it was a happy accident. Jump forward to October 2017, and they're headlining a sold-out show. I'm with the same boy, but I've got a much larger camera and I'm actually working (how crazy is that?) and the boy and I are holding hands now.

Minneapolis was also the first city I'd done LANY fan photos in, and I've grown to recognize some of the fans and they know me by name. (And I try hard to remember your names--there's a lot more of you than me!) The LANY fandom is like a little family and I love that so much. It's like having a bunch of little sibs at every show.

Some of them had different hair colours this year and it was definitely colder than last fall's show, but their eyes were bright and their hands clutched roses. In front of First Avenue, they'd drawn with chalk the LANY rose and sweet notes to the band. They huddled under blankets and denim jackets, excitement building as the door time drew near.

I said it last fall and I'll say it again: you humans are magic. You hold within you the power to change culture and change the world. You've done something rare: to have a fandom of a boy band that isn't catty or competitive, that cares about each other and that welcomes new humans in. That is, in small part, because of the band's attitude, but mostly, fam, that's because of YOU. That's what makes LANY special. It's how you look out for each other and befriend each other. It's how you welcomed me into the crowd when I had to shoot from there. You could've easily been irritated at the girl with the big camera, but you were kind. Thank you. It's how I can fly to New York to meet a girl from Germany and how we are friends because of a band. LANY fam is a fam.

Keep being kind. Keep bringing roses and giving each other hugs. Be generous with your kind words. It's okay to cry, but remember to laugh, too, and don't be afraid to lose your mind about the things that you love (right now for me, it's potatoes). Stay up for sunsets and wake up early for sunrises. I promise you it's worth it every time. You're getting older since I first met you, but don't let the world tell you, don't let hard times tell you, that there isn't wonder still left to find. Bad days and bad boys and bad girls will break your hearts but I promise you there are good boys and good girls and good days out there. They are coming. Each year will get a little harder, but I promise you: it will get better, too. Hold on. Hang on. Keep on. Your time is now and it may not feel like it today but the world is yours. Your time is still coming, too. You've made the band who opened up 507 days before a sold-out headliner. You have a voice and you have power and you have wonder and excitement and a lot of beautiful things. Hold them close and hold everything else with open hands. You can change the world. I believe in you. ILYSB.

the "Paul Klein pose"

LANY fans : Chicago

This LANY show was perhaps one of the more sentimental for me. Seven and a half years ago, almost to the day, I shot my very first show at this venue. I was wide-eyed and unsure and alone. Now I'm still wide-eyed (never lost your sense of wonder, fam) but a little more sure and less alone--Blake traveled with me and the LANY fam have become my friends. It's beautiful to walk by a line of people and hear your name. A band whose name I didn't know two years ago has been the conduit through which these now-friends know my name. 

Because I'm sentimental and full of words, here are a few for you, LANY fam. Life is hard--don't stop being curious or amazed or grateful. Work hard and be thankful. Learn to roll with change--if you can do this, you're golden. Keep your hands and your expectations open and your hopes and your head high. Competition is overrated; be kind and cultivate community. You need people. I need people. We need each other. Keep dancing. Always dance. Dance at shows. Dance in parking lots. Dance on rainy days and jump in puddles. Joy is important and the best way to find it is by being thankful. If you're an artist, keep practicing. It takes time. Good things take time. Give yourself grace and don't give up on yourself or your art or other people easily. This LANY fandom--this kindness and friendship among strangers--is a rarity. Value it, keep it, don't change. ILYSB.

Lany Fans in Indy

This is my third Lany fan blog post (check out Minneapolis and Columbia) and I decided to try something different. Typically I just blog the line before the show and that's the extent of my fan photos, and typically most of my photos during the band's set are of the band.

This time, however, when the band came out, I immediately turned around, faced the crowd. The light backlit Lany, but it hit the crowd right in their faces.. And it was beautiful. The best part of the show was that: looking back, seeing the night from the band's point of view. I couldn't stop grinning.

So for Indianapolis, I'm including photos from, yes, the line before the show, but also during the show and after the show. This is the story of the humans in the crowd. The Lany fam. The ones who, before the show, were waiting outside at least 7 hours before to get an envied spots on the barricade. The ones who waited for hours after the show to get a photo with or a hug from the Boys. I want to hug you all. Your enthusiasm inspired me and I'm smiling as I edit and post these photos. I'm grateful for you.

Keep living with that radical reckless enthusiasm and love the things you love that hard. Let your love keep you up late at night and may it keep you grinning.

Yesterday as I was leaving the grocery store, I walked by bouquets of flowers and thought: I don't especially love flowers but I love that it's something we do--expend income and effort on something so temporary. I love that we keep and we give something so temporary because this is all temporary but that shouldn't stop us from buying flowers. That shouldn't stop us from throwing roses. That shouldn't stop us from savoring beautiful moments, even if they're short. Whether high school or a concert or a first kiss. Just because it's over doesn't mean it wasn't beautiful. Chase that beauty. It might not always look like a rose, but even dandelions are beautiful if you choose to see beauty in them. Choose to see beauty all over, dear humans. On Saturday night I saw it in your faces. ILYSB. These photos are chronological and they tell your story. The story of Saturday night and the smiling and the dancing and the roses on the floor. I hope when you remember that night, you remember it like this.

Much of life is choosing what is worth inconveniencing yourself for. The things you drive a distance for. The people you stay up late for. Those are the things and the people you love. These humans love Lany.

Lany Fans in Columbia

Oh, Lany fans, you're gems. What can I say that I haven't said before?

But maybe it's not about saying anything new. Maybe it's just saying something true. Something honest. Something I mean.

Because Lany is like that. Love isn't new, just these songs are. Pink skies have been ending days for decades--centuries--but only now do we have that melody. And summer isn't new, just this one is.

And life isn't new, but I feel like who I'm becoming is.

Maybe it's the same with you. With these songs. With these days. With these young summer years.

More even than I love the music of Lany, I love the feeling of Lany. It's like this: 

Keep dancing, young friends. Don't ever stop being enthusiastic about the things you like. Don't let anyone tell you growing up is boring. Yes, growing up means insurance and bills and a lot of that is scary right now (to me, too), but it's also staying up all night with your friends and ice cream for breakfast and 30 glow sticks in your car and dancing in the streets in new cities to new songs and it's a lot of fresh air in your lungs and it's learning what joy is and it's feeling it, too. Sometimes the scariest things are also the best things; don't live a safe life because just like these songs and these days, life is short. Take risks. Don't be afraid of failure. Sing loud and often. Maybe these things are cliche and maybe I've said them before, but I'm not above a good cliche.

I think maybe that's the point though, isn't it? We're all just feeling the same things in different cities waiting for someone to give words to these emotions--or give us a chance to dance. Because don't we all need some roses in our hands, in the air, on the floor?

This spring I read the book Wonder and the main character Auggie says that he thinks everyone should have a standing ovation at least once in his or her life. I hope you get your standing ovation. I hope you all get an encore. You are brave and beautiful. Keep dancing.

Love is awesome. These days are awesome. Savor them. ILYSB.

Earlier in the day, Steve (my friend/Lany's merch fella) tweeted that he wanted a basketball to, well, play basketball (he probably said it better than that, but that's the gist of it), so these cute humans brought him one.

Lany in Columbia

Current Location: Minneapolis

Here we go. This is a long post and I don't know quite where to begin. A month ago, I sort of accidentally shot a LANY show and LANY's fans found the blog post and shared it dozens of times until it reached frontman Paul and cleared 1000 views. In one month. To give you perspective, most of my blog posts have about 37 views. On a good day, maybe 100 or 200. Nowhere near 1000.

I knew LANY had lots of fans, but I didn't realize how dedicated they were until that moment. When I'd refresh my analytics page every day to see another dozen or two views, I realized I'd stumbled upon something bigger. And these humans have been so kind in sharing my work. Even in the past few days, when my photos have been shared, they've been credited. And they've said such kind words. I was won over.

So I decided to do something at the Minneapolis show: fan photos. I've done a couple fan photos before, but nothing to this extent. But, then again, nothing to this extent had ever happened to any of my blog posts before. 

And last Saturday was the perfect time: my current location was also theirs. Minneapolis felt like both summer and fall in the best ways and even by mid-afternoon there was a block-long line of mostly girls and some boys, all clad in white sneakers and denim and handmade shirts, proclaiming love for the band. Hands clutched roses and eyes sparkled nervously in anticipation. There was a tent and a card game and pizza and more faces than I can count.

After meeting so many of these adorable little humans, I feel quite endeared to them. I want to adopt you all and take you to my favourite donut shops and thank you for being so kind. Which I realize sounds weird so I won't do that, but know I think you're darling and I'm so entirely grateful for you. Though I look young, I'm nearly twice as old as some of you, rather closer to the age of the LANY boys. And I feel like you're like my little musical sisters (and brothers) and the cutest humans.

So this is for you. Because it's easy to forget. And if someone hasn't told you recently, I want to tell you:

You're beautiful and valuable and I believe in you. Don't stop being passionate about things. Create. Take risks and don't be afraid to ask for help. Live honestly and don't be embarrassed of what you like (I can sing every Taylor Swift album front-to-back--no shame). Keep looking at the world with wonder and don't let anyone convince you to be cynical. Live unashamedly enthusiastically. Stop for sunsets and cute animals. Chase light. Put sprinkles on all of your food. Skip and dance instead of walking just because. Write poetry about good days and bad days and normal days. It's okay to have normal days. Not every day has to be spectacular to be important. Don't let anyone tell you your life isn't worthwhile or important. Or that you have to be famous to be valuable. It's not true. You're infinitely valuable. Being cool is overrated. I've never been cool (I used to own off-brand pink Crocs); it's okay. Life is more than followers or likes--the social media kind  or the kind from a boy or girl. Sing obnoxiously loud to the radio because you have lungs and you like the melody. Drink lots of water. Dream really really really big because I believe that dreams are immensely important and you can create something spectacular. Don't let your dreams daunt you. Learn to ask good questions and listen well--this is a game changer and something I'm still learning. It's okay to rest sometimes. Be kind even when it's hard. You'll have good days and you'll have bad days; just take it one day at a time and don't be afraid to ask for help on the bad days. Run up hills and roll down them and jump into leaves and into puddles (I still do this) because life is short and you'll grow older but you don't have to grow up, I promise. Yes, adulting is hard (I'm not good at it), but it doesn't have to make you boring and it doesn't have to steal your joy. Hope is powerful and love is powerful and you're not alone. We're in this together, okay?

That was long, but I'm full of words and I like you lots and want you to know those things. That all being said, here are the photos of your lovely faces.

Instead of curating the photos into groups like I did with the concert images, these are exactly in the order I took them (with the one exception of the very first image). I started at the beginning of the line, by the gals who won meet-and-greets, and by the folks who'd be waiting since the day before, and took photos all the way to the corner of the block. These are the faces.

I don't have a brilliant conclusion or one photo that sums up the entire afternoon, but I just have a few words. LANY fans, you're beautiful. Thank you for your kindness and for welcoming me on the internet and in real life. I like you lots.

Bad Bad Badlands

The past month has been a whirlwind and crazy in the best way. I stumbled upon the opportunity to shoot LANY in Omaha a few weeks ago and due to the kindness of Lany fans, the blog post cleared 1000 view in less than a month. Insane. Thank you.

Bear with me for a moment as I back up. To give you perspective on how ridiculously unlikely and serendipitous Saturday was. It's a good story. Last fall, nearly a year to a day today, I drove back alone from Ann Arbor to Des Moines, mapping out coffee shops in larger cities along the way to break up my 9-hour drive. One of those coffee shops I found was Dagger Mountain. At the precise moment I walked in, I was the only customer, and thus struck up a conversation with the barista. In our conversation, we learned we had several uncommon places and events in common; and through that conversation, Matt and I became friends. When I traveled to LA, he introduced me via Instagram to his friend Steph. I tweeted a few weeks ago that I was looking to shoot LANY again with my friend Blake, but the Minneapolis date was sold out. Did anyone have any extra tickets? Steph knows Steve, who's on the Kinda Tour, and she introduced us via Twitter; and he got us set up to shoot the evening. And to make this story crazier, Blake and I only met about 6 months ago, via Instagram. I had never even heard of LANY before he introduced me to them. So this is all to say, yes, I did take these photos, but I can't take credit for much of this adventure. It's quite a bit of serendipity and even more generosity of other people. Thank you, LANY. Thank you, Steve and Steph. Thank you, Matt. Thank you, Blake. Thank you, LANY fans, you've welcomed me in so kindly this past month. These photos are for all of you.

Also, before I begin, there's a LANY/Halsey mashup Instagram account named "Bad Bad Badlands" and I thought the name was so clever that I used it for the blog post title, but it's not original to me.

Blake is my LANY roadtrip buddy. He's the same Blake who introduced me to LANY. None of this magic would've happened without him. He picked all the best music for the drive north and we explored Minneapolis most of the day, drinking coffee and eating 9 pieces of pizza and taking photos. He shot the show with me so be on the lookout for his photos! And he rocked overalls all day, which is basically an art, too.

While hanging out by my car and drinking cold brew coffee and weird beef jerky from Whole Foods, Blake and I saw Jake walk by. Naturally (nervously), I asked him for a portrait. He was quite kind and said yes. If you'd like to see portraits of all the boys, I have some here. If I was to get one portrait, though, it was lovely to get one of Jake because, as you'll see, most of the concert photos are of Paul. Primarily because there was no photo pit and from the spot I was posted up, Les was quite far away and Jake had a cymbal straight through the middle of his head. Even on my tipiest toes, with my camera up as high as I could reach, I could barely catch his face. Rather unfortunate, but what seems unfortunate is not always entirely so. I mean, it's still unfortunate that I didn't get many swell shots of Jake and Les. But. If there had been a photo pit, I would've only been able to shoot the first three songs and I would have missed shooting the surprise encore (more on that later). What seems unfortunate is not always so. Remember that.

With encouragement from Blake (I still get crazy nervous butterflies every time I approach a stranger to ask for a portrait), I took photos of the first block of LANY fans, most of whom had been waiting for hours, some since the prior day. Dedication. They were immensely kind and adorable. To keep this post from being dozens of photos long, I'm limiting it to mostly concert photos and a couple portraits. I'll have a general Minneapolis adventure post and a post entirely of fans in a bit. Deal? I promise I didn't forget about all your photos. You're beautiful humans. Speaking of beautiful humans, let's jump right in--shall we?

Doors opened at 6 and Transviolet took the stage at 7:15. They'll be in a separate post, too (I'm committing myself to a lot, I suppose), but meanwhile, these are photos from their Omaha show. LANY was slated to go on at 8:15, and took the stage around 8:25 to a room of screaming and the sound of Whitney Houston singing. 

More than perfect, I want my photos to feel real. Like you're there. If you were there, I hope you remember how it felt.

That's why many of these photos are in black and white. That's how a LANY concert feels. Deep and grainy and nostalgic and alive.

One girl (or perhaps a few) in line handed out cut bits of streamers and the whole group of them slipped the pieces of paper between their phone cases and phone lights. When "Pink Skies" began, they held up their phones, all glowing rosily across the high ceiling, like pink fireflies or stars. As the song goes, "it's better you and I, under pink skies." When the skies are gray and November, you create your own pink skies. "You'll want a photo of this," one girl to my right whispered to me before the song began. And I sure did.

The band left, but not moments later, they were back up the stairs for an encore. ILYSB. Then suddenly frontman Paul looked to his right, towards the stairs and door they'd just come out of and waved, motioned for someone to come up on stage, too. It was Halsey. I lost it. Everyone lost it. They sang "ILYSB" as a duet and it was everything you could hope for. Tumblr come to life in the best way. Because this was what made this tour date in particular stand out, what differentiated it from every other night, I've included quite a few photos of that moment.

To stunned, overjoyed, incredulous screams, Halsey left the stage. A few moments later, the LANY boys took a bow and, reaching out one last time towards the hands extended to them, left the stage as well.

Yea, babe, maybe love sucks sometimes. But LANY concerts sure don't. I like them lots.

LANY

These photos are from LANY's show in Omaha last night. I never should have been there and I shouldn't have been shooting. It's a good story.

There are a few bands on my short list to shoot in the near future. Folks like the 1975, James Bay, and Troye Sivan. And LANY. But I didn't have any luck with a photo pass on LANY's  Kinda Tour but I decided to go anyhow. By myself. To sing and dance and wear denim and generally make a fool of myself in the best way. 

Upon hearing I was going to a show, my boss let me off work early. Who does that? Only nicest humans. Driving straight from work, I got to the venue 3 minutes after the first band started. My backpack slung over my shoulder, I entered the dim room and realized 3 things: they didn't check my bag, there was little security, and there was no photo pit. Which meant I could probably shoot from the crowd. I booked it back to my car to retrieve my camera. I posted up on the right side of the room, one hand clutching my camera, one hand clutching my prism, sort of close to the front. 

In front of me was a dad-of-a-teenager aged fellow and when I pulled my camera out, he motioned that I could stand where he was: right next to the stage. And he let me stand there the entire show. Where I shot with my camera. Totally unexpected and entirely grateful. Undeserved. 

Due to my inability to move around, most of my shots are of Paul and Les and from similar angles (sorry, Jake!), but I would be a fool to be disappointed. I didn't expect to get to shoot the tour at all and here I was in the front row with my camera. Grateful, insanely grateful.

LANY, you were lovely. I like you lots.

LANY

All the images are unedited disposable camera shots and all the lyrics in quotes are from LANY's "Youarefire."

"Half days and Fridays and any days..."

I've been hustling 10-hour work days this week so that I could leave work at 11am.

Our only stop on the way to Minneapolis was at a rest stop. The light and the trees were just lovely and Blake is quite dapper so I asked him for a portrait. I was afraid it would be too dark without a flash, but it turned out lovely.

I'm pretty sure I took this at Spyhouse Coffee, but I honestly can't quite recall.

"...any days without school."

It's summer and roadtrip season. The world is wild and awake and saturated in color and life and adventure.

Spyhouse coffee. Otherwise entitled: 4 shots of espresso is a lot.

"Can I get a portrait of you right here next to all the cars?" Real life. Blake taught me about seltzer water and it was very interesting and feels quite European.

"Means more days in more ways, I've been running around...with you."

Blake and I left Ames around lunch time and drove straight to Minneapolis. Coffee, and all black everything, and no rain, and good parking. The world was in our favour. The city was ours.

Blake was kind enough to drive downtown and I took photos out of the passenger seat window. These tunnels fascinate me.

I took this shot--with flash--as we left, avoiding eye contact as we ducked out of the door, after lighting up the foyer with my 90's camera.

Minneapolis was full of old signs like these. This particular one was one of our favourites.

H&M

"Suburban World"

The valets across from this restaurant were doing a crossword puzzle together.

"This is it."

LANY

LANY went on just after 9pm and we sang and danced until the last song.

LANY : Paul

LANY : Les

LANY : Jake

OW: Oh Wonder / Oh Wow / Oh What a darling duo

Midnight found us in a white peeling parking garage (some might call it 'ratchet'), then we drove home, hands full of cold pizza, road full of fog, and eyes full of startlingly clear Minnesota stars.

"We are gold.
You are fire."