Graham Smith Photography Exhibition Nov 2nd - 9th

I LIKE THE WAY THIS IS GOING
A Photography Exhibition by Graham Smith

Opening Reception: Tuesday 2nd November, 7.30pm

Exhibition On View: 2nd November - 9th November

Oh Yeah Music Centre
15-21 Gordon Street
Belfast
Northern Ireland

Longtime STA photographer
 Graham Smith presents I Like The Way This Is Going, an exhibition featuring images he has shot over the past decade, consisting of a series of framed prints as well as a huge collage wall of photographs. 

No longer taking on commissions he instead concentrates on a relaxed and personal reportage of his life. Being obsessed by music and now working within the industry means the majority of his photographs are related to the music world, captured from a personal and intimate angle. Simple photographs shot with the absolute minimum of equipment and fuss.

Born in 1980 in Belfast, Graham began photography in 2000. Now
regularly displaying work around the world, in group and solo exhibitions, his images can also be seen permanently hanging in an increasing amount of galleries, bars, venues and coffee shops.

Spring of 2007 saw the release of his first solo book. Limited to 550 signed and numbered copies it sold out within 4 weeks. Plans are currently underway for several more book releases.

In January 2010 Graham won the coveted Lex Van Rossen award for European Music Photography at an awards ceremony in Holland, which resulted in an exhibition of his work traveling around Europe, most recently in Berlin in September 2010.

Launch Night:

Tuesday 2nd November 2010
7.30pm
Refreshments Served
Live Music from Oliver Cole
DJ by Chris Wee (And So I Watch You From Afar)


Oliver Cole will perform at the launch evening. After several years playing with the highly influential band Turn, Oliver took some time out, coming back in 2010 with the release of his debut solo album We Albatri. A much-respected figure amongst musicians, having played with the likes of Wilco and Ray LaMontagne, this gig will mark his long awaited return to Northern Ireland.

DJ on the night will be Chris Wee from And So I Watch You From Afar.

Graham Smith Wins European Photography Award

Friend of STA and ASIWYFA photographer Graham Smith has won the coveted Lex Van Rossen photography award! The award is an annual prize for European music photography.

“Smith is a photo-journalist who documents what he sees. This is always a good starting point but as well as being highly skilled with the camera, Graham Smith’s work has a very genuine and passionate vibe. He has a real empathy with musicians, and is a very good all-rounder.” - LVR Award Judge

Photos by Graham Smith and the nine other nominees are currently being exhibited in the Photogallery Noorderlicht (Groningen, The Netherlands) till the 28th of February 2010. Afterwards the show will go to London.

Graham is currently working on two books, one of which will be dedicated to his time touring with And So I Watch You From Afar

.

And So I Watch You From Afar Photography

Graham Smith works as the tour manager for And So I Watch You From Afar but he is also a photographer and has been snapping the band constantly since first seeing them in November 2006.

Graham joined the band full-time on the road in April 2009 and since then has documented the band everywhere from Eastern Europe to back home in Northern Ireland.

Graham is currently hard at work on a book of photographs of ASIWYFA, tentatively scheduled for release in the Autumn of 2010. A series of exhibitions will accompany the release. Details about this will be available next year.

2010 is already shaping up to be even more exciting than this year, with massive tours planned around the world. Graham will be there to snap it all as it happens.

A sneak preview of some of the images to be featured in this book can be found here. This gallery will be updated regularly.

And So I Watch You From Afar: September Tour Diary

Early on Wednesday 16th September the band, myself (Graham) and Brian met up in Belfast, fresh faced, bags full of crisp clean clothes, and a sparkling new tour bus. A rather sexy red bus with bunks to comfortably sleep 7 people (or 11 people in cramped conditions), two tvs, xbox, dvd player and, the ultimate, mirrors on the roof. We are incredibly proud of our new investment.

We have a problem though. The van does not yet have a name. I think you will agree a band van without a name is almost as horrific as never giving your child a name. In fact some may say it is worse. This is where you, our lovely lovely friends, can help us out.

Name our van for us please. We will go through all your suggestions and whichever name we choose will get guestlist to any gig you choose, a free t-shirt and maybe even a beer from our rider (depending on how many beers we have on the night / how many Johnny decides to drink).

So, after making a short detour to pick up a huge order of new shirts we drove to the Ferry and headed over to England. We then should have an uneventful journey to Exeter but our Sat Nav decided that it would be a good idea to take us through the middle of the Snowdonia Mountains. In the pitch black. In a new and quite large van. I am sure the scenery is stunning during daylight, but at night it just made for a rather horrible trip with several cases of travel sickness (no puking in the new bus, fear not). Eventually we arrived at our destination and bedded down into our fresh smelling bunks for the night.

Our first date of the tour was The Cavern in Exeter. The first show of a tour is often riddled with problems but this did not seem evident at all and the band and crowd seemed to enjoy the show.

The day after the Exeter show was a day off. That's right people, we did one show and then decided we needed a little holiday. This consisted of a short drive to sunny Bournemouth where we went to the house of the Uncle and Aunt of Chris the powerhouse of a drummer in ASIWYFA. To say we were well looked after would be a gross understatement. Steaks, BBQ, wine, Jack Daniels, beers, cigars, comfortable beds…followed by a fine breakfast in their beautiful back garden. We could get used to this. But we are on tour for a reason and that reason is not to be pampered. On no no no. That reason is to ROCK / RAWK.

So, we left our lovely hosts behind and headed to Portsmouth for the Southsea Festival. As we were headlining one of the stages it meant a long day of waiting around but luckily the sun was out and their were plenty of good bands to see. Showtime arrived and we entered what is possibly the warmest venue this side of hell. It was a great show but the heat did leave us all feeling incredibly drained.

And then, we had another day off. Because we are lazy.

Monday was the Barfly in London and boy it was a good one! A large appreciative crowd left laden with new t-shirts and CDs. Tuesday was Norwich where we played to a smaller crowd but we all enjoyed the show a lot... most importantly we resisted the urge to quote Alan Partridge. It was incredibly difficult to resist this, due to the fact Partridge DVDs have been playing in the bus constantly since we left Belfast.

Touring is a series of ups and downs, swings and roundabouts. A few good shows, a few not so good shows - not necessarily terrible but not the best either. This was the case for our gig the following night in Oxford. The band played an average show. Not terrible but not great either and for a band like ASIWYFA, perfectionists, average is just not good enough. Their were various small reasons behind this (guitar problems being one of them) but the main reason was that we have discovered a fault in our otherwise perfect new van; the damn petrol gauge is hugely inaccurate.

We ran out of fuel in the middle of a motorway. What followed was an almost 4 hour break, the details of which are incredibly dull so I will not bore you too much. The point is we arrived too late to soundcheck.

A soundcheck is just as the name suggests - it is a period of time several hours before the doors open to the public where the sound is checked to see that all instruments can be heard clearly by audience and band members alike. Even the best soundman and most professional band will struggle to play a good show without a soundcheck. This was the case in Oxford. So, what followed was an average show.

The Barfly in Cardiff on Thursday was where we really picked up again. It was agreed that it was up there with one of the finest ASIWYFA shows ever. The band and the crowd were firing on full cylinders and after a lengthy encore the band spent a long time at the merch table meeting the fans, old and new.

At the beginning of next week we will be putting up a short video from the tour so far and by the middle of next week their will be the first of the band blog entries, written by Mr Tony Wright. We will also post a blog soon with answers to your many questions to the band - email us with any other questions you may have.

Keep any youtube clips, photos, questions for the band or blog suggestions coming in.

Graham

And So I Watch You From Afar Photoblog

A new written blog episode from ASIWYFA will be coming in the next 2 days and a new video blog will be online by the end of the week, but until then here are a few images from the past few days taken by Graham Smith...

And Here We Go Again From Afar!

Hello everyone, my name is Graham Smith and I work with ASIWYFA, you may remember me from posts from their European tour earlier this Summer.

Tomorrow we all re-group again, pile everything into our sexy new red bus and hit the road for what should be a very interesting few months of touring.

Throughout the coming months there will be blog entries 2 or 3 times a week and a short video once a week. Everyone will be helping to write these entries and compile the videos.

The first proper blog entry will come later this week and will include information about the music and clothing which will be available on the upcoming tour.

Don't forget you can follow us on Twitter for more up to date news and nonsense.

-----------------------------------------------------------------

We are very keen for fans of ASIWYFA to get more involved with blogging. If you have any questions for the band, get in touch and we will do our best to answer them through these blogs. It could be questions about their equipment, upcoming releases, plans for the future or anything else you would like to know.

If you photograph or film the band on the upcoming dates and are ok with your material being used on these blogs then please send youtube links or photos to the below address.

We also welcome any ideas you may have regarding the written or video blogs, please feel free to get in contact at anytime.

The email address for the above material is asiwyfablog@hotmail.com