VIDEO: Mudhoney – Touch Me I’m Sick

Much to my regret I missed out on the chance to photograph Nirvana when the played Sheffield in late 1991 – I knew the people at the venue and I was usually okay for getting a photo pass.

Having said that I had not even heard of Nirvana so I did not ask to cover the gig. But, just a month later Smells Like Teen Spirit became a massive hit on the back of that tour, so I missed out on that occasion.

It just goes to show that, if you are planning to be an aspiring music photographer, you should be aware of the up and coming bands.

Having said that it is a lot harder these days to keep up with new bands after the advent of the internet and the plethora of bands hoping to make it.

Having said that, when you think about the pioneers of the Grunge music scene most people think of Nirvana, because they had the first big hit, but I would argue that Mudhoney should be worthy of your consideration.

I got the chance to photograph the band at the, then, Newcastle Polytechnic in October 1992 – it was where I had studied and failed at engineering in the early 1980s.

Photographically at the gig it was quite bizarre because the singer, Mark Arm, had very long shoulder length hair which covered his face so, as you can imagine, it made getting shots showing his face quite tricky.

I decided to shoot both black and white and rated Fuji Neopan 1600 at the correct film speed, used Fuji HG400 with flash and a roll of Konica SHG3200 for the colour for more available light shots.

I am quite pleased with the resulting photos and I managed to get some decent pics which showed his face. But they were never published but I was pleased with the results.

When I was in the photo pit at the gig a few of the students watching the show asked me which publication I was working for so I told them, with my best deadpan expression, that I was covering it for NME. But that was just wishful thinking eh?

Looking back, with the benefit of hindsight, I would probably have shot the gig on colour film and converted to black and white in photoshop but at the time I did not even know what photoshop was.