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This post is a part of a series: V Festival 2009 Australian Tour. Plenty of photos of all the bands from all the shows!

Oh my gosh… if there was any band that I would kill to see at the V Festival, then The Dø would have to be them. My mate  Jason lent me their album A Mouthful a couple of months before the tour had started. The first track, “Playground Hustle”, is the perfect introduction to The Dø setting such a playful precident for the rest of the album. It’s still on my high-rotation list whenever I want to chillout or jump on my bed.

I got to catch The Dø at the Gold Coast, Melbourne and Perth V Festivals. I heard them as I was coming out from backstage after a shoot with Elbow but I had to rush off to shoot Vanilla Ice (but then that got pushed back… d’oh!). They always started with the aforementioned track and followed into “At Last!”… from cheery to swinging in the space of a few minutes. Aww man… I wish I was back there.

This photo might not look like much but I hope you can see that big, wide, cheesy grin on my face right in the middle there. This photo was taken at the V Festival Afterparty at Deville’s Pad that night. I had been awake for 24 hours - waking at 4AM AEST to catch a plane from Melbourne home to Perth, to shoot the Perth V Festival and after almost crashing in my hotel room, pushed on to the afterparty. This photo was taken around 2.30AM. Yikes!

Sitting around at Deville’s like a zombie, it was very surreal watching all these artists dancing and drinking around. The place was quite empty, but most were outside smoking and socialising. Two Red Bulls had no effect in getting me to party so I went outside to see “anyone” before I would leave with some friends. But then I was stopped outside…

“Hey! You were following us around and taking photos of us!” - it was Olivia from The Dø stopping me outside. OH MY GOSH! Someone noticed!!! She was so sweet and beautiful. I told her my story with the V Festival and she was really grateful a fan was there for them. Apparently it wasn’t hard to spot me… I was the only “happy, dancing photographer” compared to all of the “sad, boring photographers” in the pit. Aww… bless you Olivia!

So, when I got out my point-and-shoot camera to have happy-snaps… battery died. Panicking, I switch the batteries only to find my spares are dead. Courtney comes to my rescue and lends me her camera phone. Shitty photo, sure whatever… in the above photo are Dan (The Dø), Alison (The Kills), me, Olivia (The Dø) and Jamie (The Kills). OH MY GOSH!!! Can you see why I’m so happy?

Definitely the biggest highlight of the whole V Festival tour. She asked to contact her on their MySpace… I’m right onto it!

There are heaps and heaps more photos on my Flickr V Festival photo set.

Much more V Festival to come!

This post is a part of a series: V Festival 2009 Australian Tour. Plenty of photos of all the bands from all the shows!

While I’d like to say I got into a tussle with security while trying to barge my way into the photo-pit to take photos of The Killers, the reality is that I slipped and immediately knocked my head on a nearby wheelie-bin.

Some of you may have followed my Tweets/Facebook updates. I posted this soon after the accident:

Whatever happens on tour, stays on tour… I slipped on the damp grass and knocked the back of my head and drew blood. Not drunk related!

It was absolutely pissing down the morning of V Festival at the Gold Coast. I’m guessing it was the cyclonic storms that resulted in crazy flooding on the east coast somewhere.

Then it stopped. Just in time for the gates to open.

Then it GUSHED down during Mr. Brightside by The Killers. By some sixth sense, I actually foresaw this happening.

After the show, we had our usual after-drinks. It was still pissing down. I was running … I don’t remember what I was running for. Must have been to get my P&S camera. And… yeah- the above happened.

Photos taken at these times:

1. Soon after the fall. The lovely Amber rushed off to get something to clean it with as it apparently looked really bad.
2. One week later in Sydney.
3. Just recently… I have an awesome scar.

So yeah… stories from the frontline at V Festival and the scar to prove it! Hah!

This post is a part of a series: V Festival 2009 Australian Tour. Plenty of photos of all the bands from all the shows!

One of the first surprises of the Australian V Festival Tour was the opening act Black Rose, fronted by Rosso (from Merrick and Rosso). I can’t remember if they were a part of Virgin Mobile’s Right Music Wrongs campaign, but I guess after seeing these guys perform, they’re a hilarious parody of anything that the campaign stood for. I don’t think you can go wrong with a cock-rock band like Black Rose though!

Black Rose stands up for all those blokes and what it means to be “Australian”. Who else can sing about crashing Holdens and Peter Brock in the same song? Bring on the booze! The Sydney performance (I think) was recorded for Merrick and Rosso’s show on the Comedy Channel. 

It was actually quite pleasant to see so many people in the crowd for an opening band. Though, it is Black Rose after all…

With such great support from fans, Rosso asked if they could do it again. Though the Gold Coast V Festival was the day after the Sydney one, Virgin Mobile penned them in for opening the Melbourne show. Hilarity ensued!

Can you see what I mean when I say “cock-rock”? If you can’t, look closer…

Not pictured in these Louder Lounge photos is Vanilla Ice who was totally lapping up the attention from fans. I think he was meant to be interviewed in this area, but the seats were never really used. Rosso and his band just decided they’d lounge about here for a while. Friendly blokes, they were!

And so, where to from here? Maybe we’ll see more of them on the TV. I don’t have Foxtel so I don’t know if the footage has been shown yet. They were freakin’ awesome though and were a great start to the V Festivals.

There are more photos in my Flickr V Festival photo set.

Stay tuned for more updates from the Australian V Festival tour!