Music & Photography



For all of my life, music has played an important part in how I do things and my mood and how I get motivated to do things. From The Eagles that my Dad used to listen to when I was a child through to myself going through many phases as we all do in our teens and into our 20s, music shifts often with the times, the metal and rock stuff that I listened to in the early 2000s was very there and I eventually I realised that mostly guitar-based music kind of does its thing for me. But it’s been really interesting through lockdown and since starting up again and spending a bit more time editing and pushing the business and I’m sat there on the computer, music still plays an important part in my everyday life. At every point throughout the day, if there’s not a bit of music or something going on, something almost feels like it’s missing. So while I’m sitting in the office now, it could be a range of music that I listen to – I’ve got CDs still in my office. Now, how much do I listen to music from the early 2000s? Certainly not as much as I did. How much is now obviously streaming on my phone and how much of it is actually similar to the same music but maybe different artists or maybe a different style or maybe actually a little bit more chilled out. 


Yes, I am getting old so everything has chilled out a little bit so now when in the past it would be great to hear a Stone Sour track come on, “Oooh this is new and this is exciting!” maybe it’s more of a Joe Bonamassa track nowadays. That said, I think music plays an important part in mood and productivity. Keeping your mind calm and keeping your mind in the right place and not being distracted by other sounds and people digging the road or the bin lorry coming past, I think it just helps to keep that tone going. Now I’ve worked with musicians over the years and bringing music into my photography has been a really great experience. So I’ve done a lot of work with Mark Deeks over the years, whether that’s been his piano work, helping him promote himself as a pianist for events through to the choir concerts that he coordinates through his own metal music that ended us up in Metal Hammer magazine which was very exciting! That whole journey there with music and all the variations just makes me smile. Just being able to bring that in is fantastic. I remember taking pictures of a folk band on Newburn Bridge and if you know Northumberland and you know Newburn Bridge is a very blue and iconic bridge and it happened to be closed and we happened to get a full-on folk band there with full instruments and things and it was just good from an experience perspective because obviously, I’ve got their CDs now – which now and again go on. How does music impact your life? Is it there every day? I’ve got friends that don’t listen to music at all. They sit in a silent car and music never comes into their sphere but that’s really not me. I don’t think there is a norm with music but it would be interesting to see what your take is on music and how it impacts your daily work or how it impacts your daily life to make things easier for you.

Using Format