The Manifest

Touring isn’t quite what it used to be. Not speaking from experience, but rather referring to the idea of everyone getting crazy, drinking well beyond their tolerable amounts and ingesting the full gammut of narcotics available at any given time. I have been on tour with Linkin Park and Incubus for the past week and it is not even remotely close to the traveling fiesta these roadshows once were.

I am sitting on the empty tour bus at Jones Beach Amphitheater. Everyone else is working hard to get the stage ready for tonight. Checking every light, tuning the guitars, polishing the drums, eating the catered food backstage. I am typing on the air conditioned bus with a ice cold Samuel Adams by my side. I can’t do my job because the union bullshit in New York state won’t allow any “non-union” cameras on the premises. I don’t know whether to love them or hate them.

Its probably the most interesting venue we’ve been to, being that its right on the water and looks like its was built for USO shows during the first World War. The place is literally falling to pieces and, in a matter of hours, will be brimming with angsty teens putting the frail infrastructure to the test. If and when the whole structure comes tumbling down, I hope the union cameras are good enough to capture the ensuing chaos.

I have been working a lot more than I thought I would, but thats quite alright because I feel like I never really work all that hard. Carrying a camera around and shooting insane slow motion shots of Chester Bennington headbanging is barely making me break a sweat, but the real rub is that I have zero access to the bands. Its not that they don’t want me to shoot them backstage doodling their thumbs, they are just not around. They fly in and out of every city 60 minutes before showtime and have a million fans to meet and greet and sign posters, kiss babies, etc. I get to shoot that crap everyday, but its boring as hell. No one cares about that stuff.

So what am I gonna shoot? Hell if I know. I can’t even shoot. So now I’m the one doodling my thumbs.