Tonight I did this...

We Are Scientists at KOKO.... after mistakenly turning up at The Roundhouse (hope my assignment editor doesn't see this!  oops!).  Anyway I made it in plenty of time, phew!

The crowd was heaving, full of screaming girls which was kind of hilarious, and the band were on really good form.  They seemed genuinely excited and having a good time, and they sounded great - thankfully they played "Nobody Move, Nobody Get Hurt" on the third song so really made my time there worthwhile (yeah yeah unoriginal but it's such a bloody good song).  Took me right back to 2007 and meeting a certain someone...

And the best thing?  FABULOUS LIGHTING!  Oh what a breath of fresh air it is to go to a gig that has thoughtful, exciting, flattering lighting... and you can almost always count on any band playing at KOKO having good lighting.  It made my job so much more pleasurable tonight, rather than standing there throwing obscenities under my breath about "whoever the f*** decided this lighting would be a good idea" etc etc.  Sometimes I do wonder if people stand back and take a look at what they have created - sometimes there is barely any lighting, and I wonder are the crowd - the paying gig going punters - as pissed off at me that they are standing there unable to make out the people they have come to see (and hear, obviously).

Anyway - this is my favourite shot of the night.... enjoy.

yeah you know the score, it's all copyrighted 'n shit.  Leave it alone x

NME awards...

Last Wednesday was the NME awards at the Brixton Academy, and I was lucky enough to be there shooting for IPC Media along with Red Bull and Carling.  It was an absolutely amazing night, and got me all "fangirl" over PJ Harvey, Warpaint, Liela Moss, Juliette Lewis and of course, the incredible Dave Grohl.
Actually I did thankfully managed to suppress my excitement so as not to embarrass myself, but, it was a room full of greatness in my eyes!

I was able to have access to the tables where all the guests were sitting which ensured a good view of the stage when there were performances - great to see PJ, Crystal Castles and The Foos playing - it also meant getting crushed in amongst a heaving mass of sweaty musicians - everyone was having a great time and it was good to see a distinct lack of egos in the room, everyone was just there to party and have fun.

The best moments had to be getting a great shot of Juliette Lewis and Dave Grohl together - both of whom are incredibly nice people, and of course watching the Foos play an enormous 2 hour set and seeing every body going crazy dancing on tables.  I was shattered by the end of a 6 hour photography stint but it was well worth it, here are some shots from the night...

ALL IMAGES © ANNABEL STAFF PHOTOGRAPHY 2011.  NO REPRODUCTION PERMITTED.  Thanks!

ROLLING STONE!

SO COOL, very happy about this! 

On the road with Smatka...

As promised here are some shots from last month when I went up to Manchester for In The City with Smatka, what a great day!

Chromeo at The Roundhouse, Camden...

Last Friday I went along to The Roundhouse to shoot Chromeo, it was an awesome show, not only is their set eye catching and vibrant but they really got the crowd going - which can be hard in London as a lot of people know!  Good old Montreal-ers do it best...

Here's a shot from the show, the rest can be seen here.

New website, new projects, all happening!

At last my new annabelstaff.com website has been launched and I am really happy with it.  There are a few little tweaks that need to be ironed out but overall it's making me very happy every time i look at it!

So today's agenda on such a miserable, wet, cold dreary London day involves a lot of catch up work that has sadly been neglected due to my workload of late.

That's a good thing I guess but it also means that there's a lot to be getting on with and promises to be kept.  The biggest one being getting the latest photos I took of the lovely Smatka, which I took on a whirlwind 24 hour road trip to Manchester last month, done and dusted.  What a day (and night) that was, it was like hitting the road as a 16 year old again (mmm, yeah come to think of it one of Smatka's lovely band members is 16.. swear that didn't make me feel old).

Lots of frolicking around Manchester ensued and an extremely drunken van ride back, taking a little stop off at a massive 24 hour Asda (class) to pick up some junk food and vodka and hitting the road again to fall asleep singing to the worst music blasting out of the stereo - thanks to Stars purchasing the cheesiest CD she could possibly find.  Good times.

It was all for Smatka's triumphant gig as part of "In The City" this year, which got some great press - and deservedly so since Smatka blew everyone away, with such a unique talent you can do nothing but stop and be sucked into to her crazy fantasy world.  She has been described as a cross between Siouxsie Sioux and (strangely) Paloma Faith - I can only imagine the latter is solely due to the theatrical element of Smatka's shows.  Good thing then that Siouxsie happens to be my favourite musician ever.

So there's a lot of images to get through, I am really happy with them and it's hard to narrow them down when it all conjures up good memories.  I will post some when they are done, looking forward to getting the out there.