Canal Parade 2005

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The Mayor of Amsterdam intervened to give this year’s canal parade (part of Amsterdam Pride)
the go ahead — there was some fuck up over licenses. I’ve watched the
colorful boats ‘n’ floats go by before, but this was the first time I
got a good spot at the barrier on Magere Brug.
It’s near the end of the parade’s route through the Amsterdam
canals, when the boats hit the Amstel River. All around me people
complained that it wasn’t as busy as last year (… that’s how I got my
spot!) and that the floats weren’t as good… I really didn’t care. It
was chilly and I got rained on a few times, but I stayed glued to my
spot for five hours, snapping away. Despite the fact that I was
coughing my lungs up and couldn’t see properly with my runny nose and
teary eyes. One thing I learnt was that my gear
isn’t up to this kind of stuff. I used my Tamron 70-300 4-5.6 and the
85mm/1.8. The 85mm was too short and the Tamron is a piece of crap.
Surprisingly, there weren’t a whole lot of photographers around where I
stood, but the ones carrying SLR’s all had top range zooms on them. I
am definitely going to get me that Sigma 70-200/2.8 for this kind of
work.

Ben Christophers, Paradiso, Amsterdam

God damn The Frames’s audience who didn’t have the decency to shut. the. fuck. up. during Ben Christophers’ support slot in the Paradiso an hour or so ago.

His songs are so brittle and how beautiful they sounded in that quiet 14th century church in Dingle late last year.

I don’t think Ben enjoyed fighting the Paradiso din. He rushed through his encore.

Made a bad decision and ended up on the wrong side of his guitar, which makes for shite photos (Flickr set) and I didn’t feel like moving to the other side. George (because it was George and not that guy I knew in high school he looks a lot like which always confuses me) gave me his Sigma 70-200 to shoot with and I didn’t feel too good and didn’t feel like talking, especially with Ben playing.

I think I’ve a cold coming on.

And fuck the Frames anyway, I left before they came on. Thinking about that Sigma, of course. Fuck.

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