Hilltop Hoods @ Jubilee Pavilion, November ’09

Home shows for the Hilltop Hoods are a special occasion. There’s something in the air, a unique connection between what’s happening onstage and what’s going on with the audience. It’s almost as if the fans “own” the Hoods and this show is theirs. With families and friends in attendance, the mood before this show was akin to a Christmas relo bash, but instead of Aunty Flo’s slow cooked turkey, we were set to feast on some of the worlds best hip hop.

And feast we did.

The Hoods have their show perfected, hitting every nail square on. The set didn’t slow for even a second.

The lighting tonight was spot on the entire show, making my job a complete breeze. It’s pretty handy having access to the lighting technician – by knowing the songs and what the lights are planning on doing I was able to set up shots based on the lights. You only get lighting like this with a well versed technician and the Hoods have their man and they travel with him everywhere. And it shows. Much credit for these shots should be directed his way.

Having AAA access and being able to shoot the entire show also opened up a bunch of shots that otherwise wouldn’t have been possible. Before tonight I had planned a few shots I wanted to try, the one behind Debris could ideally be better if it was shot with fisheye, the crowd lit up and Pressure & Suffa on either side of the stage, but damn, to coordinate all those elements was almost impossible! I’ll get it one day tho.