Twisted Records 10th Anniversary Halloween Ball, 27 Oct 2006
Twisted Records is one of the oldest and most respected Psytrance / Psybient labels, and their tenth anniversary party (held on founder Simon Posford's birthday) was clearly set to be a corker of an event. With collaboration by Inside-Us-All (pulling out all the visual stops), IDspiral, Tribe of Frogs, Backroom Beat (each hosting impressively decorated spaces), and a profusion of top quality artists this really was a class act. As an added twisted twist, guests were encouraged to dance dressed in their best Halloween costume. My brief was to portrait them as they arrived, then cover the artists on stage.
Alas though, the path of life is not always smooth. The planned venue cancelled the booking at short notice and the only available replacement was far from perfect. On a personal note, I'd been in Kenya all week dealing with a family medical emergency and arrived sleeplessly back just a few hours before the party. Circumstances scrapped my plan for backdrops and studio strobes, which left me little control over lighting the costume portraits... the deep shadows being quite suggestive of my psychic state!
Yet despite of all this it did turned out to be a fantastic gig. I danced some healing, my camera twisted into life, and the pleasing shots started to flow. So this album deserves the subtitle "artistry from adversity" - an extended version of it features on the forthcoming official DVD of the party.