Photographing Behind the Scenes at the 2011 Outside Lands Music Festival

A couple weekends ago, my reporter Nick DeCicco and I got to cover the entire weekend of the Outside Lands Music Festival at Golden Gate Park in San Francisco. Being a local daily newspaper in Solano County, it’s rare that journalists at our newspaper get an opportunity for press passes at such a big event in the big city. Nick keeps up a well thought out music blog and pitched the idea of covering it to our bosses and in the end were given the green light to go do and cover it. I love being in big crowds and seeing live music. Ever since I was an adolescent, the majority of my pitiful income would go towards summer concerts and band tours. This time it would be different. Our press passes were our golden tickets. One of the things I love most about my job is the doors photojournalism can take you through. In this case, it was the backstage access and photo pit in front of the front row that allowed me to get a new glimpse into the music world I grew up loving. There was not a bad performance to be had. Notable bands worth checking out in no particular order of awesomeness: Joy Formidable, Foster The People, MGMT, Clap Your Hands and Say Yeah, Phish, Ok Go, Arctic Monkeys, Old 97′s, The Black Keys, Josh Ritter, John Fogerty, The Decemberists, and Arcade Fire. Here are some of my favorite snaps from the weekend. Keep on rocking people! -M