GPOYW

|January 8, 2014 | Photos Of J.Yuenger, White Zombie

I hated photo sessions, and there were so many of them – or, I started to hate them after the first few, when the only thing going through my head was I’m in the band! I’m in the band!

Is hate too strong a word? I’ve never been the sort of person who likes seeing themselves in a photo, or on film, but I got used to it. And I got pretty good at it, I guess. You’d show up at somebody’s loft ( a lot of those photographers lived and worked in real-deal lofts, carved out of old factories and warehouses ) and just get on with it. Posing for pictures was a lot like working a job that you don’t love – if you don’t watch the clock, the time goes by faster and you can go home.

Things are certainly different now, where your friend with the Canon 5D can flutter around your band for 2 minutes, take hundreds of photos, edit on their laptop and give you a few good shots, pretty much instantly.

Back then, in the 1990s, the photographer, after much puttering and adjusting of lights, would shoot a couple of Polaroids to get an idea what was going on. Then, they’d drop those Polaroids on the floor, where they’d lay until getting swept up at the end of the day. I always made a point of grabbing and putting them into my pocket, and I have a tidy little stack now.