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September 24Some singles I got recently, thought it'd make a change from photos. I love picture sleeve singles, so if anybodys got any nice ones they want to get rid of let me know. 
 Jimmy Page from Classic rock and the Halfin- Wall bookazine  
September 23Sunday and its a beautiful day, been nice here all weekend and I've done nothing much. I was so bored today I even looked at John Bionelli's "exciting" road report on Aeroforceone. Now I know John works for them but even I hadn't realised he'd drunk the Jonestown serum. Mark Weiss is back - 'Wow!' Must get back to my cornfield for the 11th time. The only show I really want to go to is the Sex Pistols, November 8th Brixton Academy. John should remember "Never mind the bollocks'... September 21Scott Rowley sent me High Voltage, a collection of Mick Wall's writing, with photos by me. If I'm honest, I'll own up and tell you I was not looking forward to this. I don't want to re-live the 80's. I don't remember a great deal about it, although I do when I think about it. Unfortunately for me the stuff I think about makes me squirm in embarrassment - passing out on Concorde, drug-taking for hours in a hotel rooms, talking absolute bollocks. I was thinking of all the girls I had sex with - not as many as you might think because I only wanted to get as fucked up as possible and cocaine doesn't work for sex. The other side is waking up with some monster next to you who looked stunning at 7am. Ugh, the past... I opened the book on Mick Wall's David Lee Roth intro and reading it made me smile (I don't smile) and even burst out laughing. I realised an hour or so later I was still reading it. I enjoyed the Bon Jovi story and I never thought I'd EVER say that. Mick's intro is so true, "Poor Jon" - I was still laughing. The book brought back a lot of memories, considering I didn't think I had any, funny ones. My photos make me squirm - Iron Maiden and Marillion look godawful, but if you want to know what we did and what went on (in a semi-sanitised way) this is a good book. I've written some side bars on my thoughts which have been edited down because Scott's worried about offending bands and managements. I might print some of them unedited on my site. High Voltage also has intros by Scott Rowley, Geoff Barton and me (with the good bits edited out). Reading this has made me think of writing a book with Mick - giving you all the stuff you want without the boring interviews. September 19Been catching up on my reading. Re-read Silk by Alessandro Baricco and am now on a bit of light reading - ENDGAME 1945 and ABSOLUTE WAR, SOVIET RUSSIA IN THE SECOND WORLD WAR... After these two I'll get back to Bali, Java, in My Dreams. Some recent pictures of Iceland. See more... 
 September 18Some more of the Chris Cornell in Iceland set. See more... 
 September 17I read Mick Wall's diary, or blog as he likes to call it. His September 14th entry is spot on - I went to bed last night smiling... Chris Murray, owner and editor (Chris wrote the vomit-inducing feature on rock photography in American Photographer in August), has sent me an invite to JOHN AND YOKO: A NEW YORK LOVE STORY by Allan Tannenbaum at the Govinda Gallery in Washington, featuring a collection of photos you really don't want or need to see. Chris, please, there must be more Beatles you can dig up and fawn over. I mean, what a load of old shit. Coming soon, BONO, A LOVE STORY... Some older travel pictures of Macau and The New Territories. See more... 
 September 14
Saw Mark Blake who gave me an inscribed copy of Wish You Weren't Here, his new book on Pink Floyd. It is a good read. Truthfully it's called Pigs Might Fly. Go and buy it and make him rich. Classic Rock had a review of Mick Wall's Axl book, WAR, which gave it a begrudging ok review by GNR fan Stephan Graves. Stephan, realise it, you were not there - Mick was. Some older travel pictures of Dubai and flying out of Singapore plus the sky across Asia. See more... 
 September 12Some more Chris Cornell. I have some older travel which I'll put up before the end of the week. I'm going to re-do my travel page soon as I hate the way it looks. See more... 
 
 September 11Got a promo copy of Fragments, The Who fanclub dvd by Justin Kreutzmann. Like the sad Who fan I am, I watched it at 9am this morning. Lots of good backstage footage and Justin doesn't try to just shoot the show. There's me shooting Pete and Roger in Boston and again shooting Pete with Chris Stamp in New York plus even Joe Perry and Roger. Let's hope Justin does more of this. Chris Cornell in the land of ice and snow. See more... 
 Iceland
 September 10Some of the latest pictures of Chris Cornell in Iceland. 
 September 9thUp at 5am, Chris looking very chipper and Yogi looking fried. Head out in the rain towards the airport, amazingly as dawn breaks the rain stops. Shoot a strangely happy Chris Cornell on lava beds as the cold looking light of day slowly comes. The three of us fly to London, Chris and I listening to Soundgarden outtakes a fan has given him. This includes Communication Breakdown which Chris likes, 'I sound really drunk', and Blind Dogs which he deciphers the lyrics for me. Fly over a sunny London, he looks quite fascinated looking down on it. I leave Chris and Yogi heading to Terminal 3, I'm off home. Some of Maynard from Puscifer-Tool 
 
 September 8Got up today ready to shoot Chris, who then refused to get out of bed until 3pm when he had to do an instore signing. End up wandering around downtown with Yonnie (Chris's tour manager). We find a trendy shop selling Indian art and I buy a bedspread. Quite why I'm buying something from India in Iceland I haven't figured out. Finally corner Chris. We agree to shoot after his instore except it's pouring down with rain. 'Hey,' he beams with positive joy 'You come all the way to Iceland and get to shoot backstage.' He must feel slighty guilty as he now agrees to shoot at dawn tomorrow on the way to the airport. I did get Chris looking film noir on the way to the show. The hall was (to my surprise) the same one Led Zeppelin played in 1970. You can see it in the black and white footage on the dvd. Earlier I'd played Chris Blind Dogs which he has no recollection of. He did remember how it went a bit on the guitar. Great show, even better than the Roundhouse. The same set with good lighting. It did feature a rather homoerotic element when Yogi and Pete came out together dripping sweat and naked from the chest up. Chris was the only one dressed after the show and I took photos. The band were like Las Vegas male strippers - looking for work... September 7Kevin THE CAVEMAN Shirley had another son today, which he has called Ross Jimmy Robert John Bonzo Shirley. I hope his son likes photography and classic rock. I was surprised he didn't call him THE CAVEMAN junior. Kevin has posted a strange picture on his site of his new family dressed up as astronauts. Well done Kevin, may you have many more. Went out last night with Wilf Wright and Charlie Hernandez (Police Production Director). We ate in a civilized manner at the Butcher and Grill like the carnivores we are. Thought I'd have an early night, but ended up until 1.30 this morning, then couldn't sleep (I had to get up at 4.30am). Clock watched every half an hour. Gave up and got up, left for Gatwick at 5am. I'm off to Iceland to shoot Chris Cornell in the land of the ice and snow, rampaging through Reykjavik wearing helmets with horns on looking for Valhalla or a KFC. Gatwick is dreadful, mob chaos (and it's 6am). God, British airports are shitty, shit service, shit attitude and shitty security. Sleep all the way on shitty British Airways. Get in at 10am to grey skies and rain, it is bleak. Arrive into Reykjavik as the sun starts to poke through the sky. Might not be so bad after all... Call Chris Cornell and get 'What time is it?' It's mid afternoon. 'Ugh, I need to sleep.' He hangs up. Went out to bleak nothingness. It was calming, black rock with nothing as far as you could see and completely silent. Reminded me of the highlands of Scotland where I was forced to go to every summer as a teen. Had dinner, with drummer Jason Sutter, at a fine Icelandic dining house, all candlelit and olde worlde. We ordered whale and horse, Jason couldn't deal with the whale so I ate it (like seared light liver), and the horse was nice as well. We finished the night at Hresso, a coffee bar where Yogi was having a rock'n'roll party and playing an acoustic set. Yogi wasn't bad at all, it was the locals who were shit-faced. Fucked up beyond belief drunk. At the bar was a middle-aged man in a suit with his wife wearing a viking helmet complete with horns. They were so drunk that everytime he tried to drink his beer it went all over his suit. I felt as if I was trapped in a lunatic asylum. September 6Here's an interview By Joe Bosso done for Gibson Guitars I did online, some of what I said has been "Americanised" for those American mongoloids who can't understand English. I like the bit about being taught to paint at art college by people who can't paint - very true. The part about Kerrang making me is frankly bollocks. I made that magazine with the photos and the writers at the time (when they had good writers) did the same. The bit about Saxon is laughable. More Chris Cornell from The Roundhouse. See more... 
 September 5As the tube strike is on so took a cab out of Victoria. The cab driver asked if my name is Ross, then told me he was in my year at school and went through a list of people in my year. It turns out two are in prison for murder, two are dead from drug overdoses and another three have been murdered. I only used to see one, Neville Green, and I gave up seeing him as he's nuts. A wonderful taxi ride - I think I'll pass on Friendsreunited... More of Chris Cornell. See more... 
 Also just put up the pictures of Aerosmith in St Petersburg. See more... 
 September 4Just adding some pictures of Chris Cornell. 
 September 3
Decided like a dimwit to travel on London transport to the Roundhouse in Chalkfarm. Was ok getting to Victoria, then it took one and a half hours to travel four miles. No wonder no one has any sympathy for London transport, they strike in rush hour - cunts. Speaking of which, some plonker at Liverpool University has done a study of rock stars and worked out that they are more likely to die younger than you and I as they drink and take more drugs. Wow, that's not true, there're just more selfish cunts. All right I'll stop swearing. Chris Cornell was brilliant, the best show I've seen this year, better than The Who, Aerosmith and Prince all put together. The band was more loose than before and jammed in a good way. Generally jamming is boring - look what it did for the Black Crowes. They played Outshined, Rusty Cage, Ty Cobb, Black Hole Sun, Spoonman, Jesus Christ Pose, Burden In My Hand and finished with Slaves And Bulldozers which went into a bit of the Doors Break On Through and then Whole Lotta Love (nearly complete including a second drum solo from Jason Sutter which was good enough to join Led Zeppelin ). They even did In My Time Of Dying at the end of J.C.P., plus Chris did a solo acoustic bit and played the other Soundgarden songs you'd like to hear. Great show, and his new songs were good as well. My only complaint was the lightshow was dreadful. September 2I actually have a lot to do this week. Well, a lot to do in my world - I always look at piles of old negs and think I must go through that, then never bother. Mojo are doing a big thing on Blondie and I have a lot of pictures I never bother to go through from when I used to shoot trendy 70's bands - Blondie were trendy once. Okay, more like everyone wanted to shag Debbie Harry - and Saw Prince again at the 02. He played a more jammed out set, still good - and I got the water taxi some of the way along the Thames. Have written a bit about bands for a Classic Rock special coming out soon on Mick Wall's writing, with photos by me (when I could find them). Looking back is not always pleasant. Iron Maiden Seventh Son for example. The band are wearing track suits and look like Essex car dealers. Off to shoot Chris Cornell tomorrow at the Roundhouse - yes, sometimes I even take photos.. September 1Spoke to John Bionelli who's looking forward to exposing himself in Hawaii (he's going surfing) - look out girls... We discussed if the 'Smiths will change their set as they start a mini tour of the US. 'I hate to say this, but I hope they drop Jaded and do, say, Pink,' John said. We both thought they should do Lick And A Promise but they'd never rehearse it. Watched a good Korean film - Woman Is The Future Of Man... Just put up some Aerosmith from the Moscow gig. See more... 
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Drummer with my picture of Joey Kramer. 
