The Skinny Showcase: Markus Thorsen

Gallery | 08 Jan 2010

All photos from Markus Thorsen's LIVE: A Collection of Bands from the Edinburgh Live Scene.
You can tell good live music photography by how evocative it is. One image, one permanent impression of a long-forgotten fleeting moment, and you feel like you know the band already. The whole thing: the music, the politics, the themes, the history, the drive, the dreams; it's all there. Some of Markus Thorsen's photos in this book are inspirational. I'm writing this in silence, but looking at The Hidden Masters' guitarist on his knees, face obscured by a scraggly mop of blonde hair, wrestling the fuck out of his Gibson, my overwhelming reaction is: god, I love music. Isn't it wonderful? That there is the greatest moment in that man's life, his surrender to the glory of music at its fullest; and he gets to recreate that every time he plays. Look at the Hitcher singer, doubled over as if in pain; and in the next photo he's sprung back up, triumphant, to bellow it all out. What would he do without music? He'd be crippled. I don't think these guys care about becoming part of a city heritage or scene, the way journalists like to tell it. They just want to squeeze each moment on-stage for all that it's got. [Ally Brown]

 

For details see www.markusthorsen.com