A few months ago I was covering a Lauren Housely show at Antwerp Mansion in Manchester. I work closely with Toast Recordings so couldn’t wait to see what the First Animals on Toast Night was going to be like.  Given that it was a launch night it was a pretty subdued evening, at least until support act Federal Charm took to the stage.

There has certainly been a surge in interest in the blues rock sound over the last 12 months with bands like The Black Keys and Alabama Shakes hitting the mainstream but from the first sleazy Clapton-esque riffs of “Reconsider” it was clear these were no imitation wannabes.  I grabbed a few shots and made a mental note to do some digging online to find out more about them.

Federal Charm performing live on the first Animals on Toast night at Antwerp Mansion, Manchester, United Kingdom, 2012-09-15 (Mike Gatiss/Mike Gatiss Photography)

A couple of weeks later I got a call from guitarist Paul Bowe – he’d seen my images and would I be able to document their album preview show in December?  Absolutely! A couple of coffees later and a chat at Paul’s Guitar Academy in Stockport and we were all set.

One of the things that makes any photographers job easier is a band that really performs.  I’m not talking about the quality of the music, to be perfectly honest that’s almost irrelevant to a music photographer.  I’m talking about the difference between just playing a song and performing it.  These guys perform in spades.  You can tell just by watching them how much they all enjoy it and that rubs off on the crowd.  Too many bands starting out are so terrified of making a mistake that they forget that the audience are here to see them as well as hear them and spend the whole show concentrating on hitting every note.  Unsurprisingly a band that doesn’t move much makes creating interesting images a lot harder, when you’ve got a band that enjoy themselves as much as this it’s almost too easy.

Of course when you’re as good as Federal Charm are it seems effortless but the result is a blinding bit of classic rock and I can’t wait to hear more when they play The Bakers Vault in Stockport on December 28th.  Until then check out this video for “There’s a Light”