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Diana Price Photography

With a list of bands that reads like a who's who of kick ass music, we jumped at the chance of featuring Diana Price in the latest Voltcase. Having photographed the likes of Mad Sin, The Nekromantix and Zombie Ghost Train - not to mention Voltcase's favourite band at the moment, the Koffin Kats, we caught up with Diana for a Voltcase interview (below) and to share a selection of her psychobilly photos with all of you lucky people out there. Check out the pics, check out the interview, and then go say 'hi' to Diana at her official site here.

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VOLTCASE DIANA PRICE INTERVIEW:

Welcome to Voltcase, Diana, how are things?

Very good, actually. Better than they’ve been in quite some time.

How would you describe yourself to a stranger in three words?

Meticulous, tenacious, workaholic.

So, you get to shoot loads of cool psychobilly bands - how did that all come about? Were you into the music and the scene anyway?

I’ve always loved all kinds of music, but about two years ago I had never even heard of psychobilly till I started going out to see a Phoenix band called The Limit Club. One night they were playing this marathon psycho show with about eight or nine other bands. I almost left after the first few bands because I had come out mainly to support The Limit Club, but their singer, Nick Feratu convinced me to stay for the headliner, which was a psychobilly band he swore I would love. I saw Stitch Hopeless and the Sea Legs for the first time that night, and a little band from Detroit called The Koffin Kats…maybe you’ve heard of them?

I can definitely say I fell for the genre that night in a love-at-first-sight kind of way, or sound, as it were. I suppose it was destiny I would fall in love with psychobilly: I already loved punk music, and grew up with my mom’s collection of 45s and albums of Elvis and classic 50s music, to Marty Robbins, Johnny Cash and Waylon Jennings. Plus, I had always been obsessed with horror from a young age, and can even remember my dad sitting around drinking PBR all the time. So when I discovered psychobilly, it was like, “Holy shit…I’ve come home!”

And the rest, as they say, is history.

And what are the tours like - do you get pampered and travel in comfort, or do you just have to slum in the back of a van like a roadie?

I have yet to go out on tour with any bands, but I can assure you I don’t need to be pampered. I can sleep on floors, in vans, buses…whatever. And in fact, I wouldn’t want to do it any different than the bands themselves do it. I’d rather spend my time with bands who tour that way, than pretentious divas who need five star hotel rooms, fancy tour buses and entourages. Boring.

A lot of the your photos are 'action' shots, have you had a lot of practice at being in the right place at the right time in order to catch them? Are there certain areas on or around the stage that you know will produce good images?

I usually try to stay around the center so I can shoot everyone in the band, but that isn’t always possible. And even if I do, getting good shots of drummers is so difficult -- they’re farthest away, in the least light, and move the fastest. It’s a recipe for photographic disaster, but I‘m working on it.

You really just have to be ready all the time and try to catch those little “moments.“

Of all the bands you’ve worked with, have you got any particular favourites? Or, for that matter, any least favourites? And any bands that you haven’t worked with that you would like to work with in the future?

Well, obviously the bands I shoot again and again I enjoy working with, and certain ones I seem to have some sort of photographic chemistry with, most notably the Koffin Kats. They are insanely photogenic and constantly add crazy new shit to their shows, so I’m always able to come up with something new when I shoot them.

As far as least favorite bands, at the risk of being obvious, I hate shooting bands whose music I hate. I talked my way into a lineup of emo/screamo bands that are always on the covers of the mainstream music magazines, and I was absolutely miserable the whole night. That was when I realized that if I ever hoped to make a living shooting rock and roll, it would mean shooting a lot of pretentious, unoriginal bands like that. And I knew I had to find a way to try to keep it for “the love of it.”

I look for bands who not only make good music but are good people. And real -- not pre-fabricated, professionally-styled, choreographed clones of every other band du jour on MTV. I’m not interested in working with divas or dicks no matter how much it might advance my career.

As we’re based in the UK, do you have any plans of popping over here, or have you ever been here before at all?

Actually, I plan to come over to the UK some time this fall and do a little tour of dive bars. So recommendations for bands and venues are certainly welcome. And I’m also hoping to make it to Australia in the winter.

If you were interviewing yourself, what question would you ask yourself? And what would the answer be?

Well, I’m not sure what I would ask, but I know the question I get asked most often is what kind of equipment I use, as in “That‘s a really good photo...what camera did you use?” It’s a question I notoriously loathe -- everyone I know who is reading this is laughing right now, because they know how that drives me nuts!

So, once and for all -- it’s not the equipment, but the person using it. And to prove my point, almost all of my photos were taken with the mediocre Canon Digital Rebel and the kit lens it came with. So there you go.

Of course, good equipment certainly helps, which is why I’m about to do a serious upgrade and get some lenses more suitable to low light photography. I think this will make a huge improvement to the quality of my work and certainly my timing, as the Rebel seriously lags in auto focus and flash card writing time. I‘ll be pressing the button, trying to shoot and it‘s flashing “busy.” That drives me nuts, and can’t tell you how many great shots I‘ve missed that way.

But the bottom line is you can get good shots with whatever you use, if you know what you’re doing and work at it.

And if you are thinking of being a “rock photographer,” then make sure you have another way to make a living, because you almost certainly won’t make a living at this. And be prepared to work very hard, because it’s damn competitive and hard to make a name for yourself with so many people doing the same thing -- most big name bands still ignore my inquiries. Make sure you really love it for its own sake, because it can be terribly thankless and time consuming. But seeing your photos on posters and cds is amazing…I’m still like a little kid about that, and get so excited when I see my work used. And of course, if you’re lucky, you’ll get to shoot photos of cute guys naked.

It certainly has its fringe benefits.

So, what are your plans for the rest of the year?

You know, this happens to be quite an exciting time for me. I’m changing my job to a temp employment agency so I have the flexibility to travel and do more in-depth projects, particularly going on short tours with bands. I’m tagging along with the Mad Sin, Koffin Kats, Brigitte Handley tour in June, and as I mentioned, I plan on going to the UK in the fall and Australia in the winter. I have my first two cd covers coming out next month for Phoenix band Stitch Hopeless and the Sea Legs and the Koffin Kats. I’m doing a pinup calendar for 2009 which will be my first, and will be shooting a lot more pinup work this year. I’m also branching out into band interviews, building my professional music blog, working on more magazine publications and editing for a documentary-style coffee table book on psychobilly with a lot more behind-the-scenes type shots. Ironically, Paul Roman was just telling me last weekend how I needed to do more behind the scenes work and be sort of the “psychobilly paparazzi.” And who am I to say no to Paul?

Told you I was a workaholic.

And finally, the question that we ask everyone that appears in Voltcase - what does the word 'Voltcase' mean to you?

Well, this may sound crazy -- which isn’t necessarily a bad thing here -- but when I think of “volt” I think of electricity and lightning, and when I think “volt case,” I also think of “nutcase” or “basket case,” so it sort of sounds like an “electrified lunatic.” Like Frankenstein, or something.

But then my horror-addled brain would come up with something like that.