I feel that I was really privileged to get that shot.
Bikini Kill was a band that I kept hearing about. At the time I was really in to Fugazi and The Nation of Ulysses. So, when I moved to DC, I was really excited to see them.
If there’s a good band, I try to photograph them as many times as possible until I get the right shot. It’s rare that you go and see a band once and get a great photograph.
It really comes down to being in the right place at the right time and knowing how to compose under pressure.
For me, photographing bands is all about respecting the band and respecting the fans. You don’t want to get in anyone’s way, so I would usually get to the front early, rather than waiting for the band to start and then shoving my way up.
Bikini Kill started every one of their gigs by announcing “All boys to the back, girls to the front.” A lot of my friends were in, and had started Riot Grrrl. So there I was - a guy - up at the front with them. But I think the band didn’t mind because they knew me, and knew I respected them.
That weekend there was a lot of activity around DC because there was a big pro-choice march on the mall. There was a benefit and Fugazi were headlining both nights; one night with Bikini Kill, one night with The Scrawl.
The gig was in a church called the Sanctuary Theatre. Most venues in DC were either set up in churches or strange halls. That made it more intimate. That’s another thing about getting an iconic picture – it’s about the space in which it was taken.
I was using my first camera, which I got from my grandparents. It was a Pentax P5. My lens was a 17 – 28mm wide angle Samyang zoom. Which is the most generic thing ever, but it had amazing depth of field.
The other interesting thing about shooting at that time is that I had a Pentax flash but it wasn’t connected to my camera. So, to take the shot I’d have the camera in one hand and the flash in the other. I’d hit B for bold, hold the shutter open, wait for the moment, and then fire the flash. It was a kind of crazy, low-tech way of doing it. But that was all the equipment I could afford at the time.
If you look at the photo of Tobi and Kathleen sitting on the stage, you can see that Kathleen is looking up at my flash. Probably thinking, “What are you doing?”
It’s weird, I can look back now at every moment of that gig on YouTube and I can see my flash going off when the photo is taken.
There were all kinds of people there – lots of Riot Grrrl people, and I think Joan Jett is in the background of some of those photos.
After the gig I went home and developed the shots in my kitchen. I had a darkroom in the closet of my bedroom and exposed them in there.
When I had developed the photos I took them down to another Bikini Kill gig and showed them the prints. The next time I saw them they were like, “We really like those photos. In fact, we’re using one of them on the cover of our record.”
That was it. I managed to get about $200 dollars for it in the end.
As time goes on, they seem to stand up. They mean a lot to me and they mean a lot to other people.
To see more of Pat Graham’s work, visit his website and follow him on Twitter. His book, Silent Pictures, features many photos taken with the same method described above. His new book, Instrument, is available on Amazon.
