Overview
Marcus Haney was 22 when he first started sneaking into music festivals. Four years later, he is a highly sought after music photographer on tour with the likes of Mumford & Sons and Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros. Haney's documentary No Cameras Allowed captures his journey from broke uni student to working with his favourite bands.
While your first reaction might be to tsk tsk a sneaky freeloader, it's hard to stay mad at someone with a genuine passion for live music. Gaining access to some of the world's largest music festivals — including Glastonbury, Coachella and Bonnaroo — was not merely a matter of jumping the fence; Haney had to get creative. "We've done everything. Everything from jumping fences to fake wristbands to posing as security to posing as artists to posing as press to running through truck entrances to going underneath fences," Haney says in an interview with Noisey.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=bPRstX6iiLE
A film student, Haney wanted to capture live performances by his favourite artists, and often snuck into the photographers' pit and even on stage with some of the acts. Being a broke uni student was essentially the reasoning behind Haney not paying for tickets, and to date he has snuck into over 50 music events, including crashing the Grammys. He even made a short film about his experience, Connaroo: How Broke Kids Do Bonnaroo, which miraculously found its way into the hands of Mumford & Sons. They saw it, loved it, and asked him to come on tour with them. Haney now had to chose between completing his final exams for university, or going on tour with one of his favourite bands. You can guess which option he chose.
No Cameras Allowed has just had its first screenings in LA, with no plans for a wider release as yet. The film includes unbelievable footage from Haney's experiences and a fantastic soundtrack with the likes of the Naked and Famous, Lykke Li, Jay-Z, Phoenix and many others. While we certainly encourage that you support live music by buying a ticket to events (as this doco show, most artists barely see a cent of record sales), this is undoubtedly an impressive tale of a young man's pursuit of happiness.
Via Noisey. Photos Via Marcus Haney.