Music Photography Blog

by Adam Elmakias

Crowd for Foals at Leeds Festival

Photographs From Leeds Festival

Leeds Festival… was interesting. I was originally assigned to photograph Reading and swapped to Leeds with hopes of catching a few more backstage portraits – after all, it can’t hurt to try. I like Leeds because it is one of the more youthful festivals in the UK and reminds me of Warped Tour. Every day I have a few artists to shoot that involve me running around the festival grounds through some mud and such, and then I can do my own thing in my free time. I ran into a lot of my old friends and made some new ones as well.

This is Leeds Festival
This is Leeds Festival
This is the map
This is the map
This is me at Leeds Festival
This is me
Ryan Scott Graham of State Champs at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
I’ll start my day out with an RSG smile
This is me creeping on State Champs
This is me creeping on State Champs
Awesome people at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Awesome people
Awesome people at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Awesome people
Kellin Quinn of Sleeping With Sirens at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Kellin Quinn of Sleeping With Sirens
Gabe Barham of Sleeping With Sirens at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Gabe Barham of Sleeping With Sirens
This is me shooting Sleeping With Sirens
This is me shooting Sleeping With Sirens
Derek of State Champs and Kellin of Sleeping With Sirens at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Derek of State Champs and Kellin of Sleeping With Sirens after the set
Two friends walking back to their buses
Two friends walking back to their buses
Waterparks  x Mikey Way at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Waterparks x Mikey Way
Matt Best of Tonight Alive at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Matty of Tonight Alive
Photographing Fall Out Boy - photo by Marcus Maschwitz
Photographing Fall Out Boy – photo by Marcus Maschwitz
Machine Gun Kelly at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Machine Gun Kelly
Machine Gun Kelly at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
MGK
Photographing MGK photo by Casey Lee
Photographing MGK photo by Casey Lee
Jenna of Tonight Alive enjoying the mud at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Jenna of Tonight Alive enjoying the mud
My camera with the mud
My camera with the mud
My mud with my shoe
My mud with my shoe
Sunset at Leeds Festival
Sunset at Leeds Festival
Yung Lean at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Yung Lean
Crowd at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
The crowd at Leeds Festival
Kano at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Kano cold
Kano at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Kano warm
The 1975 at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
The 1975
The 1975 at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
The 1975
I had an intern for a day, she was awesome!
I had an intern for a day, she was awesome!
Frank Turner at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Frank Turner
Frank Carter at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Frank Carter
Frank Carter at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Frank Carter
Frank Carter at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Frank Carter
Met some cool people at Leeds Festival
Met some cool people
Mat Kerekes of Citizen at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Mat Kerekes of Citizen
Ninja of Die Antwoord at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Ninja of Die Antwoord at Leeds Festival
Die Antwoord at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Die Antwoord at Leeds Festival
You Me At Six at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
You Me At Six at Leeds Festival
Photographing You Me At Six - photo by Jon Stone
Photographing You Me At Six – photo by Jon Stone
You Me At Six at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
You Me At Six at Leeds Festival
The Neighbourhood at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
The Neighbourhood at Leeds Festival
The Neighbourhood at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
The Neighbourhood at Leeds Festival
Twenty One Pilots at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Twenty One Pilots at Leeds Festival
Foals at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Foals at Leeds Festival
Foals at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Foals
Crowd for Foals at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
The crowd for Foals at Leeds Festival
Foals at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Foals at Leeds Festival
Rain plus confetti = this is my gear
Rain plus confetti = this is my gear
Rain plus confetti = this is me
Rain plus confetti = this is me
Disclosure at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Disclosure at Leeds Festival
Disclosure at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Disclosure at Leeds Festival
Disclosure at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Disclosure
Wiley at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Wiley at Leeds Festival
Slaves at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Slaves at Leeds Festival
Slaves at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Slaves at Leeds Festival
William Duvall of Giraffe Tongue Orchestra at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
William Duvall of Giraffe Tongue Orchestra at Leeds Festival
Thomas Pridgen of Giraffe Tongue Orchestra at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Thomas Pridgen of Giraffe Tongue Orchestra at Leeds Festival
Nas at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Nas at Leeds Festival
Stormzy at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Stormzy at Leeds Festival
Anthony Kiedis of Red Hot Chili Peppers at Leeds Festival by Adam Elmakias
Anthony Kiedis of Red Hot Chilli Peppers at Leeds Festival
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Worst Part about Leeds

So the worst part about the festival for me was trying to get back home after. I spent three days kind of camping out and photographing a fest… on the fourth day, I really wanted to get home. Unfortunately so did about 40k other people. I respect the hell out of festival-goers – there’s a lot that goes on that I didn’t know went on as I used to just roll in and roll out on a tour bus with a band, it’s nice to have partially *lived* it this time around.

Although I recognize it is not to the full extent how some people live it, it still helped me get a taste. Last day of the festival – I cleaned all my gear that night, showered up, and got ready to head home. My shoes were so soaked as I had just fully washed them that I had to take out the soles and wear them that way. Actually I forgot my soles all together so I was using another pair of shoe’s soles and those were soaked so I took those out… anyway, my shoes were dead.

I left my cabin bunk bed thing at around 3 am and knew I had a few options. I could either try to get a cab… which wasn’t really going to work or catch the buses that all the festival goes had to catch to get back into the city. I knew that no matter which option I chose, a lot was going to go wrong – but I only needed a few things to go right.

I had some cash on me, I had my card, I had my gear, and I had a head flashlight to help me navigate my 30-minute walk to the pick-up point. Now, I am assuming a lot of you have not been – and if you have you will understand me even better when I say it is in the middle of nowhere. About a 20 minutes drive to the city on a highway – too long to walk.

So I start walking to the pickup area and about 20 minutes into my walk I run into two other photographers I had met earlier that day. I forget these dudes’ names but they were very kind. They told me they were having trouble getting back as the lines for the busses were huge even now at 3:00 or 4:00 am and I told them- alright let’s join forces. Let’s do this.

Here we go. So we walked over to the pickup point and it was a lot of fencing, a lot of people, and a lot of cars that were not moving. We looked at the bus line, insanely long and it wasn’t moving- cab line, same deal- cabs stuck in the street, cops confused, people sitting everywhere. It was like a zombie movie, only no zombies – just drunk tired young people which kind of counts as zombies. Anyway, we asked the cop where to go, and me being oblivious yet hopeful told him we just wanted to walk in the direction of the city.

So, he pointed us in the right direction but told us it would be a few hours. Keep in mind we all had backpacks and I had a large handbag as well. It was going to be hell and I hadn’t really slept for more than an hour but we had to do it. Then I kind of saw there were a bunch of cabs just stuck waiting to get in.

I started pounding on their doors seeing if we could get a lift. It was really hectic, lots of people trying to do the same. Luckily we found a dude who told us we had to pay something like 20 pounds each. I would have honestly paid anything. It was quite a relief when we got in the car and got back to the train station.

I was so thankful, the driver could have charged me 100 pounds and I would have paid it no questions asked. I caught my train at 6 am or so that morning after watching the season finale of The Night Of at the station. The dude next to me at the station was really drunk but I offered him some of my cashews and he was thankful.

There was so much mud and so many passed out people at the train station I wish I could have taken a trip inside a commuter that morning that witnessed the aftermath of the festival just while they were on the way to work. Hilarious thinking about haha.

That is my story. I hope you enjoyed the photos, thanks for being awesome dudes- dudes.

These dudes were awesome, I met them at 3am and we traveled together.
These dudes were awesome, I met them at 3 am and we traveled together.