Outside the average [545]

Greetings from The Borders...

Before we start, that’s not me in the photo. That outfit looks way too sweaty.

I’m Christian Payne, autotelic, photographer and writer. In this weekly dispatch I seek out novelty (see above), explore the relations between things (see below), how we share, what we share and consume, plus where we might be going.

Thanks for joining in.

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#TheAction

My new shed interior is almost kitted out, a bunch more apples have been pressed and the cider is bubbling.

Away from home, on two occasions this week, I’ve been able to venture to the nearby chunk of civilisation called Newcastle. (It’s 40mins on the train and 1hr 30mins to drive.)

Both trips were to visit music venues and my first foray was to see Steve Lawson aka @SolobassSteve play with some other solo bassists. Bass Pope and Ian Paterson aka Outri.

I saw all three bassists at The Globe, an intimate, welcoming community owned venue that suited their music perfectly. I’ve known Steve years and it was great to share a drink and catch up before the gig.

All three acts performed solo on various basses, with Steve on last. I made the mistake of getting the train, which is fine if you don’t plan to stay in town late. I only caught the first few pieces of his set, but it was a joy.

He built rich, layered soundscapes using loops, effects and harmonics, teasing an extraordinary range of tones and moods from his six-string bass. While often ambient, his playing remained deeply melodic and emotionally grounded. Every phrase shaped with care. I’ve no idea how he navigates a floor strewn with pedals and wires to deliver so much atmosphere, but he’s had years to master it.

Between tracks, he chatted with the audience in his open, modest way, sharing stories and demystifying his process for those new to the scene.

It’s not a mainstream sound, but it’s easy to see how this kind of craft and honesty connects with the solo-bass community. A loyal and curious crowd drawn to a music that rewards close listening.

You can hear Steve’s work on his BandCamp

There’s a more photos on my Flickr account.

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The next gig of the week was last night and had me back in Newcastle at the Boiler Shop. An amazing venue in an incredible building in which 200 years ago saw Robert Stephenson develop the first locomotive. Needless to say it’s handy for the station, but this time I drove so I didn’t need to rush back.

I was there to photograph John Grant and knew little of the support act Lynks.

But the night certainly started with a rush.

Lynks is a masked queer pop artist fusing electro-punk, art-pop, club sounds and theatrical frolics.

The lyrics and stage act are not for the prudish. It was a provocative mash-up of sexual candour with reflections on shame, identity and belonging. It’s all out to challenge social norms and although a few “WTF?” expressions flickered across the crowd early on, Lynks soon had everyone dancing and singing. He even leapt into the audience in an attempt to spawn a mosh pit.

It was a unique, defiant burst of energy and the short interlude that followed gave us time to decompress before the main act.

John Grant arrived to huge excitement. I’d never seen him live before, but the rich voice and mood I knew from the few tracks I own were instantly personified on stage.

At first, I wondered if Lynks’ high-octane set (all that pleather) might have left things a little too clammy, but the shared wit and exploration of vulnerability and identity made these acts feel like two sides of the same coin.

As the night unfolded, Grant moved between mic, piano, keytar and synths, blending introspection with theatrical flair. The lush synth-funk was quite different to the piano balladry I’ve known him for, but I was certainly into this new-to-me emotional weight mixed with moody electronic energy.

From a photographic perspective, the Boiler Shop’s in house lighting guy made things easy for us in the pit. A real wizard on the desk. John Grant’s guy was ok, but the shadowy backlit mood in the first three songs had me struggle to find the shots. I’m sure it was great for the audience and they’re the important ones.

Fantastic sound and great acoustics all round though. Two very different performances, with Lynks tearing the night open and John Grant stitching it back together with grace and gravity.

[As is the norm should you need any of the photos here or on my Flickr account for your publication or elsewhere let me know.]

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Back home my screen time has seen me researching poly tunnels. In our quest to live a little more sustainably and produce more of what we eat, this’ll be a massive investment for the family.

It’s a minefield out there. I’ve looked at First tunnels, Premier Polytunnels, Direct Polytunnels, Ferryman Polytunnels, Fivestar Polytunnels, Polycrub and Northern Polytunnels.

I’ll let you know how it goes but I think the search has stopped at Northern Polytunnels. They not only seem to know what they’re talking about, but and are really friendly. Their build spec also looks good and people on Bluesky and Reddit have recommended them to me.

Any of you splurged out on a large growing space like this?

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#ThePictures

The images I have taken this week were shot on an 11 year old Nikon D750. In so many instances phones are amazing but for the discerning image maker having a big sensor and decent glass still wins.

Despite coming out around the same time as the iPhone 6 the D750 is highly regarded by those wanting an affordable pro weather-sealed camera body, able to capture photos in low light.

For me it enables me to make the most of some Nikon glass I’ve had lying around for ages. Yes this camera is now feeling as retro as the iPhone 6, but it’s still very capable at capturing high quality images.

My camera bag has the Nikon D750, a Speedlight SB910, a Nikon 85 mm 1.4, a manual Nikon 135 F2 lens, a Nikon 35mm F2, A Nikon 50mm F1 .4, A Sigma 24 mm F1 .4 and a, Sigma 15 mm 2.8 fisheye lens.

Nikon no longer make SLR cameras but weirdly they still have a decent following. Outside of the nostalgia and being able to resurrect long-loved lenses, it must be the price. All in all you could buy this setup for around £2000 to £2300. That’s a lot of decent glass and a capable body for less than the price of a new Nikon Z8 costing £2500 body only.

Or you could just use an iPhone. :-)

That said, the Nikon D750 still outperforms a modern iPhone in areas where physics still matter. It delivers a genuine optical depth, exceptional low-light control with natural colour rendering and the creative flexibility of large aperture interchangeable lenses.

It’s not all that convenient though. The latest iPhones certainly win there. Especially if you are after AI-driven processing and computational HDR plus stabilised 4K video. Not to mention the onboard editing and sharing.

For travel, social and everyday storytelling the speed and simplicity of a mobile device is key. But as much as lugging this sack of metal and glass is a pain… for portraits, landscapes and low-light work, the D750 still produces richer, more dimensional images. It’s also fun to return to the origins of my passion :-)

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#TheWords

I’m currently reading Leonardo da Vinci’s biography by Walter Isaacson. Wow. I’ll review it when finished and am throughly enjoying it till I do.

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If like me you rely a lot on voice dictation for general writing on a mobile or laptop, you might have been frustrated with the latest OS updates. They appeared to break the ability to say the words “Smiley Face” and have a ‘:-)’ appear.

Obviously you can create a shortcut, but I've now trained myself to say the slightly longer “smiley face emoji” to now get a 🙂. So it’a a little extra work but does unlock many more emojis to voice dictation.

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Could autism explain Virginia Woolf’s unique voice?

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#TheSound

Now playing…

A signed version of John Grant’s new album ‘The Art of The Lie’.

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#TheConsumed

This was the cake we had for my daughter’s birthday this week.

It’s a ‘super sharer’ from Sponge.co.uk and offered a lovely selection. I liked all the ones I tried. Even the coffee cake that i’m not normally a fan of. Lots of subtle flavours and nothing over the top.

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#TheFound

I buried one of my daughter’s birthday presents (some cash wrapped in foil) in the garden and after she successfully found it with the metal detector I had a quick sweep and found this amazing nutcracker.

I cleaned it up and it’s now our go to nutcracker for a pile of homegrown hazelnuts.

It’s an 1890’s design but I’ve a feeling this is a more recent casting. It was found not far away from where I previously found a two spoons. I think there was lots of dining in that part of our garden.

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#TheThings

Not all Casios are equal and not all step counters agree with each other either.

People love the Casio LWS-2200 (LWS-2200H) and the only thing I’ve seen taint otherwise glowing reviews are comments on the accuracy of it’s step counter.

But I don’t see what the fuss is about.

I bought this watch for my daughter and she loves it. So far, the step and movement readings match closely with the two Apple Watches in our house. It’s not a scientific measuring tool, but as an activity or movement monitor, it does exactly what it should... help you stay active and healthy.

I’m not one to count steps myself. The completion of my Apple Watch activity rings motivates me more. In the same way, if you think the Casio might overcount, just raise your goal to 10,000 or 12,000 instead of the usual 8,000.

This lightweight, 100m water-resistant digital step counter comes with a 200-lap memory stopwatch, countdown timer, 8-day step log, multiple daily alarms, duel time, a bright LED backlight (with afterglow) and a two-year battery life. All for around £40!

Don’t worry about stepcount precision. Think of them as points in the game of life. If you walk, dance, hop, skip, jump, paddle, or cycle, the numbers go up... and you’re winning at life.

Less whining, more winning. Just keep moving. 😉

I do wonder if my daughter wiill miss the Casio this replaces. The famous F-91W or as she likes to call it… Her terrorist watch.

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#TheThanks

Massive thanks to the paying subscribers who continue to support this dispatch and the adventures/experiments that make it. You know who you are. ♥️

I’d love to attract more of you to the throng. Supporting this weekly dispatch gets you access to the archive and the discord server.

It only costs the price of a coffee a month so if you value these words, ideas and curation, please consider an upgrade to paid…

Thank you for reading, sharing, liking and supporting a human doing manual work with their brain.

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#TheWeb

• Feel like exploring alternative, healthier relationships to time?

• It doesn’t cost much to intercept satellite communications and expose how data leaky they are.

• There’s a few Newcastlians on the Documentally community map. I’ll let you know when i’m next down and perhaps we can hang out.

• Doomprompting is the new doomscrolling

• Inside the far right social media ecosystem normalising extremist ideas in uk politics

• The open source app ‘Vault’ is an interesting way to save and organise links, notes and images ‘privately to your computer’ Although when I tried to download it for my Mac from Github my computer told me it was broken and it needed to go to the bin. It’s not Broken it’s just that apple does not like you downloading stuff that’s not on the App Store. If you drop it in your applications folder then use this code in terminal [sudo xattr -cr /Applications/vault.app] followed by your password, and it will then open.

• Some of my other places include these.

• A personal, philosophical, and ecological meditation. Consider the snail.

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#TheEnd

Thanks for reading, liking, sharing and of course subscribing. All spelling and grammatical errors are proof of life.

If you feel these posts are too long let me know. I take hours writing and compiling them and could split them up into bite sized chunks. Might take the pressure of this Friday deadline I often miss.

Happy to chat so let me know how you are and i’ll be back at a screen at some point over the weekend. You know where to find me.

Have a great week!

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“Realize that everything connects to everything else.” ― Leonardo Da Vinci

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Connect.

See you out there.

Over…

A ❤️ is a high-five, a comment is a hug. A supporting subscription earns my undying love.