Akashic Books, 132 pages, trade paperback, $22.95

Pat Graham’s Silent Pictures is an exhilarating collection of both black & white and color music photography that captures musicians in their element, both onstage and off. Having toured with musicians for the large part of 20 years, the fact that Graham seemed to be in the right place at the right time for these events is no coincidence: the man lived for the show, and always was up front and center with a camera stuck to his face. Behind the scenes, his many connections and forged friendships allowed him access to the practice spaces, studios, and hangouts of his cohorts. As Ian MacKaye states in the book’s forward, “There are photos of other people’s experiences taken in a way that makes me feel as though I was there.”

They’re all here: emotive, action-packed live shots of Fugazi, Sleater-Kinney, Bikini Kill, Jesus Lizard, Elliot Smith…Chris Thompson of Circus Lupus leaning on a walker, Dan Higgs of Lungfish doing weird stuff to his bearded face. Ted Leo in a recording session; Isaac Brock of Modest Mouse lighting firecrackers. Chances are, you’ll flip through this book and recognize a lot of the photos (I know I did), but you’ll also get a kick out of (re)discovering lesser-known bands you might not have thought about in recent times (The Delta 72, 764-HERO, Slant 6).

Graham’s name will be recorded in a canon of photographers that includes Cynthia Connolly (who wrote the book’s afterword), Glen E. Friedman, and Jim Saah, and like them, the collection is quite heavy with DC-centric bands. This is great for fans of the region’s musical output, and detracts not in the slightest from the coverage of bands from other areas.

The one complaint I have is, unlike Friedman’s Fuck You series of music photography collections, the subjects and dates are not listed on each page. For more than 200 sparsely-numbered pages, you see nothing but photos. No names, no dates. You have to go to the photo index at the end of the book to figure out who you’re looking at. Sure, many of the subjects and a few of the time-periods are obvious, but I’m a stickler for proper cataloguing for the sake of posterity (and for my own ease of browsing without having to turn to the back with every flip of the page!) and this format doesn’t cut it. Obviously, this flaw detracts nothing from the photos themselves. The collection itself is an event and a worthy addition to the library of any music fan.