Marcella Veneziale Arts Editor

It would be easy to dismiss Nick Zinner (guitarist for the internationally known Yeah Yeah Yeahs) and his new photography book, I Hope You Are All Happy Now. With so many musicians crossing over into other professions, the publication seems almost expected. However, Zinner’s photography is impeccable and definitely unpredictable.

Zinner studied photography at Bard College, but instead of pursuing a career in photojournalism as he had intended, he joined the Yeah Yeah Yeahs. The shy guitarist began documenting the band’s life on the road long before the idea for a book was developed. Zinner maintains, however, that the collection is primarily an art book, not just a documentary of life on the road.

To say that the subjects of the photographs vary is an understatement. They range from a favorite of Zinner’s (a dead kangaroo found by the roadside) to images that seem to have come straight out of the glossy pages of magazines he has been published in, including Vice and Rolling Stone. The latter includes shots of the group’s lead songstress, Karen O., as well as an image of Conor Oberst having pints in a bar and wearing a beer company’s t-shirt, which seems almost too orchestrated to have been caught spontaneously.

Several of unmade beds, some in expensive hotels and some in cheap dives, follow depictions of Karen O. surrounded by backstage mirrors and looking washed-out and dazed from a too-bright flash. Another harshly lit photograph shows the back of a blond-haired woman kissing someone backstage, juxtaposed with a nude sculpture with a scarf thrown around its neck.

The crowd photographs are important enough to be featured on the book’s cover, and best summarize the intent of the collection. Zinner is notoriously shy, and turns his searching lens to the masses of people who regularly focus their scrutinizing gazes on him. This role reversal is the crux of the book, and this element of deflecting the critics’ gazes unifies the photographs.

Crossover acts by artists have become a greater focus in recent years, although they have been almost common for some time now. The examples are numerous: Jack White of the White Stripes appears in feature films and Nicky Hilton and Gwen Stefani launch clothing lines, among countless ot hers.

However, the reputation of crossover acts as subpar has strengthened public scrutiny. This collection stands up to even the harshest critic.

The book includes a foreword by director Jim Jarmusch, of Coffee and Cigarettes fame, and Zinner has garnered praise from his high-powered and influential friends. Lee Renaldo of Sonic Youth said, “Nick Zinner has a rock ‘n’ roll eye for the details of life on the road,” and photographer Mick Rock commented, “He has an eye both lean and mean.”

The snarky title has been interpreted by most at first glance as sarcastic, but director Spike Jonze believes that the photographs are intended foremost to be entertaining and pleasurable, “I think Nick genuinely does hope ‘you are all happy now.’ That is the feeling I get from his photos, that he really loves the people he takes pictures of.”

This is only a small amount of the positive chatter surrounding the book’s release, but the critics’ words aren’t hollow, and Zinner has keen photographic ability and the goods to prove it.