What a punk icon taught me about staying soft while evolving hard

You know that feeling when someone says something that cuts right through all the noise and lands in your chest like a fucking truth bomb?

That happened to me watching this long-ass interview with Davey Havok from AFI. And no, this isn't some random tangent about my music taste. This shit is directly connected to how we create, how we stay honest, and how we keep making work that actually matters when everything around us feels like performance.

AFI shaped Hafenliebe more than most people realize. That whole rebrand back in 2018? Pure Sing the Sorrow energy—the mood, the visuals, that raw emotional depth that doesn't apologize for feeling everything at once.

Davey being vegan and straight edge isn't what got me—though I've walked that path too, been drug-free for years now after my own winding journey with what discipline means. It's his vulnerability that hit. His willingness to reinvent himself over and over without losing the core of who he is. The way he finds beauty in dark places without drowning in them.

Here's the thing about artists who've been creating for decades—they make you question everything about your own path. And right now? I'm questioning a lot.

What stuck (and why it matters for your work)

Create to surprise yourself first

"I don’t make things to surprise other people. I make them to surprise myself."

Fuck. When did we stop doing this?

It's so easy to create for the scroll, for the engagement, for the algorithm that tells us what "works." But when was the last time you made something that stopped YOU cold? When did you last surprise yourself in a shoot? In your editing? In what you chose NOT to share?

Because that's where the real work lives. Not in the content that performs—in the stuff that makes you go, "Holy shit, I made this."

Set intentional limitations

Davey talked about narrowing their tools deliberately—stripping everything down to find focus.

One camera. One lens. One location. One emotion.

Not because you can't afford more options, but because sometimes freedom is too fucking loud. Limitations give your work a heartbeat. A spine. A reason to exist beyond just showing variety.

I shoot 90% of my work on a 35mm lens. Not because I can't afford more glass—because that constraint forces me to move, to think, to find the story instead of just switching focal lengths. It makes every frame intentional.

Mood as structure

This one broke my brain a little. AFI built their latest album around a single emotional tone. One mood threading through everything.

What if we stopped jumping between aesthetics and trends and client expectations? What if we gave ourselves permission to stay in one feeling for an entire series?

Choose grief. Or nostalgia. Or raw joy. Let that shape your light, your shadows, your timing, your edits. That's discipline most photographers never even attempt.

I shot a lovers session during a workshop I taught this year with grief as the entire foundation. Not just sadness—but that deep, complex emotion that holds loss and love at the same time. Every frame carried that weight. The light was softer. The silences longer. The way they held each other more desperate. It wasn't a "sad" series—it was honest about what love looks like when you know how fragile it is.

Talk about the feeling before you shoot

We plan everything—locations, outfits, timelines. But emotion? We wing it.

What if, before you even touched your camera, you asked: "What do we want this to feel like?" Not vibes. Not Pinterest mood boards. Real, honest human emotions.

That question could change everything about how you approach a session.

Let people perform (the real kind)

Davey talked about bringing more theater into his voice because the songs demanded it.

How often do we photograph people who don't know they're allowed to perform? Not fake performance—real ownership of their space. Letting themselves become bigger, more themselves than they are in everyday life.

I shot a session in Berlin recently—one partner is non-binary, had chest surgery a few months before. We were shooting their first shirtless photos together in bed. The transformation when they realized this was their moment to own their body, their story, their power? Fucking magic. That's what happens when people feel safe to step fully into who they are.

Our job isn't just to capture. It's to make that expansion feel safe.

Reference everything (especially the weird shit)

Baudelaire, Lynch, Looney Tunes, The Cure, AC/DC—Davey pulls from everywhere. It sounds chaotic, but it makes perfect sense when filtered through his vision.

We sanitize our influences to fit in. We hide the weird ones. But the power is in letting it all bleed together. The music that shaped you. The films that gutted you at 16. The hardcore values. The beauty in darkness.

Stop hiding what made you who you are.

Art as spirituality

"I don’t believe in a higher power. I believe in art. It’s the only thing that’s never failed to move me."

And yeah. Same.

Same.

Protect what's left of real community

"Artist communities used to mean something. Now they’re rare. But we still need them."

He got emotional talking about how real creative communities have crumbled. How rare it feels to create and feel together anymore.

That hit me. Because it reminded me why spaces like this matter. Why we need to protect the few places left where honesty still counts.

Look, if you're feeling caught between two versions of yourself right now—same. If you're scared to walk away from what's working but not feeding you—me too. If "success" feels like a word that's lost all meaning—I get it.

Someone on Reddit said AFI "sacrifices themselves for us to feel something." Davey's response hit me: it's not sacrifice if you don't want what you're giving up. Maybe that's the real question—what are we actually willing to let go of to create work that matters?

But we're still here. Still making. Still feeling. Still figuring it out.

And sometimes that's enough.

Hugs,
Bjørn

For the hearts still beating—keep creating, keep pushing, keep giving a damn.