TOTAL PRODUCTION INTERNATIONAL
TOTAL PRODUCTION INTERNATIONAL
WWW.TPiMAGAZINE.COM APRIL 2014
ISSUE 176
LIVE EVENT DESIGN & TECHNOLOGY • APRIL 2014 • ISSUE 176
AVICII
THE LIVE MASTERING OF SWEDEN’S GLOBAL DJ
HEY BROTHER...
IMAGINE DRAGONS • IN THE SPOTLIGHT: HARMAN’S SOUNDCRAFT • BASTILLE • PROLIGHT+SOUND REPORT DRAKE • LIVE SOUND CONSOLES MARKET FOCUS • X FACTOR LIVE • IPM 2014: THE CONCLUSION
PRODUCTION PROFILE: Bastille
THE RHYTHM OF THE NIGHT: BASTILLE’S FRESH AND SCALABLE WORLD TOUR FOLLOWING THE RELEASE OF THEIR RADIO-FRIENDLY SINGLE POMPEII, BASTILLE’S HIT ALBUM BAD BLOOD LED TO A BRIT AWARD WIN FOR BEST BREAKTHROUGH ACT AND THE BAND’S METEORIC RISE TO STARDOM IS SEEMINGLY UNSTOPPABLE. PLUS, IF THE RECENT GIG IN FRONT OF 8,000 ENTHUSIASTIC FANS AT LONDON’S ALEXANDRA PALACE IS ANYTHING TO GO BY, IT DOESN’T LOOK SET TO SLOW DOWN ANY TIME SOON. SARAH RUSHTON-READ SAW THE FRESHLY DESIGNED AND IMAGINATIVELY LIT GEOMETRIC SET IN ALL ITS GLORY. In terms of production and design the tour is masterminded by some of the top professionals in the business. With an impressive, yet scalable show design by Mirrad Ltd, a company established relatively recently by industry respected designers Jamie Thompson, Bryan Leitch and Dave Cohen; video content has been created by Paul ‘Pablo’ Beckett of Bryte Design and the tour is managed by Dick Meredith, ably assisted by Stage Manager, Adam ‘Ace’ Carr. FOH engineer is Paul Cooper and on Monitors Ben Kingman. Lighting and rigging is supplied by PRG, video by PRG Nocturne and sound by Tour Tech, thus ensuring that a 36
top quality production is enabled in the live shows. The schedule is packed tight and comprises an eclectic array of venues that range in capacity from 1,500 to over 5,000. This means the set has to work on a number of levels and at a variety of scales, changing on an almost a venue-to-venue basis. Meredith explained: “Jamie has created a set that’s modular and supremely scalable. We can get the bulk of it into most places but compromises do have to be made. Right now the band are playing venues ranging from 1,500 - 8,000 capacity. However come autumn, it’ll be Ally Pally-sized venues across
the US plus two nights at Radio City in Hollywood - there’s even talk about doing a show in Madison Square Gardens in NYC, it’s crazy!” SHOW DESIGN & CONCEPT Mirrad’s design is built around the triangle in the Bastille logo, and carries the show beautifully. The stage explodes in layers of geometric perspectives with the result that it looks bigger than its dimensions and infinitely more dramatic. The geometric shape also delivers clean, simple architecture that Thompson can skilfully morph and sculpt with light and cleverly mapped video. The whole show is then bought to vibrant three-
PRODUCTION PROFILE: Bastille
Opposite: The triangular set construction was built by Metalman and the geometric backdrop consisted of J&C Joel’s grey Joelastic (JOS004) measuring 9.4 metres wide by 8.3 metres, on to which projections were mapped. Below: Although most of the lighting kit is supplied by PRG, consoles and media servers were provided by Mirrad. The Sapphire Touch console is backed up by an Avolites Tiger Touch Pro and both link through to the brand new Avolites TMP nodes, which process the DMX; Bastille used Sennheiser 945 and 965 wireless microphones for their tour.
dimensional life by a precision-programmed light show operated by Thompson on his own Avolites Sapphire Touch desk. Given the restricted budget the lighting design has been cleverly conceived. It’s packed with some stunning on-stage drama, audience blinders and washes plus a plethora of aerial effects. The rig is modest in size, but the combination of fixture choice and their positioning offers up an adaptable palette. Thompson pulls the look right down for the softer songs using the washes and effects to set the atmosphere. This offers magnificent contrast to the bigger anthems which see some whopping classic rock looks replete with
dynamic blinder moments that invoke 80s glam rock but on a larger, brighter and much more colourful scale. “In the air we’re using PRG Best Boy spot luminaires alongside Philips Vari-Lite VL3500 Washes,” explained Thompson. “The triangle and the mid-stage set strips are lined with the new GLP impression X4 LED fixtures, which we use to create a lot of internal effects. And then of course we’ve got everyone’s favourite - the Clay Paky Sharpy wash.” Twenty Sharpys are laid out in banks on the floor. Sun strips and 2-Lite molephays complement these, while GLP impression 120’s are rigged at the side for key light. “We
wanted to use the Sharpys to give an epic, stage defining look. We also had to consider the impact of having 20 fixtures on the stage so the size-to-output ratio made them the ideal choice. We used the hard edges of the beam to evoke amazing geometric shapes as well as strong saturated soft beams. We’re big fans of the Sharpy Congo blue as this is one of the few lights that delivers the intense Congo effect we want,” he added. PRG’s Scottie Sanderson worked closely with Mirrad - specifically Jamie Thompson and Bryan Leitch on lighting and rigging while PRG Nocturne’s Mark O’Herlihy assisted with projection. “It actually makes it much easier
37
PRODUCTION PROFILE: Bastille
Below: Production Manager, Dick Meredith; Scottie Sanderson, Mark O’Herlihy and Rich Rowley.
to combine rigging and lighting as we can then generate an overall rigging plot,” said Sanderson. “Working closely together allows us to streamline the project. Even something as simple as incorporating cables into the same looms heading to the same locations can save double handling on the day.” And for Sanderson the project was involved from early on: “The design had to be realised within very specific parameters, and there was a lot to take into account - lighting, media servers, projection and rigging. There is also a broad range of venues. Thankfully the lighting crew is experienced and they will get in as much as each building allows!” Although most of the kit is supplied by PRG, consoles and media servers are provided by Mirrad. The Sapphire Touch console is backed up by an Avolites Tiger Touch Pro and both link through to the brand new Avolites TMP nodes, which process the DMX, making it a fluid system with full redundancy - ideal for Thompson’s multi media design. “I’ve always described the Sapphire Touch as a designer’s desk rather than an operator or a programmer’s desk,” said Thompson. “The interface is the best looking on the market. It’s intuitive and quick to use. It just looks really clean - you’re not scanning the screens constantly for fixtures and features - everything’s in front of you. We’ve always had an excellent relationship with the team at Avolites and I think - above and beyond what they do with the consoles - their customer support is second to none. Over the years the Avolites team has been more than accommodating and they’re always available if we need them. Basically Avolites makes us feel like we’re their top priority every time we go on the road.” VIDEO / PROJECTION Working in perfect harmony with the set, lighting and live camera feeds is the evocative and moody monochrome video content, designed by Paul ‘Pablo’ Beckett. He commented: “The initial creative concept was driven by Bastille’s extremely cinematic approach to their promo videos – [frontman] 38
Dan Smith has always had a very keen idea of what he likes visually,” explained Beckett. “Secondly the concept was driven by Jamie’s design - the layout of the screens was a great opportunity to play with the repeating geometry of the triangle. Much of the content designed for the triangle has a repeating motif to it, which for example in the song The Draw sets up these lovely patterns that play and interact with each other.” One of the biggest hurdles for Beckett was the introduction of live cameras (a first for a Bastille tour) and how they would interact with the band. “The challenge was really in two parts, the first part was a pragmatic one, namely, framing camera shots onto a triangle - if you imagine a person standing in a triangle there isn’t much room for their head. This can quickly lead to shots being unusable,” continued Beckett. “The second challenge was creating a camera style for the band. The idea was that
track, into two Rosendahl Mif 4’s (again one for each server). The Camera’s were mixed on a small PPU system and then captured into the media servers on their internal capture cards. “The show design was scalable which meant that at every stage we had to try and recreate the same look with potentially half the available projection surface and in others completely different projection surfaces! AI made this very easy to achieve, using it’s Projection Mapping Editor. The content was designed around UV maps and Multiple surfaces for each projector. “One of the main problems was with the distance from projectors to screen. Nothing was ever quite in the same place in each venue. However, the combination of this system and a great projectionist in Simon Sheridan made it easy to re-map the model onto the physical set. This meant we could load in, line up the system, and have a fully working camera system before Lunch! Not bad for a team of two!”
“We’re using Sennheiser 945 and 965 wireless microphones and the result has been excellent...”
the camera shots were to be treated more as content which integrates into the whole look rather than just putting someone on a screen as this can end up looking detached from the rest of the visual style. Dave Singleton, who headed up the touring video department really rose to the challenge and worked closely with Jamie, programming the Avolties Ai Media Server, on a day-to-day basis in the run up to the tour.” Singleton said of the Ai Media Servers: “The system was based around two Avolites Media Infinity servers, one Main, one Backup, with complete redundancy at every point. The servers outputs ran into a DVI matrix, so in the event of having to swap machines, we could achieve this seamlessly mid show. All the content for the show was triggered via Timecode. We took Main and Backup lines from the bands click
In terms of the physical look of the show, Singleton had multiple discussions with Pablo and the rest of the team about how the whole show should look and feel. He continued: “Working with such a creative team meant that we could really put the Ai through it’s paces. I had multiple camera and other effects layered throughout the show triggered by myself from an Akai APC40 Midi Controller. To keep the balance between camera and content I ended up operating the show as a Live VJ show situation. Great fun! The ability to use Ai’s onboard effects engine meant we could manipulate the camera shots and do some fun things with them. At two points during the show we actually take a crowd shot and map the shot across all the surfaces, in perspective of where they would be located in the frame.
PRODUCTION PROFILE: Bastille
Below: The stage explodes in layers of geometric perspectives with the result that it looks bigger than its dimensions and infinitely more dramatic.
It looked really great, especially on the bigger shows!” The Avolites Ai Media Server drives the video, which is then mapped onto the set and delivered through projection. This initially presented Mark O’Herlihy, LED Engineer and Supervisor for PRG Nocturne and Video Tech Simon Schofield with a few head scratching moments: “The highest triangle of the set is almost nine metres high,” pointed out O’Herlihy. “We had to hire in special lenses to achieve the throw that we required. In the end we hired two 0.73 wide angle fish-eye lenses at FOH to achieve a wide enough spread while ensuring the output was bright enough.” PRG Nocturne has supplied the bulk of the video equipment, O’Herlihy elaborated: “At the moment we’re supplying five Barco R22+ projectors, two positioned on platforms at FOH and two on the FOH truss. We’re also using two Panasonic HD AW-HE 120 Robo Cameras and four Panasonic HD AG-HCK 10GPJ POV Cameras plus one Wireless Go Pro system. It’s a pretty small, yet effective package.” SOUND Bastille has developed musically over the last year and although it’s mostly rock-heavy there’s a little bit of pop and quite a lot of synth sound in the background. For FOH Engineer Paul Cooper the PA had to be L-Acoustics, V-Dosc 40
and dV-Dosc, more recently Kara. The console of choice is a 96-channel Avid Venue Profile to cope with the fast expanding channel list for this latest tour, plus the Waves Audio plugins. “I’ve used the Avid Profile for years now,” said Cooper. “So much so that it is almost an extension of me! The Waves integration is fantastic; you can just use it natively without it having to carry anything extra. With a lot of the other desks you need a rack of equipment alongside, so it’s effectively like carrying an outboard. The user interface is fast and intuitive to access and I can quickly get to my most commonly used features and controls. There is a simple tabbed interface and streamlined pages so I can also manage all inputs, outputs, files, snapshots, patchbay settings, plug-in settings fast, which leaves me more time to focus on the mix.” Nevertheless, in this case Cooper says for him the mix is pretty straightforward: “Bastille are a relatively quiet band onstage. Other than the drum kit and some strings, there’s not a lot of noise. We have electronic keyboards and the bass guitarist doesn’t have his amp too loud. It’s not like I’m doing a heavy rock band where there’s a lot of ambient noise to fight with. This means we invariably get a good, clean result. I tend to ride each song, learn the movements of each rather than scene them up specifically. As the set changes with the size of the venue, I
have a general scene for each song to give me a starting point. I will already know that some cues will need pushing around depending on which part of the song it is and what kind of venue we’re in,” he stated. Indeed with a variety of different size venues to accommodate, Tour Tech vendor has supplied a dual PA system. Chris Speirs, Technical and Systems Manager for Tour Tech, explained: “Firstly, for the arena’s main PA we’ve supplied an L Acoustic V-Dosc system. This comprises 24 V-Dosc along with 16 SB28’s. In addition we’re supplying 36 dV-Dosc, which flip between acting as side hangs for the arena shows and, on the smaller shows, the main PA. There are also a number of Arcs, which supplement the PA and are being used as various fill applications.” In Monitor world Ben Kingman uses a Midas PRO2 desk. This comes with two Drawmer DL241 duel-channel processors, giving the PRO2 the necessary input / output required for all the various IEM requirements for Bastille and the support acts. “I chose this mainly for the clarity of sound and the ability to set scenes as each song is very different,” explained Kingman. Like Cooper, Kingman is modest about his role and says that his set up is also pretty clearcut. “For me the key challenge is keeping strings players away from the drummer! Seriously, that’s it, really. The band members are all very dynamic singers. If there was anything else I
PRODUCTION PROFILE: Bastille
Below: Sound supplied by Tour Tech delivered an audio rider of L-Acoustics, Avid, Midas and Sennheiser products.
guess it would be that there are a lot of last minute changes at the moment and it seems that at every given opportunity something else is added to the set, so my job is constantly evolving.” The whole band uses wireless in-ears, in this case Sennheiser G3’s. “Half the band are on JH16’s Mould Wires from JH Audio and half are on Shure 535’s. “The decision on which microphones to use was entirely personal to each band member. We’re also using Sennheiser 945 and 965 wireless microphones and the result has been excellent.” “The Line System is Tourtech’s compact 64 way system, which allows all of Bastilles’ stage system to be contained within a single standard truck,” adds Tour Tech’s Speirs. “Truck space was an important issue on this tour and with this in mind we managed to fit the full system into 38ft of truck space, which left enough room for backline and merchandising to share the rest of the space.” SET FABRICATION Metalman were contacted by the good folks at Mirrad to look at the best way to scenically transform the production’s trusses, and in 42
particular the huge triangular truss (which measured in at over 30ft high) into the band’s triangular logo. Said Metalman’s Sam Booker: “Rather than do a solid scenically treated fascia we decided to go for a series of custom frames which attached to the truss and then use a printed fabric scrim to add the visual element. This offered a number of advantages in that it would be easier to travel without damaging the artwork, it could be done without seams and finally it could be ‘shrunk’ for use in venues where the triangle needed to be just that little bit smaller.” As often happens in the world of touring live production, seemingly simple jobs have hidden hurdles to overcome, as Booker explained: “Not only were the frames needing to be spaced away from the truss in order to allow for fitting a series of lights, but also the sheer size of the complete triangle meant that it even in Metalman’s pretty spacious workshop we were struggling to get the whole thing together in one go to test it before rehearsals. However, once we’d created the artwork for the scrims with just the right level of contrast to
PRODUCTION PROFILE: Bastille
Below: Avolites’ Selvin Cooper, Simon Schofield and Jamie Thompson; FOH Engineer, Paul Cooper; Monitor Engineer, Ben Kingman; Bryan Leitch and Will Dart of Mirrad.
ensure that it would look great when lit but also take projection, the whole project really came together and looked as clean and simple as it had in the initial renders!” The fabric elements of the set job were mastered by J&C Joel which manufactured a black IFR Polyester Trevira (PT021) curtain measuring 15.2 metres wide with a 9.1 metre drop for the set design. As the final chorus of Bad Blood dropped, so did the Polyester Trevira curtain revealing the biggest triangle logo the band have had to date. The triangular backdrop was manufactured from J&C Joel’s grey Joelastic (JOS004) measuring 9.4 metres wide by 8.3 metres drop and was finished with large eyelets all round, which allowed the drape to be bungeed into position. The triangular backdrop was used for image mapping various videos and visuals throughout the show to really capture the feel of the design during each song played in the set. CATERING Popcorn’s Simon Raynor was the man on the road for Bastille’s European catering requests. “I did surprise a lady on the butchery counter in Berlin, Germany when requesting all the fillet steak she had…” said Raynor, of the band’s dietary preferences. Having worked with the band for the first time, he described them as “a truly lovely bunch of guys.” According to Raynor, the band were certainly appreciative of tour catering. “Dick the Tour / Production 44
Manager was ace too!” he smiled. “When it comes to food, continental Europe can throw you a curve ball, but we found it easy to cater for the band’s and crew’s needs. “The Bastille band members were always happy to go with our menu choices, but we always made sure the food was swiftly adaptable for a ‘drop the potato, and give us extra veg’ request! Some evenings, a simple steak and steamed veg was all that was required. TRANSPORT MM Band Services provided tour buses and Fly By Nite provided trucking. Three trucks were used for the UK and European legs of the tour, taking in 18 shows resulting in a 31-day road journey. Said Operations Manger, Paul Walker: “Providing drivers that enjoy working in a production environment on a daily basis is very important to Fly By Nite. We look to supply the same drivers that have worked on certain tours before in order to maintain continuity. This is an important part of pre-tour planning as having the right mix of drivers is key for the smooth running of the whole tour.” FINE TUNING With just two production days in Manchester, UK, the production team didn’t get much time to fine-tune before they were on the road. “We didn’t have the luxury of a pre-production period and the first few gigs were in shoeboxes: Newcastle O2 Academy and the Corn Exchange
in Edinburgh,” said Meredith. “This meant we didn’t really get to stretch our creative legs until we got to Manchester, and even then only two thirds of the kit came out the truck! I think Alexandra Palace as a venue is the first time we’ve managed to get everything loaded in and to be able to give the show a run for its money. So far I’m happy with the way it’s going and I’m looking forward to getting into Europe and doing the bigger venues.” For a band that is only really on it’s first record and started touring just three years ago, Bastille’s trajectory to the top has been impressive, and by all accounts touring with this band is hugely rewarding. As Meredith summed up: “I don’t think I’ve been involved with an artist that has gathered such momentous success - especially in America - for a long time. Let’s face it, everybody wants to be touring when there’s a buzz of triumph around and everyone’s happy, it’s addictive. I have to say working with Bastille, and this team in particular, at this moment in time, must be one of the best jobs in the music business today.” TPi Photos: Sarah Rushton-Reed www.bastillebastille.com www.prg.com www.tourtech.co.uk www.jcjoel.com www.hangman.co.uk www.flybynite.co.uk www.mmbandservices.co.uk www.popcorncatering.com