UK - A.C. Entertainment Technologies (AC-ET) has launched a new website to showcase its portfolio of technologies. Created to deliver a better overall user experience, www.ac-et.com features a cleaner design, improved menu functionality with faster navigation, and is now fully responsive, adapting to the best layout for viewing on mobile, tablet and desktop. The website also reflects AC-ET's position as a one-stop supplier of lighting, rigging, video, audio and related technologies. AC-ET's UK sales and purchasing director, Jonathan Walters comments: "We are delighted to share our new website with you. The team have been working tirelessly to create a high-quality website, which reflects our (AC-ET’s) world-class products and services. We are confident that the smarter, slicker design will enable easier and quicker browsing to ensure you find the right products
USA - When lighting designer Trevor Ahlstrand was in search of a powerful yet compact lighting fixture to form the bulk of the floor package on Kane Brown’s current Live Forever tour, Elation Smarty Hybrid effects grabbed his attention before he ever laid eyes on the light itself. “I was at a demo and it really caught my eye - how wide it filled the room and the crisp gobo projection,” the designer says. “When I looked to see what light was making the effects, I was surprised to see a fixture whose footprint was so small. I knew I needed a small fixture for Kane Brown so decided to take a closer look.” Brown is a breakout success story who came to fame on YouTube several years ago and has seen his popularity grow ever since. Live Forever, which kicked off in Duluth, Georgia on 10 January, is the artist’s first headlining arena tour and his fi
UK - Northern Irish rockers Snow Patrol were back on the road after a seven-year break, reaching out to fans with their new 2018 album Wildness and a sold-out UK arena tour. Adlib was the audio provider, working with engineers, Nigel Pepper mixing FOH and Jamie Hickey on monitors. Robin Scott was the production manager at the helm, with Neil Mather tour manager. Adlib provided crew, with systems specialist Sam Proctor and an L-Acoustics system. Sam was joined by Terry Smith who looked after stage and monitors for Jamie, plus Aaron Greig and Neil Dodd who completed the audio crew. The Snow Patrol tour’s standard system configuration was 14 x K1 speakers a side with four KARA down-fills, together with eight K1 subs flown behind the main hangs to help direct the low end towards the back of arenas. These were supplemented by two side-hangs of 12 x K2 speake
Tajikistan - The recent renovation of the 700-seat Sooroosh Hall in the Tajikistan capital of Dushanbe included a substantial upgrade to the technological infrastructure. This has resulted in the installation of Martin Audio’s Wavefront Precision Compact line array. The work was carried out by the manufacturer’s long-term distribution partners, Latvian-based A-T Trade Music. According to the company’s sound and stage equipment project engineer, Imants Cīrulis, they had been invited to develop an integrated but adaptable solution by their Tajikistan dealer. “Prior to this, the system could only be used for conferences and meetings rather than classical, pop and traditional music concerts and other events which now take place,” he explaines. Of the choice of PA he says: “The client wanted a system that would be useful for this hall as well as for open
UK - Unusual Rigging has worked its own magic on Magic Mike Live! (an in-depth production report is coming soon in a future edition of LSi). When TAIT UK was tasked with a seemingly impossible feat, operations director Alex Hitchcock turned to Unusual. "We were initially approached by Magic Mike Live! with an enquiry for an automation and engineering package at the theatre at the Hippodrome Casino on Leicester Square", explains Hitchcock. "Some overhead rigging and staging, steel work structure, diversions and winches. We were already familiar with the venue having once done another show there. But at that time, installing a single winch was a nightmare - Magic Mike required about 18!" The Hippodrome Casino is not a big venue - certainly not designed with the intention of staging elaborate productions like Magic Mike Live!. "The venue
Grand Cayman - Seven Mile Beach gives visitors plenty of reason to smile. The famous landmark on the western edge of Grand Cayman Island was the site of the Humour Me Comedy Tent at the Kaaboo Cayman Festival. Supporting the likes of Saturday Night Live’s David Spade and Chris Rock Show alum Wanda Sykes was a collection of Chauvet Professional Maverick and Rogue fixtures, deployed by Chris Lisle Lighting Design. “It was important for us to add colour and movement to the comedy stage that was consistent with the exciting looks we had on the two music stages,” explains Erik Parker of Chris Lisle Lighting Design, which was responsible for lighting all stages at the festival as well as its grounds. The Humour Me stage rig featured Maverick MK1 Spot and Rogue R2 Wash fixtures, which were supplied by AI. Flown on a long truss structure that ran over the
France - French restaurant and leisure destination Pirates Paradise has specified a Coda Audio sound system to enhance the venue’s immersive environment. The pirate-themed restaurant, located in Neuville-en-Ferrain near Lille, is a family destination that regularly welcomes more than 500 guests during the weekends; entertainment and audio excellence is key to its success. Owner Jérôme Descamps explains: “My dream was to create the best restaurant I could, offering great decor, furniture, atmosphere and food supported by a fantastic sound system. It was important to me to do everything properly, so I engaged a company that could help spec me the highest quality audio on the market." Pirates Paradise engaged local company Public Address, with general manager, Gregory Devilder and head of technical, Benjamin Pauwels taking up the challenge. They recommended Co
Malta - The X Factor competition made its debut in Malta and quickly broke a long-standing record to become the most viewed programme on Television Malta. Lighting for the series was entrusted to Nexos Lighting & Video who worked together with the rigging and technical team. Lighting designer Anton Borg Olivier joined the team to work on the live broadcast finals, helping to manage the increased TV lighting requirements and deliver that extra kick to the show. Nexos Lighting & Video supplied 22 x Claypaky Mythos 2, 14 x SuperSharpy, 18 x A.leda B-EYE K20 and 16 Claypaky Sharpy for the duration of the series, with an additional eight Alpha Wash included for the final show. “The Claypaky fixtures were the backbone of the lighting rig,” says Olivier. “Claypaky fixtures were chosen for their rich colours, power and reliability.” It was imper
Australia - In celebration of their third studio album, Lo La Ru, five-piece Australian band The Rubens performed for audiences across the country last November and December. The tour saw the band play Brisbane, Sydney, Adelaide, Fremantle and Melbourne as well as eight regional cities across Australia. Lighting designer Tim Beeston of Melbourne-based Flash Bang Productions was “delighted” to have Ayrton’s new Mistral-S spot luminaires on the tour, which were supplied by South West Solutions (SWS) of Yarraville, Victoria. “I designed a ladder system incorporating mirror balls and small spot beams,” explains Beeston. “The Mistral-S with its small, light profile was the ideal fixture for my ladder system. We also compared it against a very well-known profile fixture and, with its flat field, the Mistral-S was definitely the better instrument.”
Australia - The Eurovision – Australia Decides national final recently took place at the Gold Coast Convention and Exhibition Centre. The winner, Kate Miller-Heidke with her song Zero Gravity was chosen by the combination of a public televote (50%) and the votes of a professional jury. Paul Collison, lighting designer for the show, voted for three grandMA3 light, one grandMA3 full-size, one grandMA2 light and five MA NPU (Network Processing Unit) for control, plus MA 3D for visualization of the show. He commented on his choice: “We loved using the new grandMA3 hardware. Even though we’re still on grandMA2 software, the grandMA3 hardware has breathed new life into the well-established grandMA2 platform. The more ergonomic layout of the surfaces made the long days more tolerable, and incredibly accurate touch screens increased workflow efficiency.
The world tour by Belgian tenor Helmut Lotti is one of the first to see the Rivage PM7 go truly global, accompanied by a Nexo audio system. The five-month tour has seen Lotti promoting his latest album Soul Classics In Symphony with shows in Austria, Belgium, Germany, Scandinavia, South Africa and Switzerland. The tour’s audio rental company is Revolution Event Support, whose owner Bart Faut is the tour’s production manager and Front of House engineer. For the tour Bart specified a Yamaha Rivage PM7 monitor console, with a CL5 mixing FoH sound. I/O is taken care of by Rio3224-D2 and Rio1608-D2 racks. The Nexo PA is a mixture of flown and ground-stacked Geo S12 and Geo M6 with LS18 and RS18 subs, powered and managed by NXAMP4X4s and NXAMP4X1s. Lotti is backed by the Golden Symphonic Orchestra - a 22-piece band, including string and brass/woodwind sections, pia
UK - The 1975 toured in support of the release of their third album A Brief Inquiry into Online Relationships, which is their third consecutive number one album. Lighting and visual designer Tobias Rylander enjoys a productive ongoing dialogue with the band - in particular lead vocalist and creative director Matthew ‘Matty’ Healy, whose thoughts and ideas are at the essence of every live show’s design. This tour featured four dramatic moving elements – three large portrait shaped video cubes and a ‘blade’ piece derived from their logo – all of which were automated using a Kinesys system supplied by Christie Lites UK. Tobias has worked with the band since 2013 and their first album release. At the time he was working with visual and lighting artist LeRoy Bennett at Seven Design Works in LA, and the band approached the team after liking Roy’
New Zealand - Packed houses greeted UB40 on their 40th anniversary summer tour of the Southern Hemisphere in January and February. The band was doing so well and having so much fun on the tour that they added a final show on 8 February at the Central Energy Trust Arena Stadium in Palmerston North, New Zealand. Sourcing local suppliers, the band’s management contacted Sight & Sound Services, which provided them with a collection of Chauvet Professional Maverick, Rogue and STRIKE fixtures, supplied by MDR Lighting. It was a choice that met with the enthusiastic approval of UB40’s LD Brock Coddington. “I was extremely impressed by the entire rig,” said Coddington. “It went really, really well. The Mavericks provided excellent punch, and the colours were fantastic. The Rogues were a great fit on that stage. The STRIKE 4s were great LED blinders. All and all
UK - Absolute Motion Control has returned to The Bridge Theatre for the fourth time to provide the automation for Alys Always. The show started previews on 25 February, and has its press night on 5 March 2019. The show is designed by Bob Crowley, whose set incorporates a large stage lift, a sliding floor palette and a cloth roller. As The Bridge doesn’t have a fly tower, any full height cloths need to run on a roller. In this production a roller is used as a ‘blinder’ to hide scene changes inside a large gauze box. For the floor palette, Absolute has rented the production a zero-fleet winch. The compact zero-fleet design allows the winch to be used in a variety of situations. All Scene All Props, the production’s scenery contractor, built two custom decks that incorporated the pulleys required. These custom sections were then simply dropped into place, r
UK - Ministry of Sound’s [MoS] orchestral tour, The Annual Classical, reimagines the Sony Music compilation, The Annual, the top-selling dance compilation, as a live production. The live shows, mixed on a DiGiCo SD7 supplied by RG Jones, deliver mega sounds as much-loved chart toppers receive a classical reworking. Amongst the hits are The Chemical Brothers’ Hey Boy Hey Girl; Insomniaby Faithless and Moloko’s Sing It Back. At the helm of the complex live mix is sound designer, Phil Wright. “In the last couple of years, we’ve seen all kinds of classical dance music shows take to the stage, but the design brief from MoS was to make this a genuinely live performance, meaning no playback,” says Phil. With the brief in place, a collaboration between Coalition Agency and Raymond Gubby Ltd, which runs the 55-piece London
India - Technosales Multimedia Technologies recently deployed JBL Professional by Harman cinema surround systems in two theatres at the Sai Teerth devotional theme park in Mumbai to provide a more immersive spiritual experience for devotees. Sai Teerth is India’s first devotional theme park, featuring immersive exhibits dedicated to one of the most worshipped secular saints of all time; Sai Baba. With four major audio-visual attractions, Sai Teerth is home to one of the largest cinema screens in the country, as well as an innovative 5D theatre. After surveying the location, Technosales designed a custom cinema surround sound system that utilizes JBL Professional loudspeakers and Crown amplifiers. “Sai Teerth asked us to provide a world-class audio system to make their exhibits more engaging and immersive,” says Rajesh Patil of Technosales Multimedia Techn
USA - FedExForum, one of the nation’s premier arenas in the NBA and North America, recently updated its arena lighting with a lighting package designed and installed by Bandit Lites. Home to the NBA’s Memphis Grizzlies and the University of Memphis Tigers men’s basketball team, the installation comes as part of the arena’s recent updates. Bandit Lites installed a package comprised of HES Solaframe 3000, Chauvet Rogue 3 Spots, Claypaky AXCOR 300 Beams and Chauvet Ovation E-260WW w/ 10° Barrels. “As FedExForum was one of the earliest projects that I and Roth Edwards personally installed, I was thrilled to once again be a part of the team trusted to update their system,” says Bandit Lites director of sales and installation Chris Barbee. “Both John Cameron Carter and Roth did a phenomenal job reimagining the lighting system.” Bandit’s team mount
Belgium - Woven in and out of English, German, French and Dutch language fables since the early medieval period, the anthropomorphic trickster Reynaert the Fox has succeeded in eluding capture for centuries. Keeping the legend of the fox alive was Expedition Reynaert, an immersive bike tour in Belgium that culminated in a captivating museum experience, complete with an informative exhibition and engaging performances. Central to bringing the legend of Reynaert to life was local design studio CREATE.eu, which specified 24 Chauvet Professional Ovation E-260WW, 8 STRIKE 1 and 12 Maverick MK2 Wash fixtures as part of their comprehensive visual concept. CREATE.eu relied on lighting to reflect the varied environments that participants experience during their visit to the museum. At the same time, the studio’s designers also made sure to provide theatrical lighting support
UK - White Light recently provided the lighting equipment for Gently Down the Stream which has opened at London’s Park Theatre. Set at the turn of the 21st century, Gently Down the Stream is a delicate examination of the relationship between Beau; a 62 year-old piano accompanist from New Orleans, and Rufus; a 28 year old bi-polar lawyer, set over the course of 13 years in Beau’s London flat. It is written by Martin Sherman, directed by Sean Mathias and features a lighting design by Jamie Platt. He comments: “The majority of the show is set in Beau’s apartment which is beautifully designed by Lee Newby. We wanted this to feel as real as possible so, as a result, most of the lighting for these scenes was committed to creating a totally naturalistic world. That said, Sean was very keen to make the monologues that are dotted throughout the play feel i
USA - Professional Wireless Systems (PWS) handled all wireless microphone and IEM systems management for pre-game, half-time entertainment and post-game, along with the wireless microphone utilised by the referee, during Super Bowl LIII held in the Mercedes-Benz stadium in Atlanta. This is the 22nd year that ATK Audiotek has tapped PWS to provide wireless support for the Super Bowl. “It is pretty amazing to think about all of the changes that have occurred in wireless technology over the course of 22 years,” explains Jim Van Winkle, general manager, PWS. “This year was no different in that we implemented a number of new systems that helped us handle the exceedingly crowded RF environment in Atlanta - where the TV repack hasn’t even happened yet.” As in previous years, PWS started planning back in October, with a site visit to Mercedes-Benz stadium. Van
USA - Late January typically doesn’t bring the kind of weather associated with music festivals to central Massachusetts, but the bitter New England winter wind notwithstanding, the mood at the multi-stage Birds of a Feather Festival was as care-free as a summer beach party. Thousands of fans crammed inside the 90-year-old Worcester Palladium for four straight hours of jam and alt rock sounds on Friday, 25 January, and although summer vibes resonated throughout the building, the reality was that being indoors, Birds of a Feather offered no visual variety beyond the stage. With no mountain views, no surfside background, and no tall trees flanking the stage, eyes seldom wandered from the performance area. For Vin Pugliese, lighting designer for the Main Stage, which featured The Lizards, Jazz is Phish, lespecial and Pink Talking Fish, this meant focusing on creating vi
Spain - When one of the world’s largest night clubs puts on a special season-end event, its magnitude is difficult to ignore. Open since 1993 on the Spanish island of Ibiza, this mammoth club can host up to 10,000 guests at one time. On the season’s finale evening, Privilege Ibiza made the decision to employ the Clair Brothers C12 loudspeaker system, along with an assortment of more Clair Brothers gear, to cover the entire venue. The size of the venue allows management to redesign facilities for individual parties and artistic shows. For this event, they didn’t hold back, calling on Clair Brothers’ Spanish distribution and rental partner, VTècnics, to recommend and design a sound system worthy of this special occasion. Josep Maria Serra, production manager at VTècnics reports: “The Clair Brothers team understands the concept and value of global sharing bet
UK - Indie rockers The Vaccines are back on the road in the UK, continuing their world Combat Sports album tour with lighting designed by Dan Williams and equipment supplied by Colour Sound Experiment. The Combat Sports album cycle started in April 2018 and having already played extensively around the UK last year, Dan and the band wanted to treat fans to a new visual experience and ensure that the Vaccines - known for their enthusiastic and ebullient live shows - saw something different. Last year’s UK tour design was inspired by the album track Nightclub, yielding lots of mirror balls and a tungsteny disco vibe. For the festival section of the tour, Williams had a gold sequined drape made up with a large logo across the middle, and this evolved into the lighting look for this leg, which bridges front the nightclub into the fight club, mat
UK - Pointing a microphone directly at a PA speaker is likely to generate feedback, but sometimes when you are trying to achieve a particular vision, you have to tear up the rule book and see what happens. This was the situation FOH engineer Simon Honywill found himself in when he was asked to tackle sound design for a new live music and dance production called The Nature of Why. Using a combination of DPA microphones and EM Acoustics loudspeakers positioned in a circle around the stage, Honywill pulled off the task of creating an ambient acoustic ‘bubble’ for this unusual performance in which the audience is as much a part of the show as the musicians and dancers. “I needed to make sure all the microphones I was using were as predictable as possible,” he explains. “DPA was the obvious choice - not just because they are always my first choice but beca
