Quickly becoming on the of
the hottest stars in country music today, Cole Swindell has recently set out on
the “What the Hell World Tour” with fellow country music superstar Dierks
Bentley. Fresh off his very successful “Down Home Tour”, Swindell and his
production team were looking for a fresh tour design to take on the road in
2017. Once again working with tour provider Elite Multimedia, production
manager James “Mo” Butts began the process of finding the ideal tour design and
in the end, it was the creativity of Sooner Routhier at SRae Productions that
was chosen to highlight the Academy of Country Music award winner.
“When we started outlining
the new tour design we chose four designers that we really felt were doing
great work and asked them to submit design proposals for a completely new
production design,” began Butts. “As an artist, Cole loves video and it’s a
primary request in his designs. He also likes a wooden, industrial look to his
tours, and Sooner really did a great job of applying her own interpretation to
the design requirements for a creative, new tour design.”
“When Mo contacted us and
asked us to submit a proposal for the tour design, we started by asking the
questions about what the artist wants, and what he likes to see on tour,” added
Routhier. “With this being our first time working with Cole, we needed to find
out what style of show he wanted and we then went back through his previous
designs to make sure we were giving him a completely new look within the guidelines
provided.”
Now on board, Routhier and
the design team at SRae Productions got to work to make the design concepts a
reality. Starting with the set design, she drew her inspiration from the
rustic, earthy design materials the artist wanted to see, and then applied her
own unique since of style.
“With the set design, we were
inspired by wooden and metal architectural elements. We wanted to find creative
ways to incorporate those into the staging,” continued Routhier. “Rule number
one in scenic lighting is ‘light the scenic’. We did so with small LED up
lights along the set carts and larger wash lights downstage.”
Continuing the production
design process, Routhier next turned her attention to the lighting design that
would best showcase the artist and his music. Since the production has a
long-standing relationship with Elite Multimedia, Routhier had her first introduction
to the Nashville-based tour provider.
“We are very vendor neutral
and since Elite Multimedia already has a great relationship with the production
team for Cole, we were excited to be working with them for the first time as
well,” explained Routhier. “As we began piecing the lighting elements together,
they sent us an inventory of what they had in stock, and they had everything we
needed to make the design exactly what we wanted it to be.”
Working together, Elite
Multimedia and SRae Productions decided upon a tour lighting package that
included Clay Paky Mythos, Elation Professional ACL 360i, and Martin MAC Aura
Wash luminaires.
Routhier continued, “When
designing, we like to have a minimal amount of types of fixtures, but a good
quantity of those specific fixtures to create bigger and more cohesive look.
Since Cole would be opening for Dierks Bentley, we didn’t have the ability to
put a lot of lights in the air, so we needed to make sure we were using a
fixture that had a lot of capabilities. For this, we chose the Clay Paky Mythos
to operate as both a wash and beam fixture with its gobos and prism
capabilities and they are our only fixture across the top. We then needed a
versatile effect light to place inside the set so we chose the Elation ACL 360i
with its continuous rotation and its ability to create asymmetrical focuses for
beautiful fan effects that shoot through all the wooden elements.”
Now that the lighting and set
design were complete, there was one final design requirement that needed to be
implemented; the LED video. As an artist, Swindell likes to have a significant
video presence on his tours, and working with video designer Andy Reuter that
is exactly what Routhier and Elite Multimedia provided using a PixelFLEX
FLEXCurtain HD 12.5mm LED video wall.
“In the design, Mo also
requested a video surface for content but we wanted to make sure we provided a
new look. We designed a long LED video wall that extends across the entire
set,” said Routhier. “We then contacted Andy Reuter who does a great job
creating original video content. Together, we make the relationship between
video and lighting as cohesive as possible so that there are not a million
crayons on stage.”
“When we started creating the
content, we looked at what Cole has had in the past and what best fits his
musical style,” admitted Reuter. “One of the things that was a bit tricky was
that we would need to design the content to a wide 1920 x 606 aspect ratio, so
we kept the content as one large composition with a lot of mirroring, and then
we also use a lot of IMAG during the show as well. I had never worked with the
PixelFLEX LED technology before and it was really cool to have the curvature in
the screen so that it wasn’t simply a flat wall. It gave the stage a really big
look bringing everything into the center and focused everything on Cole and the
band.”
With the “What the Hell World
Tour” now out on the road, country music fans are once again embracing the
soulful artist who is playing sold-out out crowds across the country. Backed by
his powerful new tour design, the production team is excited to have given the
artist a creative backdrop for his impactful music.
“Our vision is that the
production design is there to support the artist,” added Routhier. “In the end,
we want the audience to be excited about what they heard and saw, but the focus
has to be the artist and the music.”
“This is a sizeable
production and we have about 12 minutes to complete the changeover on the road,
but it works,” explained Butts. “When I started with Cole, it was me, him and
the band and we were in one bus and trailer with very little gear that was
mostly sound equipment and back light. We have now grown to three buses and a
semi-trailer playing some of the largest venues across North America, and it
has been great that Elite Multimedia has been there to support us the whole
way.”
http://www.elitemultimedia.com,
