Lighting designer, Louisa Smurthwaite
utilised the award-winning Jands Vista system to provide an elegant lighting
design for hotly tipped Oxford indie rock band, Glass Animals’ recent biggest
UK headline show at London’s iconic Roundhouse venue.
Since releasing their debut album in 2014,
the band have quickly gained a legion of fans all over the world, along with
appearances at premier music festivals such as Glastonbury, Reading &
Leeds, Coachella, and Lollapalooza. Their latest album, How To Be A Human
Being, was released in August to much critical acclaim, and their debut amassed
over 200 million Spotify streams.
For the band’s Roundhouse show and current
international tour, Louisa’s lighting design, along with the set design by Rob
Sinclair, together reflect the lyrical and visual themes of the band’s latest
album – which is about lead singer, Dave Bayley’s interactions with people when
touring their previous album across North America.
Louisa commented, “As far as design
concepts go, Dave and the band wanted to feel like they were playing within the
album cover.”
As such, the band are framed on stage
within large ‘Tetris’ shaped cubes, representing the ‘coloured blocks’ which
frame them on the album cover.
The Tetris cubes spring to life during the
show with some creative uses of Martin Viper Performances.
Louisa is a long-time Vista user, having
programmed and operated the flagship Vista L5 console on international tours
for high-profile artists including
Florence + The Machine and Kylie Minogue,
amongst others.
For the Glass Animals tour, Louisa
purchased her own compact Vista S1 control surface, which is complemented by an
additional two Vista M1 fader wings – all powered from her MacBook Pro.
Louisa commented, “When touring, space is
money. I needed a lighting control solution which was lightweight and portable.
At first I was a little apprehensive about leaving the Vista L5 console behind,
but I have now realised that the S1 / M1 combination offers absolutely no
compromise in terms of creative possibilities or power.”
Louisa was also impressed by Vista
utilising the same simple, powerful and visual software across the whole
hardware family – allowing her the flexibility to seamlessly transition from
the range’s largest L5 console to the smallest S1 / M1 hardware package.
The Roundhouse concert was a special event
in many ways. As well as marking Glass Animals’ largest UK headline show to
date, it was a chance for them to perform in one of the most iconic performance
spaces in the world, and during celebrations commemorating the venue’s 50th
anniversary as an arts centre.
The show lighting rig featured Martin Viper
Performance / Air FX, Martin Aura XBs, Clay Paky Mythos, various generics, and
a huge golden mirror ball.
Summarising her experience with Vista,
Louisa commented, “I am always impressed with Vista’s fixture swapping and
cloning capabilities. Adapting existing programming to incorporate fixture
substitutions or the house rig is a daily occurrence on tours. Having Vista
automatically handle every single attribute for me, and for it to simply work
every single time, is a massive advantage. Vista’s extensive factory library
makes encountering the world’s most obscure fixtures a stress-free scenario.”
Louisa and Glass Animals are touring
Europe, North America and Asia from November through to January. They will
return to the UK in March for another series of shows.
http://www.jandsvista.com
Photo
credits:
Roundhouse photo © Nick Pope
