Leading UK lighting and visuals rental company HSL
supplied an extensive lighting specials package – including 140 new Philips
Nitro LED strobes – for the Prodigy’s show-stopping headline performance on
Friday night at Sonisphere 2014 in Knebworth Park.
Show Designer Andy Hurst has developed the latest
unique and spectacular look for the band who are playing a series of festival
headliners and own shows throughout Europe across the summer, where they are
maintaining their reputation for high production values and epic visual and
sonic experiences.
Prodigy are also one of a handful of artists whose
music and energy can rock the house with equal force at either a heavy metal or
an EDM event!
HSL is also supplying a standard ‘floor specials’
lighting rig for the entire tour which is being used in conjunction with a
festival / venue ‘house’ rig at all gigs and which is built to Hurst’s
specification.
HSL’s Project Manager Mike Oates comments, “We love
working with the Prodigy! They are one of the most innovative artists and put
huge emphasis on ‘the show’, while Andy’s lighting and visual concepts are
always fresh, exciting and energizing.”
Sonisphere presented a great chance for HSL’s new
Nitro strobes to have a good workout as Hurst wanted a monumental effect to
really offset the show, and HSL even bought some more RGB Nitros for the
occasion.
The fundamental Prodigy tour design is based on the
‘aircraft hangar’ look that Hurst created for their high profile New Years’ Eve
show at London’s O2 … which the band loved.
That was originally designed as a one off, so Hurst
produced a tourable and adaptable version of the basic infrastructure – six
upstage / downstage finger trusses, complete with 60 Robe LEDBeam 100s and a
large upstage arch rigged with 32 beam lights – part of 68 on the spec’d rig –
which is sourced and provided locally, and then augmented with their touring
lighting rig.
The touring package features the band’s striking
Harrier jump jet backdrop upstage, plus eight floor-based upstage trussing
towers which are wheeled on – each rigged with two Robe LEDBeam 100s, two Nitro
Color RGB strobes, four ColorBlock db4 MkIIs
and a Patten 2013 on the top. Then there is a ‘small’ arch that frames
Liam’s keyboard hub and eight Robe Pointes rigged on top.
Both parts of the rig concept are fully scalable
and can be shrunk or expanded to fit the available stage space.
“The most important thing to remember about
designing a festival rig is to make it infinitely variable but retain its form
and integrity. To ensure that we can have our show wherever we are playing took
a lot of pre-planning, but that is all paying off when we get to site,”
confirms Hurst.
Sonisphere was the first time that HSL’s Nitro
Strobes had been used for a full-on rock concert.
They were arranged in three flown arrays either
side of stage, taking advantage of their ability to be easily clipped together
– similar to constructing a flown PA. The units were built into drops of 10 and
attached to steel wire rope ladders – configured as 4, 2 and 1 x 10
respectively – the longest on the outside, to mimic the shape of the arch.
Hurst used a total of 56 Nitro RGB versions and the
rest were white. It made massive impact in a classically strobe-tastic show
which also included 28 Atomics dotted around the place. The whole field –
rammed full with an ecstatic audience – was lit up in dramatic giant flashes
and vivid explosions of colour from the Nitros as the band brought the house
down with an intense string of anthems like ‘Firestarter’ and ‘Smack My Bitch
Up’ as well as material from their forthcoming new album.
HSL also supplied additional smoke and haze
machines to boost the already humungous
amount of atmospherics, and other extras for this show included 14 Patten 2013s
– their distinctive retro look is another favourite with the band.
HSL’s top technicians Ian Stevens and Matt Brown
ensured that everything ran like clockwork onstage for the Sonisphere, and
Hurst operated the lighting using his own Road Hog Full Boar console.
His mix included taking the director’s cut of the
IMAG into a Catalyst media server, treating and effecting it there, then
returning the feed to the vision mixer for output to screens … facilitating the
crazy messed-up video aesthetic desired for the show to appear onscreen.
