Three hi-energy sold out shows at San
Francisco’s Bill Graham Civic Auditorium launched the new Martin Garrix live
show which will tour around the world for the rest of the year as the young
Dutch superstar DJ and music producer continues to wow crowds with his
incredible musical skills and good looks!
Equally hot in appearance is the
lighting and visuals show created by production designer Gabe Fraboni which
features 138 Robe moving lights – 90 x Spikies, 20 x Pointes and 28 x BMFL Spots.
The main goal of this design is to
take Martin Garrix out of a purely DJ context and take a more rock / pop
approach.
Fans at this year’s Coachella
festival received a sneak preview of what was to come with the plus-shaped
video screen and surrounding grid of 90 x Spikies tight at the heart of the
performance environment. Now the power
and impact of this and the full new production design has been unleashed to the
delight of his fans.
Gabe had used Robe Pointes and BMFLs
very successfully on the last Martin Garrix tour, so when it came to the
new design he wanted to add a dynamic “trick fixture” for this one and chose to
do it with Spikies!
They are rigged onto an elegant
industrial trussing structure which is built upstage of the DJ booth and frames
a large plus-shaped LED screen in the center that is also attached to the truss
uprights.
The Spikies are placed exactly 2ft. 9
inches apart on the horizontal and vertical plane and are the main focus of the
show lighting.
“Spikies were the perfect fit”
declared Gabe “the continuous pan-and-tilt, flower effect and the prism give
the exact ‘trick’ elements I need to keep up with the frenetic pace of Martin’s
set.”
This is balanced by the zoom, flower
and prism features which add the ‘beauty’ elements he needs for the slightly
slower elements of the show!
The Pointes and BMFL Blades are hung
on three straight trusses above the stage and add a complimentary architecture
to the space, together with texture and depth. In the full production version
of the design there is also a large 9 mm LED screen upstage as a backdrop.
The BMFLs and Pointes also become
prominent at certain points, providing a classic show lighting element creating
structures with beam work and layering this with gobos and color on top.
Apart from some strobes and 4-lite
blinders that was it – so a relatively expedient rig for a full-on dance show!
As we all know it’s not how much you have it’s how you use it that counts!
Previously Gabe used Spikies on the
North American leg of the Pretty Lights tour working as assistant designer and
programmer for LD Greg Ellis and “They absolutely blew both Greg and me away,”
he enthused, adding that he’s now specifying them whenever an opportunity
arises!
The most important consideration on
this show is ensuring the entire rig was never used all at once and layering
all the different visual elements to ensure a diverse and interesting show to
help fans through the pumping musical adventure.
Lighting and visuals are designed to flow
harmoniously on this show. The new video content package was also debuted at
Coachella after being in development for the six months leading up to the tour.
Each number in the set has its
dedicated video clip and is paired with a lighting look which compliments or
contrasts. In some songs, lighting will feature heavily, in others it will be
video and in others it will be lasers that define the visuals for that piece of
music.
Having all this info mapped into the
cue sheets allowed Gabe to establish a narrative with Martin – who takes a keen
interest with his stage presentation – for the show, which has a clear visual
and scenic flow.
The light show was programmed by Gabe
and Ben Dalgliesh and run by Gabe for the three San Francisco gigs together
with lasers, calling all the other elements via comms. Ben will be taking it on
the road globally, with video being run by Lorenzo de Pascalis.
For these three launch
performances lighting and video equipment was supplied by VER and lasers and
SFX by Pyrotechnico.
Internationally, the
production will be supplied to Gabe’s spec by the local promoter and the fact
that Robe is now widely available on all continents has also given Gabe
confidence that the integrity of the design will be maintained everywhere.
