Liverpool, UK based ADLIB supplied lighting and sound production for a recent tour by hot UK indie band The Maccabees.
ADLIB's Andy Rowe operated a lighting design created by Ian Tomlinson, which consisted of a floor-based ‘specials' package that was used in conjunction with the house systems at each venue, complete with a full rig supplied by ADLIB for the Brixton and Manchester Academy shows.
Otto Kroyman looked after the sound elements for ADLIB, acting as systems
tech and minding both band engineers - Joel Gregg at FOH and Andy Egerton on monitors.
Lighting
Flexibility was the basic requirement, so the design included a minimalist selection of fixtures that could easily be moved and fitted in as and where the spaces onstage appeared and allowed!
The floor rig included 8 JTE PixelPAR 90s, 5 x Martin Professional MAC 550s, 5 MAC 250 Washes, 5 Martin Atomic strobes and 7 floor-mounting PARs.
The PixelPARs were rigged on tank trap stands so they could be positioned to highlight the grey backdrop from a slightly offstage side position.
The idea was to have a large wall of lights at the back of the stage pointing forward at the band, in the process creating interesting and moody silhouettes, with the beams also shooting past the band out into the audience, diffusing the energy and vibes of the music all around the venue.
For Brixton and Manchester, the backdrop PixelPAR count was upped and the cloth was ‘framed' with these fixtures for additional impact. The ADLIB crew of Tim Spillman and Dave Eldridge also brought in front and back trusses, with an additional 8 MAC 550s, 4 x 4-way linear Moles and 3 Atomic strobes on the back.
On the front truss was another 5 MAC 550s and 4 linear 4-lites for a bit of audience blinding.
Rowe operated the shows using a Road Hog console. One of the reasons he chose this was for its easy fixture change and exchange facility, which enabled him to quickly and easily patch the house lighting into the board each day.
“It was an enormously fun tour – nice people, good music, great shows,” says Rowe, whose biggest challenge each day was to get the rig looking similar despite a massively varying selection of stage spaces.
Audio
ADLIB supplied two Soundcraft Vi6 digital consoles to the tour and a full monitor system consisting of 15 ADLIB MP3 wedges (plus 2 x listeners) and Nexo Alpha side fills. They ran a digital multicore between the two desks and hooked in to each venue's racks-and-stacks.
The wedges – which also included a dv-SUB for the drummer - were driven by Labgruppen PLM10000 amps, with Crown Tecton for the Nexo Alpha highs and mids and Crown VZ5000s for the bass/subs.
For Brixton, ADLIB's Kenny Perrin joined the audio crew, bringing a JBL VerTec FOH rig comprising 10 VT 4889s and 6 VerTec Subs a side, run by Camco Vortex 6 and Crown i-Tech amps respectively.
The Manchester audio set up featured 6 x VT4889s aside run off Camco Vortex 6s, with 6 ADLIB subs a side powered by Crown i-Tech 8000s.
ADLIB also supplied a comprehensive set of mics-and-stands for the whole tour including Shure, Audix, Sennheisers, etc.
The challenge was often physically squeezing a lot of wedges into some small stage spaces, but Kroyman echoes Andy Rowe's overall comments, saying ”Everyone worked hard, and it was a very friendly relaxed and happy tour with a brilliant vibe”.