30 Odd Foot of Grunt Pulses with Pulsar

Midway through their Australian tour, Russell Crowe and his band 30 Odd Foot of Grunt decided to add some more grunt to their lighting effects with two Pulsar ChromaBanks.


"I'd seen them in the factory and really liked them but I needed to use them on a gig to get a good idea of how they would perform and what we could do with them," says Neale Mace, managing director of Entertainment Installations, the company that supplied both lighting and audio for the tour.

"For the size of venues we were playing we already had quite a large rig,” says Mace. “We decided to place the ChromaBanks behind the drummer, where we used them for straight color as well as a strobing effect. The strobing effect is great and looked really good when used in conjunction with the strobing movers. We also used some of the macros that are built into the units. We had them on a fader and they were quite good." He adds that the ChromaBanks is that they are “bright, punchy and look really good.”

In fact, Mace reports, that the guitarist situated immediately next to the drummer was stunned by their brightness and made sure he didn't go anywhere near them when they were strobing.

"They're also very easy to rig," says Mace. "I believe the latest model is even easier to rig and is even brighter--I can't imagine them being much brighter but apparently they are! One day I would really like to use the ChromaPanels to supply flat panels of light on stage." The band's usual LD, Anthony Petruzio, was unable to do these shows as he was on tour with Grinspoon. The band's American LD, Ethan Balmer, took the helm. It was a thoroughly impressed Balmer who uttered the immortal and final comment on the ChromaBanks: "Wow, these things are the shit!"

(This item was reported by Cat Strom and can be found on the Australasian Lighting Industry Association website).