Stephan Aue, lighting designer for chart-topping German rock band Silbermond used 24 i-Pix BB7 LED wash units as the main over-stage lighting on the band's latest tour, promoting their "Nichts Passiert" (Nothing Happened) album.
The concept was such a success that he intends to expand it for the next leg of the tour in November, when the shows step up a level.
The band's initial brief for the tour lighting included a request for a 'classic' rock 'n' roll appearance to the stage that was not full of modern clichés and something that specifically didn't resemble any of the standard 'LED looks' that are the trend of the moment! His challenge was to produce something unique and different within those parameters.
He took the bold move of deciding not to use any moving lights overhead, and no LED panels. The no LED panels idea was re-thought for the festival section of the tour where they needed a specials package. For this he created a moving set piece with Martin LC panels, back-lit with Jarags and MAC 3K Profiles. This was then integrated into the full production shows which included the BB7s on the tour.
So, the BB7s played a major role in creating the overall stage visuality and ambience. They were rigged across three over-stage trusses braced by scaff bars to get the fixtures in exactly the right places for even coverage of the whole stage.
To add some quirkiness, for the first three songs, cloth tubes of varying lengths were attached beneath the BB7s, forming internally lit cylinders. These were then ditched via magnetic kabukis, and thereafter, the BBs were used to their full potential as stage washing fixtures.
"They were exactly the right lamp for the all functions and effects I wanted," enthuses Aue who really likes the quality and tone of the light output, and worked them hard on the tour!
He first saw BB7s in action on the Radiohead tour, and was "Amazed by the light output", the fabulous array of colours and the fact that they looked so "non-LED".
His first opportunity to use them on one of his own shows was for another successful German band, Reamonn, when he used 6 as specials and liked them even more! Then along came the latest Silbermond tour with their request for a retro, slightly unusual and off-beat look. "Apart from all the great features of the BB7 as a lightsource, it also has that real 'vintage' look which I really like," he concludes.
The lighting kit for the Silbermond tour is being supplied by Berlin-based Black Box Music.
On the first leg they played venues ranging from 2 - 8000 capacity, and on the next one, they move up to larger arenas, reflecting their massive popularity.