LD Dan Hill reports, "This was essentially a larger, more intense version of the lighting rig we've had out lately. In London earlier this year, The Wombats played Brixton Academy and the show at Alexandra Palace really grew from that - nothing crazy, but extensions of what was already there to cater for both the larger crowd and the bigger, wider stage that Ally Pally provides. I wanted to keep things as dynamic and as fun for the band on stage and for people in the crowd as it was back in Brixton."
Hill's rig is heavy with fixtures from the Ambersphere Solutions family of brands with Clay Paky and Ayrton units making up over half of the total design and with a grandMA2 Lite FoH. Explaining the reasons for his choices, Hill begins with the Ayrton MagicBlades: "This was my first design with MagicBlades. I'd seen them used a few times before but had been waiting for the right chance to use them. They have a lot of features and capabilities which are great but I've seen them overused in a way that I'm not necessarily into. I wanted a fixture that framed the stage well 'geometrically.'"
On the Clay Paky Stormys, Hill comments, "I don't like to see a cheap looking block of LED strobes; the Stormy gives me the RGBW colour changing capability of an LED fixture but it looks and acts like a real strobe. Add to that, I use them to back light the band. It works brilliantly and with a good colour spectrum from pastels to primary colours.
"The Clay Paky Sharpy remains the 'go to' beam light for me," continues Hill. "There were over 30on this rig. If I want a solid beam, a strong gobo selection, speed and reliability, I can go anywhere in the world and find a bunch of Sharpys that can do the job and do it exactly as I want."
As for control, Hill takes a fairly prosaic approach, "An LD or operator can often be judged on what desk they choose to use, which I don't really subscribe to; at the end of the day, they're a tool to make lights work and a stage look good. However, after trying out and using most of the other leading console options, the grandMA2 just works best for me."
(Jim Evans)
