The concept and vision of this world tour is inspired by Armin's latest album, Intense. Armin Only is a concept that started in the early days of Armin's career. Since the first editions in the early millennium years, the show has grown and come to life. Armin explains, "Unlike today, now that it's all based on short sets and quick highlights, it used to be all about the long sets, the musical trips. That's what Armin Only is based on - to take the clubbers on a six- hour journey into music. Through the Armin Only - Intense shows, I can tell them the full story of my Intense album - in fact of everything I'd like to say."
The second week into June 2014 the ArminOnly Intense crew arrived on South African soil and met up with technical supplier and 'one-stop-shop, Gearhouse SA, in Johannesburg. Under the guidance of lighting operations manager, Stuart Andrews, and with a relatively short load in time of only two days at the Coca Cola Dome, Gearhouse's man on the ground Robert Grobler with Herman Wessels put the grand plan of getting over 555 intelligent lighting fixtures into every corner of the massive stage and AV setup.
Twenty Universes of DMX distributed on a redundant fibre network from a Grand MA2, with one for backup. Flanking each side of the massive 21m wide by 6m high LED backdrop, one of the features was a matrix of 60 x Martin MAC 101 Fixtures on each side of the stage.
This show had a lot of beams. With Robe Pointes and Clay Paky Sharpys literally all over the set. The inspiring programming from the Armin Crew brought out the best in the workhorse Martin MAC Vipers. Often using breakup gobos, which let through so little light but in this case there was more than enough for totally dazzle the audience. The trusty Martin Atomics's were given a thorough work-out that evening along with most of the fixtures shutters and iris's.
After an hour of 'warm up' and taking people on a journey for the next four hours with a combination of live singing, drum and guitar solos, Trampoline artists on stage and a huge balloon drop, Armin surprised fans with a hour long 'old school' set on vinyl (the rest of the evening was played on CD), playing literally inside the Front of House area amongst the technical crew.
(Jim Evans)
