In order to allow the bands to engage at close quarters with their hordes of screaming fans, production designer Butch Allen designed a 91ft catwalk leading from the main stage to a 'B' stage - using no fewer than 79 GLP Volkslicht Zoom LED spots to edge the perimeter of the vast 155ft-wide main and subsidiary stages - including 17 footlights down each side of the thrust. The complex staging and movement was fabricated by Tait Towers.
"Since the whole set design was based around the 91ft thrust, my idea was to use the Volkslichts as footlights, to carve the space out around the audience," said Allen, explaining the concept.
The tour has seen him reunited with Jesse Blevins (associate designer) and Ray Woodbury (creative director) - in the same team that had worked on No Doubt's 2009 tour - with Blevins the lighting board operator and programmer this time around.
In addition to the indoor arenas, the bands also appeared before an audience of around 40,000 at Boston's Fenway Park, in NKOTB's home city.
"We decided to change some focuses on the thrust lights, throwing them on to the audience ... and they were so bright you could see them right out in the stalls," Allen reports.
(Jim Evans)
