The account was handled by HSL's Mike Oates, who says: "It was great to be working with Abbiss again. As always, he came up with a really inventive design and a flexible rig offering lots of options for the different sized venues."
Abbiss's initial brief expanded as the tour sold more tickets and some dates moved up to bigger venues, resulting in the final itinerary ranging from the 16,000 capacity Manchester Evening News Arena at the larger end of the scale to Norwich UEA and Ipswich Regent Theatre at the cosier end. "This was the real challenge," says Abbiss, "Designing something that looked equally good in different spaces and that didn't take away from the overall integrity and look when used in the shrunk format."
The design was based on three trusses - front, mid and back, with a series of under-slung triangular mini-beam truss pods dropping down off the back and mid trusses. On the floor at the back were two large floor stands rigged with pods at head height giving a multilevel light-source effect.
Each airborne pod featured three Robe ColorSpot 575E AT fixtures and a 2-lite blinder; the floor ones were rigged with two moving lights - and a total of 45 Robe ColorSpot and ColorWash 575E AT fixtures were spread across the rig including on the floor.
The back truss contained two bars of ACLs, two bars of six PARs and two pods hanging off it, while the mid had four bars of ACLs and four pods. The front truss had two bars of six PARs, three Robe ColorWash 575s and four ColorSpot 575s plus more blinders.
On the floor, eight JTE PixelPARs under-lit the risers, and two Studio Due CityColor colour changing wash fixtures illuminated the backdrop, highlighting Webbe's intricate logo.
The set, based on a diamond shape, was supplied by The Production Office. Abbiss ran the show off a WholeHog II console and a Wing, and HSL also supplied two hazers, a follow spot and four mirror balls. HSL's fabulous crew came in the form of Simon "Piggy" Lynch and Dave Jolly. Sound was supplied by Capital, with Simon Thomas mixing FOH and Sean Busby-Little on monitors. Webbe's production manger is Sam Kruger and his tour manager is Andy Burnstein.
(Jim Evans)
