Harding has played an integral part in the development of the Vista from the launch of the system at PLASA in 2004 until present day. "I had been working on it for a couple of years prior as a consultant to Jands," he says. "I designed the control palettes and had quite a lot of input into the fixture selector."
"I have a Vista S1 that I carry around in my backpack," he reports. "Once in my hotel room I can just plug into my laptop and it's got encoders, playbacks and such like. In fact I did most of the programming for the West Coast Blues Festival appearance in my hotel room. It was just too cold outside at 1am in the morning! It worked out really well and looked good. The modularity is also good on tour when we do festivals where I may just bring in the Vista S3."
For Crowded House Harding also utilised a couple of the M1 playback-only Vista control surfaces. "I'm a very hands-on operator and do a lot of things flying by the seat of my pants, he continues. "With Crowded House I have one cue per song and then I just fiddle with it for the whole song. I guess the way I operate the show determined the Vista set up as I wanted the M1's for their faders."
Harding is about to embark on the world tour with Crowded House, with lighting designed by Paul Normandale, and the Jands Vista system will accompany him all the way.
(Jim Evans)
