Bill Bailey is currently touring his live comedy show Vaudevillean, which celebrates the golden age of variety entertainment with music, surreal wit, and exotic instruments.
Phaseshift Productions supplied a floor package of lighting, including 12 of their new ACME Tornados with bespoke rolling base plates, seven Martin MAC Viper XIPs, and 11 GLP JDC-1s. Control was their new ETC Tour Hog 5 as the main console.
Lighting designer Alex Saad wanted a rig that could scale to different venues; it needed to roll in and out easily, make a big impact, and be easy to transport. Phaseshift’s Sebastian Brown designed the rolling base plates for the Tornados that are proving to be a solid, elegant solution that transports easily.
“Alex and I went back and forth with ideas and designs,” explained Seb. “We tried a moving base plate with just a pipe in the middle, but it was wonky, and we couldn’t get it to stabilise without making it look really chunky.
“Pre-rig is the most solid thing, and the Tornados are protected in there, so it’s the safest way of travelling the new lights. The base plates have been designed specifically to fit four across in a truck, and be very versatile about the options on top, so we can run either 300 tri truss or 300 box truss.”
Seb says the main benefit is their stability: they can support weights and be securely strapped down. They are also highly versatile, and while this is their first design, the team plans to adapt them for many other uses.
The show features eight base plates, four 1.2m sections of pre-rig each housing one Tornado and four 2.4 metre sections of pre-rig housing two Tornados.
“It’s just an easy solution,” Seb Stated. “We’re even travelling all the cables and things, and a lot of the power management is on each base plate. So, we literally just have the loom on the base plate, we plug it into our distro, and we’re good to go. I know it’s boring talking about truck space, but the practical side of me loves that they fit so easily in a truck!”
Alex was keen to incorporate ACME Tornados into his lighting design, describing them as a great multifunctional fixture.
“You have the main 120W LED beam and then 120 0.5W LEDS in the outer circle, and I can either use both or either; they’re versatile that way,” he commented. “I don’t have to have a multi-zoom effect coming out every time. I can just have the visual of the rings.”
Alex used the Tornados sparingly, particularly early in the show, reserving them for standout moments when they could truly dazzle. The GLP JDC-1, located on the floor, are purposely used in certain areas all the time, and again, the hard stuff is only for certain songs.
Alex chose the Martin MAC Viper XIPs, saying they are a very good unit and better than anything else he’s seen.
“The gobos and the output in them are fantastic,” he declared. “Their framing is perfect; you could not get a better unit for framing. I can understand why people are buying them because they are very good units, and it’s what I’ve spec’d for overseas.”
Alex remarked that Bill Bailey doesn’t necessarily play songs in order and the nights can be quite random.
“We get a set list five minutes before we go on,” he said. “I can’t have the show in order formatted because he might just change anything anywhere. So, I’ve just got a lot of go-to cues and set-up cues for certain things.”
Alex was running Phaseshift’s new ETC Tour Hog 5 console, describing the console’s layout as much better than previous models.
“The extra functions are quick to program and keep within easy reach, making on-the-fly operation much faster,” he added. “We use in-house flown rigs, so each day I first adapt the overhead rig to the show. The Tour Hog 5 handles new fixtures and fixture swaps well. So far, I’ve used about 10 different profiles and 12 different wash units for the show. If I return to a fixture I’ve used before, such as a MAC Quantum Wash, it’s already programmed; I only need to patch it and check that my updates are correct.”
After the Australian tour, Alex will remain with Bill Bailey throughout the upcoming fourteen-week UK tour.
