When designing the lighting for Bjorn Again, Matt Devine pretty much gets a free creative licence although there are some specific cues the management want in the show.
“The light show has to be dynamic, it’s a rock light show that has to be subtle at times,” he explained. “I’m even starting with very little to no haze on a couple of songs to tone it back and let the video do most of the work, then in other songs, we have huge moving circle effects with sparks (pyro) and strobes. I guess the main thing you need to achieve in a show like this is a lighting rig flexible enough that most venues can cater for it whilst looking good in both rock and ballad moments.”
Matt comments that travel has been the biggest challenge this year with equipment not getting loaded onto planes or flights being cancelled or at one point, even a landslide over a highway turning them around and giving them a four-hour detour!
“We made it to the venue at about 5pm for a 7:30pm show!” he said. “As a group, we’ve had almost everything thrown at us over the 100+ shows this year so far.”
As far as challenges with the lighting, the main one for Matt is finding the fine line between “too much and not enough” when it comes to an ABBA rock show.
At Sydney’s State Theatre, the lighting rig was a combination of inhouse lights (eight Martin MAC Vipers, fourteen ShowPRO Fusion LED Pars and eight MAC Auras) along with Bjorn Again’s own fixtures of six Claypaky Sharpys, six Chauvet DJ Intimidator Hybrid 140SRs, four LED Blinders and two LED strobes.
“Programming from venue to venue gets considerably easier when you morph and clone fixtures!” added Matt. “Touring the Bjorn Again light show, the programming is fairly minimal now that I’ve got the light show where I want it, I simply update positions and focus front wash and specials.
“When we tour anywhere other than the east coast, it involves cloning and morphing fixtures and updating colour, gobo and position palettes.”
As far as execution, Matt has specific cues and scenes for each song, however, it’s not a “cue list” based show, what works in one venue might not necessarily work in another so he keeps an element of busking in the show for flexibility.
“I’d get bored if I was just hitting GO or NEXT every time a cue or change comes up so for the most part everything in the show is done live with not much set and forget happening,” he commented.
Matt tours his Chamsys MagicQ MQ250M Stadium console that he bought earlier this year and says it has made his life so much easier.
“It has some cool features like 64 universes over network, it has a small executor screen of soft buttons which comes in handy, along with its 10 faders it has 10 flash buttons and encoders that are completely separate to the 10 faders,” he said. “It also has a phone holder with a high-powered charger port and that comes in handy!
“Software-wise, the most helpful thing I use is fixture cloning and morphing, makes the show a lot more consistent when you rock up with none of your own lights! I often get hassled about not having a Hog or an MA, but in all seriousness, I can do just as much on the MagicQ MQ250M Stadium as others can do on the Hogs or MAs … it’s all down to user preference!”
The show has heaps of video elements with new content designed by Brad Alcock from BACC Light with both Brad and John Tyrrell (Owner/Manager of Bjorn Again) creating content to compliment the colour schemes Matt had already been using for the songs.
“It just adds a whole other element to the show,” stated Matt. “My favourite new video content would be in Take a Chance where you can see the four front members of Bjorn Again singing on the big screen, it’s hilarious and it’s hard to remember I have a job to do while watching it!”
“So while the keys are playing the riff of Money Money Money, I have the strobes and Hybrids come in and strobe in time to each keystroke, while the movers are strobing they come up over the audience over three seconds. As soon as the drum roll comes in, there’s a blinder chase from right to left (following the toms) and right at the end with the crack of the snare and cymbals EVERYTHING comes back on in white and crowd blinders full, then it returns to the chorus, all of that happens in about 6 or 7 seconds but it’s great if you nail it!”
