Ok so last week I ended the blog by telling you about how I incorporate track lighting into my light show. Well, at first I embarrassingly zip tied them to mic stands. It was really a desperate attempt to get a vertical ACL wash across the stage. It began to be a pain in the ass for the band and myself to drag them around so I took the two pieces I had, untied them and cut them down to about a length of three feet each. The day I went to set them up during a load in a really cool thing happened. I placed them horizontally on the ground one in front of Nathan’s bass rig, and the other in front of Matt’s guitar rig. When I patched everything and turned up the faders I was astonished. It lit the rigs up so intense. Everyone looked over at me and said it looked bad ass. I was complimented in a weird way that day by Geoff our drummer and Erik our sound engineer. They told me that I have the most f#*ked up ability to take something shitty and make it into something cool. I was proud that I made it cool, but also analyzing that it was shitty in the first place.
This now leads me to entering the realm of LED lighting. Last week on my Wednesday gig I mentioned before that they were putting in a new system. Part of that new system was LED par can lighting. This was my first time I had worked with LED lighting and I have to say that it was really fun. The colors that come from them are so much richer than regular pars. I like that they can pulse, chase, and strobe in any color. It really adds a lot more. It also allows me to strobe at certain parts of a song with out having to make the extra reaches for my intelligent lighting. Plus they are two separate sources so transitions are much smoother for me. After that gig I came home and checked my bank account to see how much I had in it. Not a lot but enough to buy a couple LED pars. I am excited to use them and I will be experimenting over the next couple weeks on where I’ll be placing them on stage. Stay tuned for that… I’ve actually gone back through some old color theory notes of mine from school that going to read up on. I want to be able to even do some manual fades with RGB and mix any color at my own will. A book I would like to suggest is called “The Art of Color: The Subjective Experience and Objective Rationale of Color” written by Johannes Itten. It’s all about color theory. So for us people who evoke color pretty much every day in our lives you all should enjoy it.
We’ll now move on to the cue writing aspects. Today is Tuesday which means its band rehearsal day where I sit on my CPU and listen to them rehearse the new songs then I’ll listen to my I-tunes versions of those same songs. I always listen to the song in sections. It’s always Verse, Chorus, and, Bridge. If there is an intro or outro I focus on that last. Next I’ll try and dissect the song through lyrics. The Cars tune “You Might Think I’m Crazy” is written like this:
The Cars- You Might Think I’m Crazy with “I’m Gonna Be” (500 miles) by The Proclaimers melody after guitar solo back to chorus. After the last chorus melody again to close the song (This is my initial approach to setting up the cues). 1-4 x3, 1-6, 1-4 x3, 1-6 par open, (this is my count for a particular lick I’m trying to follow with my ACL’s and white cans). > (means next part) Verse- spot on drum vocals > Chorus- scroll drums and highlight crowd (with the scroll I try to give a… well… “crazy” feel, and the lyrics say “all I want is you.” I have the lights out toward the crowd as if they were that person > Bridge- at this point I use a circular motion with the ACL’s and Par’s with the pace of the song. When the vocals come back in, the vocals talk about the sun falling. So I will call up on my cue with Amber/Yellow that resembles the Sun. I like to project it on wall or backdrops to move it down. I will also set it low so I can raise it. Depending on what the song commands. > Guitar solo (for solos they are solid bounces, scrolling, or strobes on a particular member. If it’s a rhythm section jam with drum and bass I make a scene that will highlight both.) After the guitar solo we head into the melody of “I’m Gonna Be” (500 Miles). I’ve specifically wrote a few cues to follow it and strobes going left to right. I can’t really describe it any further you’d just have to see it. After the melody we go back into another verse and chorus recalling our same scenes we set up for the verse and chorus. Now this can be modified if another idea comes into play the really needs to be expressed in the song. Then after the chorus we finish with the “I’m Gonna Be” melody and close the song with a cold ending. I like that I got to take some Audio elective courses when I was in school because I got to hone in on some of the audio world terminology. So there’s an anatomy of a song I write cues for. Honestly “Wagon Wheel” by Old Crow Medicine Show is very acoustic oriented. With lighting acoustic work I love to use subtle par changes for mood where the attack of the intelligent lights isn’t necessarily needed. Now that I’m thinking of it… I’m glad the LED pars are being added into the show so I can make some sweet color mixes. A good mentor of mine named Jesper Luth gave me a cool insight on color intensity and mixing when I first met him over some glasses of wine at a friends house, and talked about lighting. I like to think I’ve come a long way since that chat, and I’d like to thank those people who have taught me along the way. Next blog I’ll mention them, more specific video tales, and encounters with “Pirate Hookers.” I’ll leave you with some links where you can see a bunch of EastonAshe stuff including some of my video work. Here are the URLs:
http://www.myspace.com/eastonashe
http://www.myspace.com/squints4
Don’t for get to email me at:
Soon I will also mention a couple light shows who have caught my attention recently. They include Primus, Galactic, Muse, and Nine Inch Nails. I also may dissect Led Zepplin’s “Fool In The Rain” cues I’ve written. ‘Til next time, tah! ~Tony
