LIVERPOOL, UK – UK rental specialist Adlib is supplying lighting, sound, rigging equipment and crew for the current Elvis Costello and The Imposters ‘Revolver’ UK and European tour. It’s the first time that the Liverpool based company has worked with Costello. There’s no formal set list in the show. Songs are chosen – enough to fill nearly three hours of performance – largely by audience members invited onstage to spin a giant wheel bearing different song titles, with a pool of more than 100 potential numbers.
More details from Adlib (www.adlibsolutions.co.uk):
Adlib’s account rep Phil Stoker says, “Working with someone of Elvis’s stature is fantastic and production manager Milo Lewis and engineers Fern and Nathan have been great to deal with all along the way.”
Adlib worked with PM Milo Lewis to combine both lighting and sound, with all the advantages that having a single source supplier brings to a production.
Adlib’s Neil Holloway created the lighting design using a careful blend of classic and contemporary.
The band chose the backdrop, which they have used previously – a faded, old- fashioned TV set – and there are a series of quirky circus style props onstage, the most prominent of which is the song wheel.
Holloway wanted to lose some of the PAR 64s from their previous rig and make it more tour-worthy and less power hungry, so he replaced all those that were on the front truss with 10 ETC Source Fours (a mix of 19 and 25-50 degree lenses) and 4 Martin MAC Aura LED washes.
The back truss – trimmed just at the top of the backdrop – is made up of five sections of prerig, loaded with seven bars of PARs plus four MAC 700 Spots for some rear key light and solo pick-ups and general contrast in light.
On the floor are another eight MAC Auras, which are a personal favorite of Holloway and the band. For eye-candy and adding to the general idiosyncrasy of the stage, are four JB Lighting A8 LED fixtures and two A12s, which highlight the band from behind. Basic pixel mapping is used on these, which are zoned into eight sections.
Sweeping up the backdrop bringing some rich psychedelic color to the area are 12 Philips CK ColorBlaze LED battens.
Also feeding into Holloway’s grandMA2 light console are the LEDs around the perimeter of the wheel.
It’s the first time he’s used the MA2 light as a busking console, which is working “very well,” he says.
“Simple and flexible” was the key, he comments. It’s all about looks and textures that he can build from the lighting as there is no haze allowed, so the lights are almost imperceptible until they hit the stage and the band.
