“We are in the middle of experiencing a cultural shifting moment,” says Amish Dani, Lead Creative and Executive Producer of the Peso Pluma Doble P 2023 Tour. “People will look back on this period—and tour—as a defining event that further broadened the horizons of Latin music.” Since breaking through in a big way in early 2022, Peso Pluma and his eight-piece traditional mariachi band, sans drums, are tearing up TikTok and YouTube, while topping Billboard’s Latin charts. He is currently one of the top 50 artists in the world on Spotify with songs that reached #1 globally.
Dani’s company, FRAMEWORX, a diverse team of producers, directors, designers, and technicians with vast proficiencies in live and broadcast entertainment, have been active in the Latin market for several years now. They were able to execute the Peso Pluma tour in less than four weeks from phone call to opening night—an incredibly brief span of time. Two of those weeks were spent entirely on conceptualization, before a single piece of gear was pulled. “I got a call from Max Perez, with Buena Vibra Group, who was managing Pluma’s branding; I had worked with him on Bad Bunny previously,” begins Dani. “Live Nation had booked a tour of Pluma dates without a single production element in place. They needed a touring production package design to present to Pluma’s management team. We at FRAMEWORX knew it was not going to be possible to do any fabrication, so lighting and video alone would do the heavy lifting as our main production elements.”
Flexible and Scalable
Adds Dani, “One of the primary needs of the Peso Pluma design was scalability.” Theaters with 5,000 seat capacity or less were the main venues on the itinerary when first put together. The response was so avid that larger venues and arenas were quickly added, with stadiums being considered as well. Pluma’s team gave FRAMEWORX a bit of direction centering around the image of a tarantula, which aligns with the album concept. The 24-year-old performer himself is a big Spider-Man fan. The show loosely follows elements of that classic tale.
“The artist blew up on TikTok, so I determined a photogenic approach was needed in the design, but, with very modern lighting.” Dani pauses and then says, “He’s kind of a modern-day rock star really; a young energetic kid with hip-hop swagger… and we really wanted to enhance his persona.” The music performed is very old-style regional traditional Mexican. That is why the audiences ranges from young kids to 40-somethings. “That style of music has never been presented in such a modern light, if you’ll pardon the pun,” Dani laughs. “It seems familiar, but Pluma’s music blends a spin into the fabric that’s something else entirely.”
A visual representation of lighting, video and set was put together for the artist to review at FRAMEWORX’s previz studio. “I brought in Ryan Wiley, who was my right hand creative on this project,” continues Dani. “Ryan was our Production Designer as well as Show Director and, Omar [Rajput], our Art Director helped us create a video aesthetic and tell the visual story. The three of us led all creative and design efforts on the project. We built a show story around the Mexican tarantula image.” From that emerged a story arc supported by the imagery. “The artist goes through a metamorphosis after being bitten by a tarantula,” says Dani. “We then take you on an exciting journey, which even gets introspective at times.”
With the artist and his team’s approval of concept, they told Dani, “Go for it!” FRAMEWORX forged ahead and brought full production to rehearsals 14 days later. “Really, we spent those two weeks on content production and previz,” he notes, “before we strung a single cable or allocated a single fixture. During those two weeks, we brought in programmers, animators, all these different people to bring this concept to life.”
Awash in Color
Wiley came up with the octagon truss structure to play off the eight legs of the tarantula. “I wanted to capitalize and accentuate a sub theme of everything in eights,” he says, “and have multiple layers up there to trap the tarantula with this light curtain cage made up of [Vari-Lite] VL5s and Robe Tetras; trying to frame the tarantula, as a metaphor for Peso being trapped in his own world.” Wiley continues, “Beam wash is where things are headed these days,” adding that “3G Productions, our vendor, is a Robe house and had MegaPointes, a natural substitution that worked. The large variety of gobos and the colors in that fixture blended well to the Robe Tetras. The Robe Tetra has a little bit more versatility than similar lights. Slightly punchier, the colors are done very well, and provide a great little gobo.”
Seeking to frame the stage with color, Wiley says, “Having the CHAUVET Color STRIKE M was essential to the design. They are a little bit brighter and more powerful than other LED strobes. With two 3K lines in there, a lot of eye candy stuff can be taken advantage of. Also, I am a big Vari-Lite guy. I love the color. The VL5 has the best color you can get. I did not want the traditional LED wash fixture with the honeycomb lens. I wanted something a little bit easier on the eye. With the VL5 sitting on top of the head, it was the perfect choice.”
FRAMEWORX’s octagon truss structure tilts almost 60° forward and backward, giving a very spaceship-esque aura. With the versatility of position of the octagon, multiple perspectives were achieved from ‘caging’ the tarantula to a very intimate setting as it settles in just six feet above the performers. “Ben [Van Brande], our Technical Designer who does all our CAD and drafting, helped on the design as well,” points out Wiley. “It was his idea to make the upstage LED video wall curved, which really added an extra dimension of depth to the overall frame of the stage.”
One would think that as the production went into rehearsals, continuous tweaking would still be on-going. But… “We had such a vision for the show,” notes Wiley. “We knew we were under a crunch and aware of the task at hand. We created a beautiful base of the show by establishing our color timeline in our previz where color reigned supreme. There are so many pixels and so much LED in the rig—the wall and the cubes—that when we went live in rehearsals, we brought a lot of dynamism to the show. A lot of punch, kicks, and bump buttons. There is no timecode to the show.”
Wiley ended up making an emotional connection as this traditional music which was previously foreign to him. “This was a cultural challenge for me, and no drums! His management wanted a modern show, not a standard rock ‘n’ roll rig; a new evolution of what you can do with this music. It was a challenge, but it was incredible. I ended up falling in love with the music. FRAMEWORX has been “diving into” the Latin market,” continues Wiley. “I am a little familiar with phrases, but I knew it was essential to have a bilingual programmer, Geo [Geovanny Carvajal], with me. I credit him with making this so successful by keeping me in tune to what was being sung, especially the slang which he says is constantly changing.”
Tour Direction
Veikko Fuhrmann came on board as Tour Director roughly two weeks after FRAMEWORX began. “Max [Perez] and I had met during the many years I was Ricky Martin’s Tour Director,” Fuhrmann says. “Pluma’s team were looking for someone who could manage the expanding scale of this. Amish and FRAMEWORX were already on board, so I reached out to him immediately to advise he design a system that could open to 240° audience view.”
Locating the gear was Fuhrmann’s first major hurdle, and he turned to 3G Productions for the entire lighting, video, rigging, automation and audio systems. “3G Productions headquartered in Las Vegas were the real hero in this launch,” states Fuhrmann. “Not only were they able to provide a full production package, but they also had this prepped and show ready before it went into the trucks and headed to the three-day rehearsal.” Dani agrees, saying, “The team from 3G Productions provided great support for the execution of the show every night.”
The late addition of shows complicated the routing of the tour, with “some hard overnight hauls,” explains Fuhrmann. To keep load-outs and -ins manageable in five trucks, he contracted for local rolling stages and kept the system to 42 points. This way, “the stage is assembled at the opposite end of arena while the rig is built and flown.” He adds, “There is never enough time in live production, yet it seems there is always just enough to get it done, but this is possibly the shortest pre-production time I have ever had in my life.”
All the challenges of this rapid tour launch were made immeasurably easier by the adaptability of everyone involved. “I had never worked with Amish and the FRAMEWORX guys before,” says Fuhrmann. “It has been amazing. When you come together in this short amount of time, everyone needs to quickly adapt to different styles. That was the key to this success.”
Business as Usual: 3G Productions
With a mere three weeks to rehearsals for the Peso Pluma 2023 Doble P Tour, Tour Director Veikko Fuhrmann knew exactly who to call to source a full production rental package. “We have enjoyed a long term working relationship with Veikko,” says Keith Conrad CEO of 3G Productions, “And really, relationships are everything in this business. It was a quick turnaround time. But that is the nature of our business in live entertainment. We do a lot of one-off large-scale festivals and tours, many of which are full production. The ‘turn and burn’ is routine for us.”
The fact they are a privately held company owning audio, rigging, video, lighting, and automation gear is just one of the aspects about 3G Productions that made them the perfect choice for this tight a window of prep and delivery. With over 75,000 sq. ft. of warehouse space between Las Vegas and Los Angeles and a full-time staff of 65, 3G was ready to deliver when Amish Dani of FRAMEWORX sent them the initial design. “It was not without challenges,” Conrad quickly points out. Several fixtures the design team requested were not in their inventory. Being primarily a Robe house, Conrad reached out to Vari-Lite, GLP, and disguise to provide the FRAMEWORX design team with the items they had to have. “Vari-Lite, GLP, and disguise were able to pull strings and deliver in a very short time, which was simply great.”
Able to hang the lighting rig on a ground supported truss structure in the warehouse and owning Tyler GT truss which can be fully loaded also facilitated the speedy delivery. “Having professionals on staff that have experience in doing large scale full production tours is another competitive advantage. We assigned a project manager—Eric Cruz, in this case. Providing that one point of contact at our company has its advantage as well.” This, coupled with fully owning all their own equipment allows 3G Productions to move quickly and react to a client’s needs. “Really, that is where our company has the competitive edge,” notes Conrad. “We just rolled right into rehearsal.”
Conrad and Fuhrmann worked with the changes as they came. “We knew from a design perspective that what was specified wouldn’t necessarily work for all the venues, given the variety of sizes and types,” explains Conrad. Indeed, at rehearsals in Seattle, a lot of changes occurred on the fly from the lighting and rigging perspective. As a full-service production company, 3G Productions had various options to offer for these adjustments. They sent key department heads to rehearsals to talk through changes and get them fast tracked. “Having a fully operational staff allows us to provide that extra support to get tours started without adding a financial burden to the client. Getting the tour off on the right foot is essential for a successful run,” Conrad adds.
As different venues were added, different elements were added. Three weeks into the tour, in Guadalajara, the artist’s hometown, a video floor was requested. “We own that,” smiles Conrad, “so, our team delivered it to the venue in Mexico, set it up then brought it back to our shop.” All LED tiles on the tour are ROE CB5 MKII, while the video floor was the ROE BM4 product. “It (ROE CB5 MKII) is a brand-new product, and I would put it up against any 3 mil on the market,” states Conrad.
Founded in 2004, 3G Productions was originally exclusively an audio provider, however, with the pandemic came new ownership and new direction. “As the pandemic came to an end, we were a first mover putting orders in; purchasing lighting, rigging, and video. At the time there was little to no risk because cancellation was an option. However, we never ended up cancelling any orders as the work was there to put the equipment on shows as it became available,” Conrad recalls proudly. For this tour, he points out, “FRAMEWORX really needed disguise to manage their Notch content, so we purchased it too. It was a move into media servers we had been considering, and this tour solidified our decision.”
Production Team
- Tour Director: Veikko Fuhrmann, We Are Live
- Executive/Creative Producer: Amish Dani
- Creative Direction: FRAMEWORX
- Production Designer/Show Director: Ryan Wiley
- Technical Director/Designer/Drafter: Ben Van Brande
- Art Director: Omar Rajput
- Lighting Programmers: Geovanny Carvajal, Davey Martinez
- Lighting Director/Additional Programming: Matt Palumbo
- Depence File Build + Operation Support: Jacob Vanvlyman
- Content Team: The Image Flux, Aaron Kaminar, Jill Crowner, Eddie Perez, Randy Cano, Mike Estacio
- Notch Programming: Tanner Thompson
- disguise Programmer: Eric May
- LED Mask Technician: Mike Beckman
- Production Coordinators: Stephanie Roy Troia, Brandon Delgadillo
- Master Electrician: Derek Lewis, 3G Productions
- Automation Operator: Tyler Jacobs, 3G Productions
- Head Rigger: Kevin Balani, 3G Productions
- 3G Productions Project Manager: Eric Cruz
Vendors
- Lighting, Video, Rigging, Automation, Audio: 3G Productions
Gear
Lighting
- 64 Robe MegaPointe
- 66 Robe Robin Tetra1
- 37 Robe RobinTetra2
- 4 Robe Robin FORTE
- 36 Vari-Lite VL5
- 32 CHAUVET Color STRIKE M Strobe
- 16 Elation CUEPIX Blinder WW4
- 12 GLP JDC Line 1000 Hybrid Strobe
Video
- ROE Visual CB5 MKII LED Panel
- Brompton Technology Processing
- disguise gx 2c Media Server
- 4 Sony HSC-100R Digital Triax Broadcast Camera
- 1 Video Switching System
Rigging / Automation
- Kinesys Elevation 1+ Hoists, 1-Ton
- Tour Rig 1-Ton Motors
