Demi Lovato’s “Neon Lights” tour, named after the single on last year’s album release, Demi, is the artist’s third headlining concert tour, and the most elaborate yet. High-tech touches include an app from Wham City Lights that links handheld smartphones with the overall lighting design, pulsing to the beat of the tour’s title song. A tightly woven interplay of high-res video, faux low-res “neon” elements, lighting and special effects adds up to an enormous number of cues per song, and timecode helps keep everything in synch. Yet despite all the visual flourishes, reviewers have praised the production for not overshadowing the main attraction: a remarkable, multi-faceted talent who’s still just 21 years old.
Cory FitzGerald
Production & Lighting Designer
“This is my first time working with Demi. Along with seeing a few things I’d done, Javier Alcaraz, her production manager, reached out after talking to lighting director Brian Jenkins whom he had worked with before, and things led from there. We actually had a meeting a few days before her X-Factor TV performance and they asked if I’d be able to help out with some content ideas and drawings. I’ve been around ever since.
“Demi was involved with some of the looks of the show at first through Nick Jonas [of Jonas Brothers fame], who served as the musical and creative director for the tour. After the initial few meetings and concepts, we all got together and started really picking things out of the drawings and concepts that worked, and then I went back and finalized things. Nick and I worked a lot on looks per song, as well as the show flow, making sure we could achieve all the desired gags and moments they had discussed. Once we got into rehearsals, we were able to show off the show as we created it and incorporate the staging moves as they worked them out. It was a very real-time rehearsal, but that intensity helped us fuel the creation of a great show!
“As for the effects in the show, we use cryo — about 12 jets, as well as a large amount of UV-florescent confetti. Pyrotek was great, as always, and Kenn MacDonald who’s out with the tour is a total pro. We used a lot of UV lights — Elation Pars — for the neon lights section, where we wanted to make a lot of UV material pop, similar to the music video. The Elation units worked out great.
“VER was the tour’s lighting, video and rigging vendor. I had just worked with them before on the Bruno Mars tour last year. The initial design for the tour revolved around the VER video Blades, so it was an obvious choice to get them involved early to ensure we could achieve the design as planned. As usual, they were very accommodating, and Susan Tesh (VER rep) and the gang really helped us fit it all in and get it out the door!
“The fixtures really do make a difference in what the show will end up looking like. I love the Blades for their look, and with using the ‘smoke’ fascia tubing, and incorporating them into the set and riser design, they really became the entire world of the show. The Idea was to expand on the idea of ‘neon lights,’ using the tubes as faux neon at times, and then running full HD video through the whole set. It really created a lot of different looks and made the entire stage come to life. The [Ayrton] MagicPanels and [TMB] Solaris Flares also did their part; they are truly some of the most flexible fixtures I’ve seen out there. I like to keep it flexible and use different lights for different things, so you’ll find a little of everything in there, but throughout the show, each fixture does its specific job, and we keep trying to push their limits every night.
“I’m a big fan of using lighting to really shape the look of the show, and I think video can and usually does wash a lot of interesting looks right off the stage. We knew we wanted a central circular screen, and we had some specific moments where it was going to be used. I liked that idea, but I also lobbied hard to have songs where we turned it off, or only used abstract imagery. I think with the Blades, it really did tie the two together and make it all click.”
Brian Jenkins
Lighting Programmer & Director
“Cory and I jumped into pre-viz together at VER, which was immensely helpful, considering the compressed rehearsal schedule we had. There were heaps of cues. Everything is listening to timecode, with all video and lighting sync’d to it. Not everyone is a fan of timecode, but it works well in our situation. We’re in Brazil for a bit on a South America tour, and I’m turning it over to Fraser MacKeen, Kelly Clarkson’s guy. Within a couple of days, it has allowed him to concentrate on cloning, focus, and calling spots each night, versus learning 1,400 cues from scratch.
“The Vipers and Sharpys are the meat and potatoes of the rig. With Demi’s set list, most songs are segued from one to another, with little breaks in between. It’s great to have a boatload of fixtures that are so responsive and reliable. The X4 has been a new favorite, cheers to GLP for pushing the design and engineering envelope.
“Cory and I have known each other for years but never had the chance to work together. What a blast we had! He’s a helluva production designer and is no slacker in the programming department as well. I look forward to doing more gigs together… the roles we had on Demi played out very well.”
Crew
Production & Lighting Designer: Cory FitzGerald
Lighting Programmer & Director: Brian Jenkins
VER Crew Chief: Joe Gonzales
Lighting Techs: Mel Dorough, Soline Velazquez, Jason Henry
Video Director: David Vega
Video Techs: Dustin Engelskind, Shea Hack
Riggers: Gerald “Gmac” McDougald
Pyro Effects: Kenn MacDonald
Production Manager: Javier Alcaraz
Tour Manager: Dave Brown
Stage Manager: Lenny Rogers
Lighting/Video: VER
Staging: Tait Towers
Trucking: Upstaging
Rigging: VER
Special FX: Pyrotek
Gear
2 grandMA2 Full consoles
5 grandMA2 NPUs
36 Aryton MagicPanel 602s
60 Clay Paky Sharpys
12 Clay Paky Sharpy Washes
52 Martin MAC Viper Profiles
32 GLP impression X4s
17 Vari*Lite VL3500 Wash FXs
12 Robe Robin 100 LED Beams
20 Solaris LED Flares
66 Elation UV LED Pars
2 Hippotizer dual output media servers
532 VER Revolution Blades
72 VER WinVision 9mm panels
5 DF-50 hazers
For more Demi Lovato “Neon Lights” tour photos by Steve Jennings, go to:
http://www.prolightingspace.com/photo/albums/demi-lovato-2014-tour-extras
