UK - Masters of metal Motorhead returned to the UK after the festival season for a limited special run of autumn shows. To kick these dates up a notch, lighting designer Caio Bertti started from scratch, devising a simple yet extremely powerful lighting theme, with an ultra-versatile Avolites' Sapphire Touch console as the ace up his sleeve.
Bertti's design is traditional rock and roll, yet with a contemporary edge of LED and moving lights mixed in with ever-faithful Par Cans. Preferring to control the show on the fly, Caio specified the highly intuitive Sapphire Touch.
"With Motorhead, if you have music in your blood you'll have a great show," says the Brazilian designer. "There's no cue-list, there's no time coding, it's just in my head and fingers. You have to play the board, which is why I chose the Sapphire Touch. It gives me more freedom and I can run through the options on the songs very quickly. The new software is also very useful now that we have the tracking back-up mode just in case. For me, specifying the Sapphire Touch was a matter of necessity."
Bertti has kept it simple, choosing not to mix effects together and playing his Sapphire Touch in harmony with the band.
"Simplicity is key on this show. We have groups of lights that are predictable in the way they flash - they're very powerful and punchy - and the Sapphire Touch is a very straightforward tool. You don't have to be specific about timing, and I really like the high-brightness touch screens; it's very easy to use and allows me to be more hands-on."
Bertti is a long-time Avolites fan, having used the consoles since 1994.
"The clever thing about Avolites is the way the desks allow designers to clone fixtures - you can still have a great show without your intended lighting rig because of the cloning feature. I understand other desks have that too, but they are nowhere near as intuitive and efficient as the Sapphire Touch."
Motorhead's tour continues with a date in the Netherlands, before another festival run next summer.