Gig Report - A Club Called Spud - 9th May 2007
I was a bit late getting to the gig last night. The taxi I ordered never showed so was standing outside with four bags packed with laptops, projectors, cables, and blu-tac looking a bit flummoxed. Shan’t be using that taxi company again! Finally waved down a cab and, after a short journey, arrived and tumbled out of the door slightly stressed, phone glued to my ear speaking to Martin who was telling me about our next Belle Atmos gig (19th May). Mark, whose night it was, helped me with the bags but only as far as the door, which were still locked as no one had turned up to unlock them. A couple of guys from the band were waiting too, the four of sheltered in the doorway from the harsh sea winds. Fortunately the man with the keys turned up shortly after and we bustled downstairs, bags in tow.
It was already getting on for eight o’clock, almost an hour later than we had anticipated. I set to work placing the two projectors, running cables, and laying down the gaffer tape. The part of the club I had originally thought of setting up in was unfortunately too near a fire exit so I ended up being at the back of the stage. Though I was working as fast as I could, and working up a sweat as I climbed up and down ladders, and plugged boxes into boxes into boxes, I needed a bit of a hand with the projectors. Fortunately Charles (VJ Spank) was only a phone call away and kindly offered to come down and help out. Also there was Mary who helped out applying blu-tac to the corners of a pile of A4 paper that I was planning to use as screens.
With the projectors in place I kicked PatchBox into action and began drawing out areas on the walls to use as screens, matching them to the various configurations of paper attached to the wall. I didn’t have as long as I’d like to spend on this part of the set up, and could’ve done with another hour of fiddling about, but people were starting to come in as I hurriedly put up the last few sheets. On top of the eleven video screens, I added three or four spot lights for the band, enabling us to kill the normal stage lighting and achieve a much more interesting environment.
Once set up, everything worked really well and had lots of people interested and impressed by the visuals. Saw one guy quickly waving his hand in front of one of the projectors trying to figure out how it was all working.
It’s quite a liberation not working to a 4:3 screen, and as my brother (who took the photos) pointed out, it didn’t detract from the band - as sometimes a large screen can do - rather it helped create the ambience, which is something that I’m very keen on developing when working with performers.
The next stage for PatchBox is to add masking to the screens so they can achieve any shape (even animated masks) and add the ability to group screens so that a single image can be spread across them like a matrix.
Met and had a nice chat with JFB too, who was playing in the band. Hope to go and see him do his turntablism thing a week on Friday at the Concorde 2.
So a good night, all in all. Must just say special thanks to Charles for the projectors and being on hand to help out, and Mark for the gig and making sure I had everything I needed.
More photos of the night available at flickr.