Toby Keith - American Ride Tour - Mobile Production Pro

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Bandit Lites continued from 30Bandit team went above and beyond the callof duty and the Bandit standard was in forceon New Year’s Eve from LA to New Yorkto London to Beijing, Honk Kong and backagain.As the new era came rushing in Bandit continuedto add new inventory, employee andtrain more staff, and purchase more real estate.There was certainly a market for the highquality product that had become known as the“Bandit Standard.” Michael Strickland and histeam continued to listen to the clients desireson a one on one basis as they had alwaysdone. As the needs of each client are different,Bandit carefully crafted a custom solution forevery need always working within the frameworkof the Bandit Standards.Many high profile events came to Bandit,starting with the Presidential Inaugural Balls.Bandit was chosen in 2001 and 2005 to lightthe four largest celebrations in Washington DCfor the incoming President. In the UK, Banditwas tapped as the lighting supplier for the prestigiousBlenheim Palace Festivals. Bandit beganwhat is an ongoing relationship with NASCARin the U.S. by lighting the culmination of theNASCAR racing season, the NASCAR CupAwards, held every year in New York at theworld famous Waldorf Astoria Hotel andbroadcast live on worldwide television.In the European market as the Lord of theDance brand continued to grow, MichaelFlatley turned to Bandit and rolled out twonew and very successful products, Feet ofFlames and Celtic Tiger. The Feet of Flamestour gave its swan song at a sold out HydePark performance to over 100,000 exuberantfans. For 10 continuous years the Banditstaff has helped Flatley deliver the message ofIrish Dance globally with troupes in the U.K.,Europe, Asia, South America and the U.S. Thepeople at Bandit are very proud of the work onthese shows.Bandit would have many opportunities to workon the grandest stages in Europe with the bestpeople in the entertainment industry. Manynotable events were supported by Bandit inHyde Park including sold out mega events byR.E.M., the fore mentioned Feet of Flamesand the reunion of the legendary rock icons,Queen.In 2004 designer Steve Cohen engaged Banditfor the long awaited reunion of the monstersof rock, Van Halen. The dazzling Cohendesign for Eddie, Sammy and the gang tookthe world by storm as the Van Halens fiercebrand of music was heard again for the firsttime in over a decade. The rig was massive asalways and featured 300+ moving lights andaudience abuse beyond belief.As Bandit continued to grow in the UK andEurope, the opportunity presented itself tosponsor a Porsche Super Cup car, which racedbefore the Formula 1 races on the same courses.As racing is the sport of interest to mostentertainment people, Bandit took advantageof this situation and for two years, Bandit andtheir clients had unfettered access to the pitand paddock area of every F1 race. Everyoneinvolved was very excited during this timefame. This also led to Bandit illuminating anumber of F1 cars, booths and events.In the early part of the decade, Bandit lit moreand more television specials and events. TheClinton Economic Summit led into a numberof political events for years to come with someof the most notable names in TV lighting.Bandit lit several conferences in the East Roomof The White House as time progressed. MTV,CNN, CBS, NBC, ABC, FOX, VH 1, BBC,SKY TV and many other entities becameregular clients of Bandit. Rob Baxter andRandy Nordstrom engaged Bandit to light theNBA Finals entertainment for worldwide TVin the mid 2000’s. The move into sports wouldcontinue globally as the U.K. office began tolight soccer Premier League events and othersuch items. Radio One’s One Big Weekendbecame a Bandit client in 2003 and a host ofcurrent pop and rock stars made the event avery special day. The crew form Bandit madethe difference as they lived up to their nameas quality people. The Cork Festival in Irelandalso engaged Bandit and the people made theevent a success here as well!For many years the Country Music Associationused Bandit Lites as the illumination companyfor a huge event known as Fan Fair held everyyear in Nashville. Virtually every artist of notein the country music industry participatesin this event. In 2003 the name of the eventwas changed to “CMA Music Festival” as itbecame one of the biggest music festivals inthe world. In addition to the name change thevenue was changed as well when it moved intothe Tennessee Titans Football Stadium, playingto 80,000 people a night for 4 nights. Banditwas charged with lighting two side-by-side stageswith a large number of of moving and staticlights and the new (at the time) LED lightinggear. This event is broadcast worldwide on livetelevision every year and features the biggestnames in country music.Always a week after the CMA Music Festivaland 100 miles below Nashville in sleepy littleManchester, Tennessee occurs the worldrenowned Bonnaroo Festival. Bandit is proudto have been the lighting supplier from thestart and pleased to have the opportunity towork with Hadden Hippsley and the team atBonnaroo. Hadden works yearly with DizzyGosnell and Steve Powell from Bandit to comeup with the design, schedule and equipmentthat works over a four-day period to satisfythe different headline acts as well as the manyother acts on the stages each day. Since thebeginning of the fesival The Police, Metallica,Neil Young, Pearl Jam, Kayne West, JackJohnson, Ben Harper, The Dead, The AllmanBrothers Band, Radiohead, Dave MatthewsBand, Tom Petty, Widespread Panic, Phish,James Brown, String Cheese Incident andother acts graced the stage at Bonnaroo.Bandit had the pleasure of working with allof these acts to insure a successful evening foreach of them.The demand on Bandit in the U.S. pushed allof the facilities and staff beyond the limit andin 2002 Bandit purchased a 150,000 squarefoot building in Nashville. This new buildingin conjunction with the previous 30,000 squarefoot facility gave the company the muchneededspace to deliver even more quality jobs,employee and train more staff, and make lifebetter for both staff and clients. As the newfacility serves as storage and preparation area,the previous facility was dedicated to being afull time rehearsal facility for use by Banditclients, and at no charge to the client! OnlyBandit offers this service! The old facility wasnamed Venue One and is booked 40 weeksevery year. Every system is completed in prepand then goes to Venue One to hang and allowthe LD 3 or more days to do his base programming.This became an invaluable tool for Banditclients as the light systems now show up fullyprepped, labeled, tested and programmed!This saves the artists thousands of dollars whenthey begin their tours. Bandit now servicesthe U.S. from its three bases in Knoxville,Nashville and San Francisco. Mike Golden,Pete Heffernan, Dizzy Gosnell, Lee AnneCooke, Richard Willis, Brent Barrett, StevePowell, JR Sander, Richard Owens, RothEdwards, Leonard Cox, Kimberly Ainge, CoriLink and a great staff steer things in the U.S.and are the best in the world at what they do!Going from strength to strength, the Banditinstallation sales team has grown and becomebetter and better. Today, led by Senior SalesDirector John Rolison, with Richard Owens,Roth Edwards, Chris Barbee, John Jenkinsonand an invaluable support staff, Bandit alwayshas multiple installations ongoing. FromCNN Studios to Home Shopping Network toRipley’s Aquarium to The Superdome in NewOrleans, Bandit delivers constant service andquality to the worlds top facilities. The churches,schools and theaters that have used Banditfor their installations over the years numbersin the thousands. Bandit is hired because ofthe attention to detail and the delivery of theBandit Standard to a job site. Turnkey installationwith exemplary service after the sale is thehallmark of Bandit Lites sales team!Corporate firms globally have come to trustBandit with their image presentation resultingin a large number of high profile events Bandithas presented. When industry leader HarleyDavidson celebrated their 100 th Anniversary inMilwaukee Wisconsin Bandit Lites was there toilluminate Elton John, Tim McGraw and manyother world-class artists as well as a crowd ofover 100,000 Harley fanatics. The entire eventwas a television special. Playboy magazinetuned 50 in 2005 and selected Bandit to lighttheir traveling exhibit of memorabilia as ittoured the world for a year. This was a jobmost of the Bandit staff fought to take part in.Hef himself was out on a number of events,and there were always a large number of thesignature Bunnies.The one of a kind Chevrolet Corvette turned50 in 2006 and once again, Bandit was thecompany of choice to make this revolutionarycar shine at the event. People from around theworld turned out to pop the Champaign corksand herald the 50 th of the original muscle carwith Bandit lighting the entire gala. Finally, thelegendary Fender Stratocaster turned 50 andcelebrated in London with a star-studded event36 mobile production monthly
for the ages. Brian May, Joe Walsh, DavidGilmour, Paul Rodgers, Ronnie Wood, GaryMoore, Paul Carrick, Mike Rutherford, AmyWinehouse and many other celebrities playedat the event with Bandit providing a 50 footStrat guitar out of truss and lights along withthe rest of a massive Baz Halpin lighting rig.Bandit continues to diversify into new areasand has for years worked with designerSimon Tutchener on London Fashion Week,a very large, posh, high profile endeavor. Thewildly popular TV show X Factor hit theroad with Bandit as the hire company andworldwide sensation UFC, Ultimate FightingChampionship has contracted with Banditfor their European lighting needs. The finepeople at Production North, Steve Levitt, IanWhitehead and Sarah Hollis as well as theirstaff have worked may different jobs withBandit through the new decade and both partiesare very happy each time the opportunitypresents itself.A 15-year Bandit client, WWE, has continuedto grow and trust in Bandit as each bigextravaganza is larger than the one before. Theteam of Kevin Dunn, Jason Robinson, DuncanLeslie and Michael Grossman work tirelesslyevery day to deliver the best world-class sportsentertainment television. Over 1,000 hours oflive TV are shot every year with 16 major PayPer Views and the grand daddy of them all,Wrestlemania. Bandit delivers lighting qualityin bulk at an unmatched level. The biggestevent yet was the just complete WrestlemaniaXXIV at the Citrus Bowl in Orlando, Florida.As the company grows, so Bandit continues todevelop and manufacture products to meet themarket. Bandit proudly uses its own PowerPropower distribution system in the U.S. andSystem 125 in Europe. System 125 powerdistribution equipment was purpose designedto meet all VDE, UK and EU standards andall components are CE marked. The patentedBandit Moto Data and motor controlsystems are synonymous with a Bandit systemon a global basis. The manual motor controlconsoles with a virtual light rig on the facewith switches occurring where the motors arelocated is both an artistic masterpieces, a musthave safety device and a great piece of wall artafter a tour!The industry as a whole continues to morphinto new versions of itself. Somewhere alongthe way, the Vari Lite brand was purchasedby Genlyte, and latter by Phillips. As the VariLite products were made available to purchase,Bandit took one look and bought in big. TodayBandit is one of the world’s largest Vari Literental houses with a complete offering of thefine products. Owning the VL products hasallowed Bandit to work with a pool of qualitydesigners that previously used other vendors.Vari Lite are proud partners as both headtoward the next decade. Lead by TSD leadersRoth Edwards and Jake Tickle, Bandit had oneof the best VL service capabilities on the globeas well. The sales team also is successful inmoving VL products into new installations.Bandit has fully embraced the brave new worldof digital lighting with numerous media servers,sophisticated consoles, LED products andother innovative technology. There is a lotof time and money being spent at Bandit totrain the staff in the application and operationof the many new technologies. This educationbenefits each individual, each clientand Bandit. The entire industry gains fromconstant education. Mr. Rick Berry, Directorof Global Education Services teaches classesconstantly in all offices and maintains anunbelievable digital database of all technicalthings Bandit related. Any Bandit tech canaccess the entire knowledge base from anycomputer in the world. This accomplishment isno small feet. The Bandit Global IT DirectorJim Guinn along with Jeff Vogt and the entireteam keep a worldwide VPN up and running24 hours a day, 7 days a week.Thus far Bandit has had the great fortune towork with many of the worlds leading talents,including Willie Williams, Seth Jackson, BazHalpin, Dave Davidian, Simon Tutchener,Randy Nordstrom, Sean Motley, Sid Strong,Tellison James, Patrick Woodroffe, Mark Fisher,Abbey Rosen Holmes, Mark Cunniffe, AndiWatson, Bob Peterson, Dave Butzler, KeithWissmar, Peter Morse, Mike Swinford, AllenBranton, Steve Cohen, Joel Young and a hostof others. Each day the staff at Bandit looksforward to making new friends and gaining thetrust and respect of new designers.Bandit has had the pleasure thus far thisdecade to work with, among others, VanHalen, Queen, Seal, Alice Cooper, BarryManilow, Christina Aguilera, Def Leppard,Donny Osmond, CSNY, Elvis Costello,Jackson Browne, Jimmy Buffett, Keith Urban,Linkin Park, Mark Knopfler, Melissa Ethridge,Offspring, Radiohead, REM, Savage Garden,Star Wars, Status Quo, Toby Keith, TimMcGraw, Faith Hill, Roxy Music, BrianWilson, Westlife, ZZ Top, Ben Harper, JackJohnson, Shinedown, Santana, Dierks Bentley,Garth Brooks, Disturbed, John Fogerty, LynyrdSkynyrd, Martina McBride, Pink, PussycatDolls, Joe Cocker, String Cheese Incident,System of a Down, Cbeebies, Girls Aloud,Shayne Ward, Travis, White Stripes, SmashingPumpkins, Carrie Underwood, Brooks andDunn, Alan Jackson and many, many otherfine artists. The roster is impressive and growingand all at Bandit Lites are committed toexcellence today, tomorrow and forever!Bandit continues to be committed to a betterfuture not only with the aggressive educationprograms, full time employment, great retirementplans and great benefit packages for staff,but also through active partnerships with manymajor schools and universities. Every year hundredsof students work at Bandit on internshipsand gain insight and education into the realworld operation of the entertainment industry.In the UK Bandit works with LiverpoolInstitute of Performing Arts, or LIPA, which isSir Paul McCartney’s personal mission. Everyyear Sir Paul and Bandit present the awardto the Lighting Designer of the Year at LIPAgraduation. There is a very active partnershipin Nashville with Belmont University and inKnoxville with the University of Tennesseeto help young students advance in the worldof entertainment lighting. Bandit also offersinternships to a wide number of universitiesacross the globe.As Bandit moves into the second decade ofthe new millennium, the opportunities andrewards have been unbelievable and all at thefirm are grateful. The future looks very promisingand the staff is very eager to move aheadand provide the industry with the best possibleillumination services on the planet. It would beremiss to not also mention the wonderful wives,husbands and families of all the Bandit staffglobally, as without their unbelievable supportnone of the last forty years would have beenpossible. Bandit management salutes all of thefamily members for the part that they haveplayed in the success of this great team!In February 2008 Bandit Lites celebrated it40 th birthday Pollstar CIC awarded the covetedLighting Company of the Year Awardas the best of the best! This was the 16 th timeBandit has won such an award, more than anyother lighting company in the world! This wasall made possible by the dedication and desireof the fine people that are indeed the heartand soul of Bandit Lites.Since 2008 there have been a number of substantialchanges to the company. One suchchange is the elevation of Pete Heffernan asBandit’s President and COO. “I’ve been realfortunate to have been involved with Banditfor 30 years and watch the transition of theentire lighting industry evolve into what it is.”Says Heffernan, “It’s been interesting to it gofrom little two truss systems to the big megashows where you ask ‘how big can it be’ to nowwhere the question is ‘how economical can itbe.’”Then there was the addition of the GRNLiteprogram. Heffernan explained GRNLite,“Basically it’s a comprehensive system that canprovide pars, eight lights, strips, wash and movingwashes in an LED format. It’s not a hodgepodgeof t this manufacturer and that. It’s allone system with interchangeable LED parts.It’s meant as a package more than an add onto a more traditional system. ”One such example of that was this year’s TobyKeith “American Ride” tour wherein designerSeth Jackson had very little of anything elsebut GRNLite product. In addition to theobvious benefite of lo power usage, a rig thatwould use a fully integrated LED system isinvariably going to weigh less because of thelack of cabling and ballasts and other suchcomponents needed for an arch or incandescentlighting instrument. There is also thediminished heat on the stage to be consideredas well.By all accounts this new development has beenwell accepted with systems out on Crosby, Stillsand Nash, Jackson Brown, Alice Cooper andRob Zombie.If one were to sum up the last forty yearsof Bandit Lites success it would be simplyput: Humility, Humanomics and The BanditStandard. As long as Bandit delivers thesethree things with grace and passion, the skywill be the limit! >mobile production monthly 37
Page 1 and 2: volume 3 issue 10 2010
Page 3 and 4: Lift, Track, and Move Any Lighting,
Page 5 and 6: contentsvolume 3 issue 10 2010Toby
Page 7 and 8: Los Angeles Convention Center, LA,
Page 9 and 10: harman.comIn fact with 27 output bu
Page 11 and 12: completely blank canvas to show jus
Page 13 and 14: FROM Karl KuenningIt was a rainy da
Page 15: Alicein ChainsFun on the Road.As Bl
Page 18 and 19: center video wall. With the center
Page 20: Commercial grade quality and compet
Page 23 and 24: At first blush Toby Keith’s 2010
Page 25 and 26: was put forth by long time FOH engi
Page 27 and 28: to a country beat. In the current e
Page 29 and 30: Lance Stoner - Tour Rigger/Drum Tec
Page 32 and 33: mpmBandi Lites mpm featureBandit Li
Page 34: Syncrolite mpm featureSyncroliteWhe
Page 40 and 41: Moo TV continued from 28Even within
Page 42 and 43: ADVERTISER’S IndexAccess Pass & D

Toby Keith - American Ride Tour - Mobile Production Pro

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