Maverick MK Pyxis tours with Louis The Child

USA - Success has not spoiled Louis The Child, nor has it made this pair of Chicago-bred DJs any less daring when it comes to reshaping their distinctive brand of EDM music. Since bursting on the scene two years ago with the highly original and spacey tune It’s Strange, the duo has continued to jump head first into the creative cauldron. Rather than resting on their laurels, they show a fearless willingness to experiment with novel eclectic synths, push percussion assemblages to the limit, and in general do whatever it takes to reach new musical heights.
The same Louis The Child philosophy is at play when it comes to lighting their shows. Going into their 32 -city Last To Leave Tour, which started 12 October, the pair told the team at Creative Production & Design (Austin, TX) that they wanted a lightshow that looked radically different from the one that had been so well received on their previous tour.
The CPD team readily obliged, coming up with a design that drew much of its vitality from a new, convention-defying fixture, the Maverick MK Pyxis from Chauvet Professional.
“Given the nature of Louis The Child’s music, we wanted a show that stood out,” said Justin Jenkins, owner of CPD. “Standing out becomes a lot more doable when you have a fixture that does things that nothing else does, which is how I’d describe Pyxis. When I first saw this fixture, I knew that its centre beam, independent pixel ring, infinite pan and tilt, zoom and other features really made it different.”
Jenkins told CPD’s Kendall Clark, Louis The Child’s LD, about the new fixture. He too immediately saw the possibilities. “The artists wanted more video this year, because they didn’t have much of it on their last tour,” said Clark. “They felt this would make their show different, but I always prefer to break up video, rather than have one continuous wall, since this gives you more balance and showcases the stage design and artists more.
“I knew that if we wanted to break the video wall up into sections on this tour, we would have to intersperse those sections with lights,” continued Clark. “But to do that we would need fixtures that were very dynamic, fast with pixel mapping so they could blend with the video and create some cool looks. The Pyxis and the Rogue R1 FX-B were both perfect for this, so we started coming up with ideas for an integrated design that blended video and these fixtures.”
“Kendall’s vision was to create an integrated and immersive look where video and lighting flowed together,” said Wyatt. “Our job was to develop a special rig that allowed us to float lights in the air so he could create that look. The Pyxis fit this concept very well, because it was compact and you could get so many different looks out of it, so you needed fewer fixtures. This allowed us to reduce the load on our pod structures. We were also able to fit everything in one trailer for the tour -- and since the design is modular, we can expand it or contract it for different size stages.”
(Jim Evans)

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