Robe lights black metal gurus Emperor
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The band, spearheaded the Norwegian inspired second wave of the genre in the 1990s, and now reform occasionally for special performances and festivals playing hits from their three seminal albums of that era. These are always sold out. A loyal cult following of dedicated fans worldwide are renowned for their enthusiasm and nowhere was that more evident than in Latin America.
Dennis enjoys the theatrical and dramatic potential of black metal was very excited to land in the LD ‘hot seat’ for Emperor earlier in 2021.
The Latam shows were the first gigs of the year for the band, the first time Emperor had played the territory outside of Mexico City and also a first for Dennis’s touring experience.
The band gave him an impression of how they wanted to the lighting to look, basically maintaining a classic 1990s signature, a task much harder than it sounds, especially with music characterised by being extremely fast-and-furious with screeching vocals and loud distorted guitar riffs.
Apart from that, he was left to his own devices and imagination and wanted to build to build an atmosphere and a mysterious aura with copious haze and minimal front light.
He took the colours of the three albums’ artwork – red, blue, and green – and while some might find that limiting, he found it liberating in terms of stimulating imagination and developing enough visual variety and an appropriate lightshow.
Robe Pointes were chosen as the main beam lights. “Pointes are great beam and spot fixtures with interesting gobos and constant output across the whole beam even when zoomed in,” he says..
He worked hard to make the show look elegant, “There were several defining moments in the music where I could slow down with the lights, and it was vital to have these contrasts to the totally manic parts of the set.”
The beams were also used to accentuate and widen the stage space amplifying and making it appear larger.
The Latin America tour featured shows at the Auditoria Blackberry in Condesa; Mexico City, at the Royal Center Bogota, Colombia; at the Teatro Caupolicán, Santiago, Chile and in Sao Paolo, Brazil at the Audio Club.
A realist, Dennis had managed his expectations for the kit sensibly, and was pleasantly surprised when Robe Pointes and Spiiders were present at every gig and in “excellent condition” which meant he could deliver the precision show he had had carefully crafted for the band.
He praises the Robe and other distribution networks in all these countries for being able to source leading brands on the 3000-seater circuit and was in fact the first time that Dennis had used Spiiders on one of his own designs.
He appreciates the deep saturated colours of the Spiiders which were a key to this show, and remarks on the “outstanding” colour consistency between the different types of Robe lights. “I don’t often use LED wash lights for pixel effects, for me it should be a good decent wash light with great coverage that brings plenty of colour and a certain quality of light to the stage,” and that is exactly what the Spiiders delivered.
