The world’s most famous virtual band, Gorillaz, made their live debut in Australia in December 2010.

After headlining the UK’s Coachella and Glastonbury festivals earlier in the year, Gorillaz headed to the Southern Hemisphere to tour Perth, Adelaide, Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane and then Auckland.

The band – the brainchild of Blur singer Damon Albarn and Tank Girl cartoonist Jamie Hewlitt – consists of an eccentric animated quartet: singer and keyboardist 2-D, bassist Murdoc, guitarist Noodle and drummer Russel Hobbs.

As part of their first world tour the band included over 20 musicians on stage at any one time. JAS provided a D&B J system – and lots of it.

Date

December 11, 16, 19, 21

System

60 x d&b J series
16 x d&b J-sub
18 x d&b B2
Powered by d&b D12 amplifiers

FOH

DiGiCo SD7

Monitors

DiGiCo SD7
24 x L-Acoustics 115xt HiQ wedges

JAS audio crew

Craig Gordon
Conor Dunne
Guto Magic – Otavio Santos
Matthew ‘Boz’ Boaro

Powderfinger hit the road late in 2010 for their farewell tour of Australia and New Zealand. The band had decided after 20 years of making music and touring the world to call it a day and set out on the Sunsets Farewell tour. It consisted of arenas for the capitals cities and big-top tents for the regional areas. They toured for 3 months in total.

The band’s FOH operator Mark McElligot contacted JAS and asked for a D&B J system for the tour. He was enthusiatic about the systems amazing sound quality and knew that because of its size and weight it would be ideal for the big-top tents.

The system design incorporated J8 & J12 for the main and side hangs. J-subs were also flown with B2 subs on the ground.
The tour also had a B stage just in front of the FOH desk and with a separate monitor system package.

At Acer arena in Sydney a 2nd audio system was supplied and flown above the B stage and thus above the band.

Jet supported Powderfinger on the whole tour with FOH duties by “John Boy Rock” and Monitors by Will Burston.

Date

September 1 – October 16 2010

System

60 x d&b J series
16 x d&b J-sub
18 x d&b B2
Powered by d&b D12 amplifiers

Acer Arena B stage system

48 x Adamson Y18
24 x Adamson Y10

FOH

1 x Midas XL4
1 x Midas XL3 extender sidecar (B stage mix)
1 x Digidesign Profile (Jet and other acts)

Monitor system

1 x PM5DRH console
Nexo PS15 wedges
Nexo Alpha M3 side-fill system

JAS Audio Touring Crew

Conor Dunne
Craig Gordon
Mark Crawley

Global comedy ‘rock-star’, Russell Peters, brought his hillarious Green Card Tour to Australia in May. As part of his “Green Card Tour,” the shows featured all new material since the release of his latest DVD, “Red, White and Brown”. He was recently ranked by Forbes — along with Jerry Seinfeld and Chris Rock — as one of the top ten highest grossing stand-up comics in the U.S.

JAS supplied a D&B J series arena system for the shows at the Acer arena in Sydney and the Rod Laver arena in Melbourne.

Date

May 8, 9, 11, 14, 17, 20

System

56 x D&B J
12 x D&B J-sub
6 x D&B B2 sub
Digidesign SC48 FOH console

JAS crew

Audio system tech: Doug Pringle
Audio system tech: Otavio ‘Guto!!’ Santos

The 2010 Groovin the Moo festival took a big leap in production from the previous years. The festival promoters had asked how they could step up the production levels without too large an infrastructure change.

The festival featured Silverchair, Vampire Weekend, Empire of the Sun, Tegan and Sara, Grinspoon and many more and with such a large number of acts the promoter was keen to upgrade the system and maintain consistency across the festivals.

Bruce Johnston helped out as the festival production manager with Natalie Earles as the production assistant. James Leydon also was the advance production manager for the Townsville and Canberra sites.

Johnston Audio supplied a complete turnkey production management service to the festival.

Date

May 1-2, 8-9, 15

Bendigo – Maitland

Main stage 1 & 2

24 x L-Acoustics VDosc
24 x L-Acoustics SB218
12 x L-Acoustics ARCs

FOH Consoles

2 x Digidesign Profile consoles

Monitor consoles

2 x Yamaha PM5D consoles
1 x Digidesign Profile
1 x Digidesign D-show

Stage monitors

16 x Wayloud wedges
16 x Nexo PS15 wedges
4 x Nexo Alpha side-fill systems

JAS Crew

FOH system tech: Doug Pringle
FOH system tech: Jock Bain
Monitor system Tech: Nicholas Brunney
Monitor system Tech: Mark Nicholls
Audio system tech: Jamie Davidson
Audio system tech: Otavio ‘Guto !!’ Santos

Townsville – Canberra

Main stage 1 & 2

24 x L-Acoustics VDosc
24 x Wayloud SB218
12 x L-Acoustics ARCs

FOH Consoles

2 x Digidesign Profile consoles

Monitor consoles

2 x Yamaha PM5D consoles

Stage monitors

16 x Wayloud wedges
16 x Nexo PS15 wedges
4 x Nexo Alpha side-fill systems

JAS Crew

FOH system tech: Peter O’Leary
FOH system tech: Nathan McGuinness
Monitor system Tech: Mathew “Boz” Boaro
Monitor system Tech: Simon Keet
Audio system tech: Shaun Ayles
Audio system tech: Sam Figalo (Townsville only) Gordon Wood (Maitland only)

Lady Gaga hit Australia for the Monster Ball tour. It was the first Lady Gaga solo tour and a monster show that featured an elaborate stage set. The shows ran for over 2 hours with numerous costume changes and sets that morphed constantly between songs, moving from New York cityscapes to Tim Burton-esque dream worlds

Eighth Day Sound Systems, Inc supplied the console and monitor package along with 6 crew. JAS supplied the stacks and racks along with an additional 2 audio crew.

Dates

March 17 – April 9

System

60 x D&B J8/12
8 x D&B J-sub
18 x D&B B2
24 x L-Acoustics dV-Dosc
64 x 1 ton motors.

JAS Crew

Audio system tech: Josh De Jong
Audio system tech: Peter O’Leary

    Photos courtesy of Stephen Booth Photography

The Pixies returned to Australia for a sell out national tour. JAS provided a D&B J series system along with a M4 monitor system.

In a sign of things to come the shows were recorded live and CDs were available at the end of the show.

DATES

March 14 – 27

SYSTEM

32 x D&B J8/12 line array boxes
12 x D&B J-sub
6 x Q7
2 x Yamaha PM5DRH
3 x DV-Dosc sidefill systems
12 x D&B M4 wedges

JAS Crew

FOH system tech: Craig Gordon
Monitor system Tech: Mathew “Boz” Boaro
Audio system tech: Nathan McGuinness

    Photos courtesy of Stephen Booth Photography Click to enlarge

Held at the St Kilda and South Melbourne Albert Park race course, Johnston Audio was again asked to supply audio for the Melbourne Grand Prix after race concert. This year’s event ran over 2 nights with Simple Minds and Australia’s Powderfinger performing. A huge crowd of 30,000 people stayed for the shows.

Date

March 25-28 2010

Main speaker system

30 x V-Dosc
24 x SB218

Delay speaker system

16 x V-Dosc

FOH control

1 x Digidesign profile FOH console
1 x Midas XL4 console

Monitor system

2 x Yamaha PM5D monitor console
18 x Wayloud wedge

JAS crew

FOH system tech: Craig Gordon
Monitor system Tech: Mark Crawley
Audio system tech: Otavio ‘Guto!!’ Santos
Audio system tech: John Watterson

2010’s Future Music Festival featured The Prodigy, Empire Of The Sun, Franz Ferdinand, David Guetta and co along with new musical acts including: Spank Rock, Way Out West, Operator Please, Bag Raiders, Space Invadas and Jump Jump Dance Dance!

Dates

Feb 27-28, March 6-8

Melbourne Festival

Main stage

24 x L-Acoustics V-Dosc
24 x L-Acoustics SB218

Stage 2

24 x D&B J
18 x D&B B2 sub
1 x Digidesign Profile FOH console
1 x Yamaha PM5D
12 x D&B M4 wedge
2 x Nexo Alpha E side-fill systems

Stage 3

16 x D&B J
12 x D&B J- sub
1 x Digidesign Profile FOH console
1 x Yamaha PM5D
12 x Wayloud wedge
2 x Nexo Alpha E side-fill systems

Sydney festival

Main stage

24 x L-Acoustics V-Dosc
24 x L-Acoustics SB218

Adelaide festival

Main stage

24 x L-Acoustics V-Dosc
24 x L-Acoustics SB218

Prodigy package

Consoles

2 x Midas XL3
3 x quad D&B C4 side-fill systems Loud!!!
16 x D&B M2 wedges

Franz Ferdinand package

1 x Digidesign Profile FOH console
1 x Yamaha PM5D monitor console
2 x D&B M2 wedges

Whitney Houston hit Australia for her first tour here in over 20 years. JAS was asked to supply the D&B J system while the monitor and FOH package came from 8th Day sound.

DATES

Wednesday, 24 February – Sydney
Saturday, 27 February – Hunter Valley
Monday, 1 March – Melbourne
Thursday, 4 March – Adelaide
Saturday, 6-7 March – Perth

SYSTEM

60 x D&B J8/12 line array boxes.
12 x D&B J-subs.
6 x D&B B2
8 x D&B Q7

JAS Crew

FOH system tech: Doug Pringle
Audio system tech: Eric Sanderson-Evans

This year’s soundwave festival was a sell-out success and rocked Australia. With bands like Faith no More, Placebo, AFI, Paramore, Jimmy Eat World, Janes Addiction and many more it made for a huge few weeks.
The festival kicked off in Brisbane and ran over 2 long weekends.

With the 2 overnight festival events, JAS supplied the audio for the main stages 1 & 2 and it was decided this year to tour the systems and duplicate the audio. V-Dosc speakers were used to provide consistency throughout the festivals and sideshows at the Horden Pavilion and Festival hall which both have in-house V-Dosc systems.

JAS supplied a total of 10 Digidesign Profile console systems and also Jamie Davidson as the console tech for the entire run.

Dates

February 20-21, 26-27
March 1

SYSTEM A

Main stage 1 & 2
36 x V-Dosc over 3 x 12 hangs
36 x SB218
12 x ARC

FOH Consoles

3 x Digidesign Profile consoles
1 x Digidesign D-show

Monitor consoles

2 x Yamaha PM5D consoles
1 x Digidesign Profile
1 x Digidesign D-show

Stage monitors

24 x Wayloud wedges
16 x Nexo PS15 wedges
4 x Nexo Alpha side-fill systems

JAS Crew

FOH system tech: Jock Bain
FOH system tech: Nathan McGuinness
Monitor system Tech: Mathew “Boz” Boaro
Monitor system Tech: Dave Leggatt
Audio system tech: Shaun Ayles
Audio system tech: Stephen Brown
Audio system tech: Jamie Davidson

SYSTEM B

Main stage 1 & 2
36 x V-Dosc over 3 x 12 hangs
36 x Wayloud SB218
12 x ARC

FOH Consoles

3 x Digidesign Profile consoles
1 x Digidesign D-show

Monitor consoles

2 x Yamaha PM5D consoles
1 x Digidesign Profile
1 x Digidesign D-show

Stage monitors

24 x Wayloud wedges
16 x Nexo PS15 wedges
4 x Nexo Alpha sidefill systems

JAS Crew

FOH system tech: Peter O’leary
FOH system tech: Josh DeJong
Monitor system Tech: Richie Robinson
Monitor system Tech: Mark Nicholls
Audio system tech: Nahuel Gutierrez
Audio system tech: Otavio ‘Guto!!’ Santos
Audio system tech: Scott Barry