Felix Peralta has been lighting Café Tacvba for about eight years now. Late this November and early December, he got to use his formidable design chops to create a powerful lightshow for the band’s 35th anniversary celebration that was as bold and wide-ranging as his client’s music.
The magic Peralta worked at the three sold out Café Tacvba arena shows in Guadalajara, Monterrey, and Mexico City drew heavily on colour rendering and dynamic effects from 40 COLORado PXL 12 Curve motorised battens and 130 Color STRIKE M motorised strobe-washes. Adding extra punch to the three-hour show were 64 high output STRIKE Array 4 blinders.
“Among the many wonderful things about lighting Café Tacvba is that they give you the opportunity to take your design in all sorts of directions,” said Peralta. “Working with Lighting Directors Chris Fernandez and Diego Rabadan, Head Gaffer/LD Eduardo “Toto” Lopez, and Lead Technician Angel Alvarado, we had a blast moving through a wide range of looks with the band. Of course, to do this, we needed fixtures that could contribute to a lot of different ways. We leaned on the PXL Curve bars to help “bend light,” wash the stage, and create unique architectural shapes. The Color STRIKE Ms were great as strobes, shock and awe. and pixel effects.”
Peralta and his team met this challenge in flying colours, in part by using an automation truss system, and vanish stealth screen that helped them come up with varied backgrounds throughout the 35-song set list.
“When we first started to discuss these special anniversary shows with band and management, we all understood that the main goal was to create a set list that would give the fans what they wanted — a set list showcasing some their greatest hits over a 35-year span!” said Peralta. “The band really wanted a hand-crafted show that would give the fans an evening they would never forget.”
“We typically use very little video with our shows, relying more on the lighting side for the overall visuals,” continued Peralta. “But for these special anniversary shows we incorporated a vanish stealth screen with a lot of transparency that allowed us to have a lighting system behind the screen for the songs with no video. Over the past few years, we had done a tour with an orchestra that was very successful. For the 35th anniversary shows, we decided to do a section of the show with a ‘virtual orchestra, on the screen. This proved to be hugely successful — the fans really enjoyed it.”
On the back end of the show, Peralta chose the route of IMAG treated NotchFX blocks to focus attention on the principal four band members. These IMAG treatments were carved out in a “surgical way,” to compliment the different automated truss shapes that Peralta was creating at this point in the show.
“The tools in our rig were really critical in defining the last act of the show,” said Peralta. “Our once-clean design canvas morphed into these unique shapes as the band continued their 35-year eclectic hit journey. None of this would have been possible without the commitment and dedication of our vendors, venue staff & local labor in the three cities. It truly took a ‘village’ to help bring these shows to life.”
