PVRIS Glows with Bandit Lites

	PVRIS virtual live stream. Photo: Jordan Merrigan

On April 23, American rock back PVRIS broadcasted a virtual live stream with a lighting system from Bandit Lites as part of a festival exclusively for the students at the University of Arkansas. PVRIS's third studio album Use Me was released on August 28 with a deluxe album following in October.

With the COVID-19 pandemic halting live events and touring, the band virtually connected with fans with a performance of eight songs. Lighting designer Lenny Sasso used Mega Lite Circa Scoop, placing a dozen of them on poles of varying heights (ranging from the floor to up to six feet). Chauvet Rogue R2X Washes were used as side light and a grandMA2 ultra-lite provided control.

"I love this Circa Scoop," says Sasso. "The band and the camera crew were all just blown away by how versatile it truly is. I ran the fixture in 55ch. mode and was able to get all of these beautiful swirling effects around the band. I basically had three fixtures in one unit: I could go from a beautiful old school tungsten style scoop look with a nice slow dimmer fade and then snap to a really cool look with just the outer rings. Our video director commented to me about how unique it looked when you could have that center light completely fade away to the ring and it creates this black hole effect. The set was only eight songs but I was able to do eight completely different looks and never repeat anything."

The show took on a much more intimate atmosphere as the full band was not present due to travel restrictions. Sasso chose to approach the lighting by surrounding the present members with as many lights as possible at all different angles, meaning that as the cameras craned around the room, a fixture would always be in frame.

"I was able to capture a huge look with a very minimalist feeling to it," explains Sasso. "The vibe of Pvris is incredibly dynamic, often going from airy and dark to a complete 180 of very open and huge; I played around with these texture changes, creating shadows, silhouettes and accenting synth, guitar, and drum hits when they tend to pop out of the mix."

"It is always a pleasure to work with Lenny, he's a mellow cat and bring fresh designs and programming to each project," says Bandit client representative Shawn Lear. "Being a musician himself, his ques sync flawlessly with the band and what is happening on stage. His visual accompaniment in song transports viewers into the melody."

Bandit Lites is committed to prepping every show to the same standard of excellence, planning for the unexpected, even when everything runs entirely smoothly, which was the case for Sasso.

"We were treating this stream as a fly date; I showed up and everything was perfectly prepped for me," says Sasso. "It made me feel like I was halfway through a tour, I had no issues setting anything up. Sometimes when you're doing these quick throw-and-go shows you might have to compromise on fixture placement due to some oversight on the amount of spare cabling you have, but Bandit created a bunch of looms for me to where I was able to place any fixture wherever I wanted, and I had the perfect cable lengths to get there. Which sounds silly, but it made all the difference: I was able to get all of that depth that I wanted without any issue."

"It felt great being able to do a pseudo-gig again," adds Sasso. "Bandit was a total dream to work with on this show, and I would like to just give a shout out to the Pvris crew and band as well - they really crushed it too on this one."