Busy Busy!!!

Wow, thats all I can say. The last two days have been a blur. I'll start with yesterday and try to get through as much of today as I can. I also activated mobile blogging so I should be able to post from my phone by texting a certain secret number... So ill have to give that a try. Maybe I can post some pictures through that too.

Well yesterday we started work around 8 and worked until 10pm or so... We started by pinning all the vertecs together, and then the riggers lowered the chain hoists down and we attached the arrays and hoisted them up. They are amazing!! we also have JBL VRX 932 as front and side fills both flying and ground stacked. and Apogee AE-5's hanging as foldbacks/monitors. Then came the amp racks with all of there soco cables and NL-4 and NL-8 breakouts for the vertec arrays. We are running the main arrays with Crown Macrotechs and we are running the fills with Crown Xti's

Rob is our buddy from MSI (the company we rented the equipment from ($27,900 worth in case you were wondering)) He is AWESOME!!!! I mean we walked in after he had been tuning the system during lunch and it sounded like a Meyer sound mica array. It was amazing. So after we had blasted some DMB just to check the system out I went back to do some work on the amp rack and thought I was in a dream because I was holding the NL-4 cables for the subs in my hand yet it already sounded amazing... So it goes without saying that after we hooked the subs up it sound really really good.

In other news we have 16 channels of Shure UHF Wireless with Beta 87A capsules. Yamaha M7CL Board and 4 Christie Projectors Projecting on a 87 x 150 foot screen... In HD of course :)

So just to clarify, We have the same board that Dave Matthews Band is on tour with...

The same Speakers Bruce Springsteen is on Tour with...

The same Mics Coldplay is on tour with.

I wont even get into lights tonight....... :)

ttyl,

Patrick

P.S. Im off to the Staff Show tonight. Then rehersals for Opening Show and then finally sleep :)

Afternoon Activities

Well after heading over to Assembly Hall to work on whatever had to be done we were assigned an ultra special secret mission that cannot be revealed at the current time. After working on that for 2 hours or so, we are now exhausted from a fun filled and strenuous day of travel. Now we are just laying in the dorm room with the A/C cranked way up. Dinner is in our building so that is a nice feature. We are headed there soon and then its off to bed. We were tracking the truck online and it is like 5 hours behind schedule, so load in will start at 8am.

I'll update you on the food in the morning.

Cheers,

Patrick

WE'RE HERE!!!!!

Well, we finally made it. After getting Christians checked baggage which was not an issue so I cant complain too much :) we proceeded on to the registration transportation table in the airport where we checked and waited for the van. Chevy Express 15 Passenger, with 8 people and a lot of luggage. It was about an hour and a half drive from the airport to the campus. After we got all checked in and received our tags and swipy card :) we went up to the beautifully air-conditioned room and dropped our stuff. Then we walked over to the assembly hall which is a short walk from our room. Our swipy card can get us into any building and our staff tag means we can eat at any dining hall at any time :) We went into the assembly hall where we were meeted with a whole bunch of union people hanging lights and trussing and nailing down staging... after a while we walked around to find the sound people. We met Berry and some other guy whose name I cant remember... They are AWESOME guys!!! after talking to them for more than an hour we found out alot about the ways the shows are run and I finaly got the list of equipment :) JBL VERTEC Arrays, VRX Arrays for side fills and Crown amps and a Yamaha M7CL Digital Console :) I am soooooooooooo excited!!!! So anyway, we kinda found out that we are the first two sound people here and we just have some time to hang out and help the union guys with the lights if we want which of course we will do. The truck with the Video and Audio stuff should get in around 9pm tonight so we will unload it and then go to sleep so we can get up and start helping the union guys with rigging and hanging in the morning. So right now thats the plan, both me and Christian are starving, so we're going to try to find something to eat and then we are off to help the union people.

-Patrick

P.S. Ill try to post some pictures.

Plane from Detroit to Indianapolis

On a DC-9 headed to Indianapolis, flying time is just under 45 minutes but they were doing construction in Detroit so there was a 15 minute delay or so… I feel better now because I bought a $7 sandwich and a $3 cookie… Now I’m just waiting to get my apple juice on this plane, which I really hope they still give out even though it is a short flight. Once we land in Indianapolis we will have to go to the baggage claim so Christian can claim his checked bag… no comment… but anyway, we are both sitting together on this flight which is good. And we have an empty seat in the row. I have been very very happy with the northwest flights on the way so far. The landing from Albany to Detroit was very smooth and the flight crews have been very nice to talk to. There is one other guy on this plane that is going to NOAC but he doesn’t have a uniform on… probably going out for old guy’s staff.
I’ll update again when we arrive in Bloomington.
-Patrick
P.S. No apple juice  just water, and I almost just dumped it on the laptop. Haha.

Plane from Albany to Detroit

Well, as I sit here on a plane crossing over Syracuse and write this I am kind of tired and VERY excited, So I guess the excitement outweighs the tiredness  We left right on time it’s about an hour and a half flight on an Airbus A320-300. I have 2 empty seats next to me… that’s right, a whole row to myself… Christian has an empty seat next to him too so neither one of us really wants to move…
After we land in Detroit we have about an hour layover so we’ll find something to eat and I’ll attempt to post this somewhere where everyone can read it.
Oh and one last note, If you ever want to see a priceless look on a TSA agents face just try to go through security with two people and, 2 laptops, 4 sets of headphones, 3 radios, 50 feet of random cables and connectors, an SPL meter, a couple microphones, a telex headset, a couple iPods and a boy scout uniform on  ha-ha, it was quite funny when she had to take everything out of my bag and hand search it and then Christian walks up behind me and she’s like “do you have a bag full of this stuff too??” ha-ha.
I’ll keep you updated.
-Patrick

P.S. I’m about to get my juice  And Peanuts!!! It’s been a long time since I’ve had peanuts on a plane.