#293 - Jeff Ravitz

Episode #293 With Jeff Ravitz, one of the earliest television, I guess, lighting for televised concert guys that there is out there and was out there and still doing it today at a very high level, still working with Bruce Springsteen today. We had some great Bruce, Bruce Springsteen stories, a great stick story that I didn't know and I've known Jeff for 20 something years. Just a fantastic talk and a lovely guy. A lot to be learned from this

man. It's why he's always invited to panels and different educational things. He's a smart dude and he's got a lot of great information. So enjoy episode #293 with Jeff Ravitz. And please like and share and subscribe. Thank you. Hello and thanks for joining me again today on Geez of gear #293. This episode is brought to you by Main Light, your go to dry hire rental provider bringing you the latest in lighting and

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Please join me in watching their Pulse series video. Inspire your audience's imagination with Elation's Pulse Strobe series. Designed to bolster creativity and deliver breathtaking kinetic intensity, the Pulse Series empowers designers to create dynamic lighting experiences

that captivate any audience. The Pulse Series synthesizes mesmerizing lighting experiences with power and precision, allowing designers to create rhythmic, heart pounding lighting effects with effortless control elations. Pulse Series. Well, although today's guest hardly needs an introduction, I'm going to give him one anyway, and I am going to read his bio as I usually do, and I'll get to that in just a moment.

But I did want to say that I've recently seen him in Las Vegas at LDI, where this gentleman took part in our Dining with Dinosaurs event. And he was one of the big highlights there, of course. And I'm talking about Jeff Ravitz and I'll get into his bio in just a moment. But first, I wanted to remind you because I haven't talked about it in a long time. And I'm going to bring up the

graphic here too. Is coffee called Coffee who are not officially a sponsor, but they are the Gees of Gear brand of coffee. And I think haven't tried it. Everyone who's tried it through this podcast has told me, wow, you're right. I drink it every day. It's fantastic coffee and I pay for it. You can ask Jamie when you contact Coffee Cult to order some. They'll tell you Marcel pays for his coffee. We don't pay him, we don't give him free coffee to talk about it.

And the reason that I pay for it is because the money goes to a good cause. So Jamie and I cut a deal on this. Where this geezers of gear geezers grind coffee from Coffee Cult. All of the proceeds go towards Roby backstage, which then gives that money away to a good cause in our industry, one of our fallen comrades or someone who just needs help, and they determine how that money gets shared. And so, yeah, first of all, try it because it's great coffee and

you get it at coffeecult.com. But secondly, buy it because it does benefit our industry in a very positive way. So I did want to do that quickly. And now we'll go back to Mr. Ravits. Jeff is a prime time Emmy winning lighting designer specializing in live entertainment for multi camera television, concert tours and special events.

His work includes award shows, comedy specials, concert films, and televised operas with notable projects like the Olympics, medal ceremonies, and world tours for Bruce Springsteen, Cher and Ringo Starr. Co-author of Lighting for Televised Events, Jeff is also the broadcast lighting consultant for Coachella since 2016 and has designed permanent lighting systems for venues including L as Microsoft Theater.

A global lecturer and recipient of numerous accolades well deserved, by the way, including a Sports Emmy and the Parnelli Lighting Designer of the Year award, Jeff leads his design firm, Intensity Advisors in Los Angeles. So. Please. Welcome back to the podcast, Mr. Jeff Rabbits. Mr. Rabbits, how are you? I'm great. How are you, Marcel? And flip, fantastic. I'm very good. It was, it was my mother's 94th birthday yesterday and and she's still alive and I'm so happy

that she's still alive. And she, she is in a dementia home. But you know, we still have her and and that's great. So yeah, still kind of celebrating because I'm just happy she's there. And you have some good DNA there. Well, let's hope. I mean, other than the dementia part, you know, I'm, I'm trying to hang on to my brain as long as I can. But but yeah, I mean, she's definitely, she's healthy other than that. Like that's the crazy thing. I have a, a very good friend of

mine who just lost his mother. She just had her 100th birthday, I think at the beginning of December or end of November, I can't remember. And then she died like the day or the two days before Christmas at at 100. And she was the opposite of my mom. So she she had a very sharp mind, like her brain. She could tell you everything that's happened in the last 50 years or 100 years, really smart, really bright, but her body just gave up and, and she was 53 lbs when when she passed.

Oh, wow. And, and my mom's healthy. She eats really well, all of that stuff, but just her mind is gone. So I don't know which is worse. I, I've been talking to my girlfriend about that. Like, you know, if you had to pick one, which would you pick? And hopefully it's neither. When you're aware but you see yourself deteriorating, right? Yeah. Or are you better off just not knowing what's going on and, and every day is a happy day, you know, or.

Whatever exactly I. I don't know the technical term or whatever, but my mom's version of dementia or Alzheimer's or whatever it is, I don't even think they know the difference. But she's happy. Like generally she's happy. She's not beating up nurses. She's not like doing all the angry things that I've heard of so many friends of mine parents have gone through and she's had it for quite some time. And yes, it, it progresses.

So every time it gets a little harder for her to to recognize you or to have a conversation or whatever. But but she's happy. Like, you know, I've, I started this thing a few years ago where every time I go visit her, I bring a muffin and I sing happy birthday to her and, and she's so happy because it's her birthday again, you know, and at first the home kind of gave me shit for it. Like they, they said I was being deceptive and, and that kind of thing. And I said hey look shut up.

You know, she likes it, she has fun. And I could sing it again 5 minutes later and she'd go, oh it's my birthday you know? Like she doesn't know so why not make her happy for a few minutes, you know?

Exactly. I think it's a good thing that you do. And when you consider that, you know, people spend an entire lifetime paying attention, stressing out, you know, having to, you know, just be on the ball all the time, and then you have a few years where you can just sort of relax and let the clouds pass you by and. Maybe it's a little Restful, You're right. Yeah, I like to think of it that way, by the way.

I, I like to think of that she's not haunted by, by her mind, but but that she's at peace, you know, that she's, she's like, whoa, look at the birds and she's in the bathroom or something, you know, like there's no birds. There's got to be some sort of upside. And some people get angry in the heart state and then then they're, you know, slaves to that as well. So yeah, yeah. Who knows? Yeah. Well, I'll tell you just to stay on the health topic for a minute.

So I'm, I'm a big advocate. Like there's a doctor that I've followed for years, probably since I turned 50, but his name is Mark Mark Hyman. Doctor Mark Hyman. I don't know if you've ever heard of him, but he's a he, he is an expert in functional medicine, which the shortest version would be basically food as medicine. You know, instead of eating to, to have fun, you eat to sustain yourself. And, and that food all has a function. Everything that you eat has a

function. And but the, the general idea is that you want to stay healthy until your last days. So, you know, if, if you know, somebody could come down a messenger and say, Jeff, you're going to live to 97 1/2 years old basically at 97 and, and you know, just before 1/2 you, you get a little bit sick and you die, right. As opposed to the last two or three years or 10 years of your life having dementia or heart, heart disease or cancer or one of the those things. That's the ideal scenario.

Well, anyways, his company Function Health created a test and I've had a few people in our industry do it. It's, it's 500 bucks and you get 2 sets of, of tests and, and it's blood and urine and, and they basically test 110 things or something as opposed to your usual blood test is 10 or 15 things if you're lucky. And so it's very, very thorough. And from that you get back all these results that tell you, you know, your risk for Alzheimer's, your risk for 1000 different

things. And lo and behold, after all the damage that I've done to myself in the, in the first half of my life, I'm actually in very good shape and I'm, I'm of very good health. And some will hate to hear it that it looks like I could last a lot longer. And one of the things they give you is your biological age. And mine is 12 years under my real age. So I turned 60 last year and, and it says I'm 48. So I like that. So. My goal is to become 40, you know, and can you go?

Backwards. You can actually, you can reverse aging. And so that's what a lot of this longevity science is all about. It's it's not just about slowing aging, but reversing it and. What emotional age you're talking about? No, no. This is physical age. This is biological age. This is like how you're how you're. Yeah. Emotional age. I think I'm already 12. I don't think I've ever gotten past that, to be perfectly honest. Yeah, but yeah, anyways, it's it's just something that I'm

pretty passionate about. So it's funny because my girlfriend and I bought each other this set of tests for Christmas, really fun Christmas presents. And so she's just doing hers now and she's very stressed that she's going to end up older than me in biological age. And and so, you know, we got a bit of a competition going on, so I think she'll get her results in a few days. She just did the final Test today, so. It sounds amazing, but I hope it's not just functional.

I hope it's fun eating too. Well, I think it is, but it takes some time. You know, like one of the examples he uses is when you can walk up to a Starbucks counter and you're getting your coffee and you look at that food behind the counter and you don't see it as food anymore. Now, you know, you've pretty much passed the test, you've gotten through it. You know, like Froot Loops

aren't food. You know, all that stuff isn't food and, and where you crave broccoli as opposed to craving a bowl of Froot Loops. You know, that's when you've sort of crossed the chasm and and gotten into a place where you're eating well and it's really it's just down to Whole Foods. You know, like you eat a steak,

try and make it a grass fed. And I don't know if you're vegan or something, I'm sorry if, if you are, but you know, if you eat a steak, it make it grass fed, that's going to be the best of the best and, and, and eat eggs and, and eat, you know, sort of like 1 ingredient foods, you know, So anyways, right, It's. Fun. And it's the preservatives and the processing that you know, that really gets you so. That's the worst. And seed oils, right? And seed oils.

But maybe when you hit that 97 and a quarter, maybe you can say, give me a big bowl of Froot Loops. I just want you to say fuck it. Fuck it, I'm going to start doing cocaine and smoking cigarettes and eating Froot Loops. Yeah, it's like that's what I want to do at the end of my life. 80 years without a froot loop I'm making. It up right now yeah that's funny that's funny yeah. I.

You know what I mean? When I was a kid, I ate Froot Loops, and come to find out, because I was in Canada at the time, like there's this, I forget what the food dye is called #5 orange or red or something.

But it's the really nasty one. And we use it here in the United States in Fruit Loops, but they don't use it in Canada or in Europe in Fruit Loops. So the Fruit Loops, as healthy as they could be, are healthier in Canada and Europe than they are in the United States, which is kind of nutty. Wow, I'll keep that in mind. Yeah, the health. Diet. So I'm with you. I'll keep that in mind, he says. OK, great. Are these kind of friends that you're giving me here? Yeah, I'm a big label. Reader.

Yeah. Are you really? I am. I am. Yeah, good for you. It's all it's all about those preservatives and and and processed things can't pronounce. Yeah, totally true. Totally. I mean, does that sound appetizing? Dexa blah, blah, blah, blah, like words that are this long. Does that sound good for you?

No. OK, then maybe you shouldn't eat it. I mean, you can't taste it, so, and maybe it makes it taste better, at least when you're used to it. You know when you withdraw from it and you get used to not having it, then yeah, then then you do notice that stuff. Totally true.

Well, and the other thing is like we went to a, we found we've been living in the same place for like 5 years and just figured out that right up the road from us, there's a farmers market that are literally the farmers from this area. I'm in Wellington where we've got lots of horse farms because it's, it's a horse place here and but all the farmers around there bring their their stuff and they sell it at this, this farmers, it's a proper farmers market, right?

And we bought bread there and it, it's like, you know, really nice, really good, healthy, you know, it's not like the modified, you know, whatever and enriched flour and all that stuff. It's, it's proper stuff. And so we bought that and it was absolutely amazing sourdough bread, absolutely amazing. And like, on the second or third day, it was already moldy and we were like, right, I forgot. Like, real stuff actually goes bad after a short period of time. Right. Right. Yeah.

They buy bread every day in France, correct? Yeah. Well, and that's actually one of the interesting things that I talk with people about a lot is I happen to be a pasta and pizza freak. Like, I could eat either one of those every single day, except physically my body says hell no. Yeah. And, but have you ever noticed, like when you're in Italy, you can eat bread and, and pizza and pasta all day and you, you don't get that stuffed, bloated, full feeling that, that you feel like

hell here. If you have, if you have pizza for lunch and pasta for dinner here in the United States, you're just dying like me anyways. Right. Who knows what they put into it? Yeah, well, and that stuff. Wouldn't last three? Days you know yeah and you know a big part of of what it is is they use proper like ancient grain pasta and and flour is not

enriched flour. It doesn't have all the crap added to it. And so it's, it's, it's an interesting thing like unfortunately, as you can hear, it's a rabbit hole that's pretty easy to go down when you start and you start reading some of these books and stuff. Next thing you know your your bio hacking your your health, you know and. It's everything. And you know, if you if you do think about it and if you believe that what you are, what you eat, it's important.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's totally true. So I saw you at LDI. You were part of our dinosaurs thing, which I think you're far too young to be a dinosaur, Jeff. Yeah. Thank you. Yeah, and we appreciate you doing that. Soon we're gonna actually put together a call to talk to people about doing it again next year, Obviously much larger, very different.

We're going to have a panel. We're going to, we're going to make it like somebody said something about the fact that it would be much more fun if we could like riff with each other and, and bust each other's balls and, and have a good time. And you can only really do that on a panel. It's hard to do when you you're at different tables and stuff so. All noted.

And what we've heard sort of loud, loud and clear is people want, and you know this because you do it all the time, but people want more access to people like you and to be able to share, take some of your knowledge away and apply it to whatever they're doing. And so it's, it's, it's fun to have another way of, of doing that, you know?

You know, maybe, and I know we talked about wanting more young people, students and people that are just launching their careers in there because that's really what they want to sort of tug at our pants legs and ask us about. You know, that's what we've done. If nothing else, we've been through it and we might have a thought or two about that for

those people. But who knows, maybe since there's that lunch involved, maybe we spend the first half hour having that one-on-one, say having lunch at tables being spread out and then it's Ding, Ding, Ding. OK, everyone up, you know the the panelists up onto the stage and get into it as you're discussing it. Might actually be the opposite of that.

Or or the opposite. Might be the opposite because then, by the way, students who are sitting there watching the panel would get a feel for yeah, this rabbits character is the one I want to go to his table. So, you know, in a sense you're marketing yourself while you're on the panel.

And, and then, but you know, I'll tell you, one of the challenges is that we are dealing with this corporate thing, the company that owns LDI and, and of course everything they touch has to somehow be profitable, where none of us is doing it for money. We're all doing it to share information. So yeah, I mean, I got to get past that machine and and make sure that that everything works out for them as well. But the idea is to get a lot

more students in there. Some of that'll be done through corporate sponsorships, some of it will be done through maybe just LDI saying you can invite, you know, the 1st 100 people. And then after that, it's got a, you know, it's paid at these different tiers or whatever. And then, you know, you just like, you could do the same thing that Parnelli's do where you get companies to buy tables and and then you invite people to fill those seats. So we'll see.

We'll come up with a way. But again, I appreciate you being a part of it. It was fun to do. Yeah. Yeah, I appreciate it being part of it. It was a lot of fun. Yeah, you're, you're always very you're always very giving with your time. And and, you know, in all the notes that you sent me for this podcast scattered throughout or you know, Jeff speaking at this, teaching at this, you know,

sharing information at this. And I love when people not just blowing smoke up your your skirt, but I love when people in our industry are willing and able to, to do those things because it's super important, super important. You know, casting it forward is truly what it's all about, especially in an industry like ours. It's kind of a a very specialized industry. It's hard to get real information.

We can learn a lot in school, but you learn so much more when you're out in the world of experience. And how else does somebody that's just getting into the business know that? And I like cutting the corners

for people. I like, you know, the idea that maybe it's not going to take five years or 10 years to acquire a certain amount of of knowledge and understanding of what it takes to work your way through the industry, both from a career standpoint as well as like whatever your art or craft might might be. And if I figure if we, as the more experienced people, can help somebody get from point A to point B that much faster, than our entire industry grows faster. I agree.

Yeah. Well, and also like, would you agree that there's sort of a disconnect between the old school and the new school ways of doing things? And I think some of that needs to disappear and stay old school and some of it needs to be pulled forward into the into the

new school way of doing things. And so that's where I see a lot of, you know, just some of the call it real fundamentals, like showing up on time, like, you know, just whatever tools you should always have with you and just a lot of the anecdotes and, and things that come from people who have done it for a very long time. I love when that information gets shared. Like, you know, Jake Berry is really good at at telling people and don't forget to do this, you

know, and always do this. And, and sometimes it sounds maybe a little bitchy or whatever, but it's true. Like these are really good values, you know? Oh, absolutely, absolutely. Yeah. I think that if we take, you know, the old school and the new school put them into a blender, I think that's, you know, probably where where we want to go.

But I mean, people of my generation and Jake's generation, we didn't have that many people really to look up to. We were starting in the business at a time when, you know, production as we know it today was really just ramping up, yeah, going from nothing to something. And so now here we are as people that can you know, kind of give give a couple of notes to the to the new people that are just. Coming.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, you know, let's face it, like back then, one of the things is probably, I don't know if it was the same for you, but if if you look at the earliest days of technology, it didn't exist. So a lot of times if you needed something, you actually literally went to a machine shop across the street and said, hey, can you build me one of these things? Because I need this arm. To like hold a light over this,

you know, set piece or whatever. And you know, now it's all just there like the the toolbox is full at this point, right? Right, right, right. No, I mean, I think of really, you know, The Pioneers of the equipment in our industry, you know, people like Chipmunk that were just resourceful and said maybe if we just take an idea from a car headlamp and turn it into a stage light and how can we do it? And somebody like Bob C, you know, helping to create, you

know, the the can. And yeah, that's the exciting part. It's almost like, you know, creating mayonnaise, you know, these completely life changing, you know, industry changing things that are so small yet so huge. All of it, like all of the the multi pin cable and the like audio. Some of the stuff in audio is even more radical because it needs to be louder. OK, let me go think about this.

And they'd go back into their garage, you know, nail a bunch of things together, put a big fat speaker in it. Maybe if I bend this piece of wood over here, I think that's going to make it push out this way louder or whatever. And, you know, JBL and a lot of the big companies were created

like that in somebody's garage. And they just needed a a bigger speaker to be able to project the sound a little bit further, you know, as the venues got bigger and you know, like, you think about the stuff they used for the The Beatles at at Shea Stadium or whatever, like it's unbelievable. You know, it's, it's unbelievable. Like right now you. Wouldn't use those little speakers on the ground. Pretty much the size of a wedge.

Monitor now. Well, and the lighting, you know, I mean, you wouldn't use that today in a nightclub or, or in a, you know, somebody's basement for a party, you know? Well, you know, I've been working for Ringo for over 30 years and my first meeting with him, he just said kind of take it easy on me because the last time I did this, there were just three follow spots. So, you know, it's hilarious. And it's very easy to burn my head if you're not careful. That's hilarious. That's hilarious.

You're still working with him today, right? I am, I am. I'm very lucky he's. He's amazing. I mean the fact that he, what is he now, 80 3/4? Two, I think 83. Yeah, and you know, touring isn't easy. I even if you're staying in Four Seasons hotels, it's still not easy. You know, that's right. There's a lot to it. And so for him to still be out there and still doing it and still pulling those huge groups of talented musicians together to do those shows who reveal.

It. Yeah, I mean, it's amazing. It's so amazing. And Paul, I mean Paul equally, you know, very different, but equally like just so impressive that, you know, and Mick and all of the guys that are in their 80s and, and, you know, let's face it, the 70s weren't easy on people, you know? That's right, if they made it through till now. Correct. Yeah. Like, you know, acid was sort of mainstream back then. It was like, everybody does this, you know, breakfast exactly.

You know, instead of Froot Loops, we take acid and, and lo and behold, it was probably better for you than Froot Loops. You know, probably you're still alive. So. Anyway. I'm not advocating for taking acid children, please, as you're listening to this, do not listen to anything I'm saying. I'm a shit talking idiot from Canada.

But but yeah, it's so you know, when I say the disconnect from from sort of old school to new school, it's, it's not necessarily even equipment related because obviously you have many different choices today for equipment that's all so damn good, regardless of who your favorite manufacturer is. And I know for many, many years you were so loyal to Morpheus. And I actually want to get into that when we get into your,

your, your history a bit. And you know, let's face it, like if you could compare anyone's technology today to some of the early Morpheus fixtures, at the time they were, they were leading edge, but not so much now. And so the fact that you were creating shows with with that technology versus today's technology, very different sort of mindset and skill set and all of that stuff.

Yes, yes. I mean, the only thing I'll say about that old technology is that the leap it took from its predecessor, which was the Leco in the PAR, yeah, was a much bigger leap than I think we're making now, smaller incremental leaps. Not that I discount any of the the great advances that we're lucky to, you know, have the advantage of today, but I think in those days they were really going from zero to 60 in two seconds. Yeah, yeah. No, I mean massive.

You know, two decades, massive leaps, but even like things like the, the color fader and the, you know, just all of those technologies, like it's almost fun being old because you, you remember when each of those things happened and how incredible it was and how it changed shows and how it changed your, your ability. Probably, you know, as a designer, I would guess like just wow, now I can do so much more. Well, clearly less fixtures. That's right. Yeah, absolutely.

Nobody's using less fixtures. That's. The thing that's that's the dumb thing, isn't it? Yeah. Yeah. Like we used to have to have a, you know, 1000 Park Hands just to be bright enough in each of the four or five major colors. That's right. And, and now we have 1000 moving lights. Each one of them can do every color you could possibly want, but we still have 1000 moving lights on shows for some reason. Yeah. You know, bigger is better, more is more.

And I guess I subscribe to that theory too. And as we work in really big venues, you like really filling the space and, you know, thinking about things visually in different ways than we did way back then where, you know, you'd be in a big arena. But really all that was lit was that little postage stamp of a stage, right? Yeah. You know, And now we're lighting the entire arena and putting lights in every nook and cranny to just really make the experience a 360 degree, you

know, visual treat. Well, and plus you're doing television with so many of the shows that you're a part of as well. So you do have to, you know, you do need that audience lighting and stuff, I guess. But when when you're pushing to 1000 moving lights, are you suggesting that that's the designer and not the artist who's who's wanting bigger and more and.

I guess it's a combination. I certainly know I, I, I realized that it seems like there's a lot of just fru fru put in. You know that when when you think that you can really light the band with 20 lights, what's all the rest of that stuff doing? That's true. And but it is, you know, creating that extravaganza feel and and also visually filling things in, certainly for television.

When you think about a multi camera shoot and there's a camera looking at every imaginable point of view to the stage, you know, some of it's almost it's behind the stage, some of it's from the performer's point of view looking, looking out at the crowd. You want a background of some sort everywhere so that it's an immersive experience. You know, everybody in the room

becomes part of the show. That might not be the same same concept for an opera, but it certainly is for, you know, for a big rock show where it just becomes, you know, big celebration. So that's a little bit more justification. Do the, do the acts ask for that? I'm, you know, some people will give you the mandate that I want it to look really huge. Some, in some cases they want it to be subtle and simple and you have to find ways to make it look big without so many

fixtures. But you know, I, I think it's more the designers than it is the bands. Really, I, I guess I always just assumed it was the artist ego. You know, like Beyoncé saying, you know, you better make my lighting package look better than that nasty little Taylor Swift, you know, and I was probably the worst Beyoncé impression ever, But you know what I mean? Like, I always just assumed it was the artist, the artist ego just saying that there's was this big.

I want this big. Well, I'll tell you, I'm, I'm down to just a few touring acts at this point, my career. And that's not the mandate they gave. They give me, I, they pretty much let me do what I need to do and I'll show them what I have in mind periodically in the design development phase. But I don't, I haven't really. Certainly somebody like Bruce Springsteen doesn't say I, I want it to be bigger than anything the world has ever seen or bigger than the stones. That's not his MO at all.

But I think he knows that we're going to come through with a show that's, you know, equal in magnitude to the performance. That he's getting He doesn't want to look small. Right, right. Yeah, I completely thinks. About it until he sees it. That's one thing about that particular artist. He has to to know what he likes. Does does Bruce get involved in that process? Like does he, does he sit with you and say, what if we could do this instead? Or what about this? Or does he? Is he?

Over the years, and it's been over 40 years for me now. Yeah, that's wild. By the way, congratulations. Like what a what an unbelievable ride, you know? Yeah, I'm, I'm, I'm very, very fortunate. And you know when you work for somebody that long, you kind of get into their head and know what they like. So I would say in the last several years there's been less pre production exchange of ideas with us. He just trusts you. But he's also done some crazy

smaller projects over the years. The Seeger session show, that was a real departure for him, anything he had done. And the, and the few times that he's done solo acoustic shows, that's where I've really gotten into, you know, one-on-one early discussions. But that's it's been many years since we've done anything like that. And, you know, there were ideas that he would toss out, things he would ask for. We would do those things and

then he wouldn't like them. You know, artists have to develop their own vocabulary too, to speak to the designer. And sometimes they ask for something and it's totally misinterpreted. And so it's a, it's a dance to get that done. But no, I'd say in the last, you know, 1520 years he and I have had very, very few pre production exchanges other than him seeing drawings. That. That management presents to him.

Well, that that's because it's you, you know, like, I I mean, if it were some young unknown designer or something, he'd probably be a heck of a lot more involved. But he trusts you, you know, obviously you've earned trust over that many years. Yeah. So is there any sign of him stopping? I mean, obviously he's going to have to at some point. We all do. I guess you know, he was. He was interviewed last year and they did a documentary about the the assembly of the most recent tour.

Yeah, it's still in progress, even though they're off for a couple of months. And they said, so Bruce, you know, when, when do you think you're going to hang it up? And he said I'm not stopping until the wheels come off.

Well, that's not happened. Now he's got a lot of options whether he could continue to do E Street Band tours where, you know, it's conducive to being on a stadium stage where he is jumping off the stage and running on the ego ramp all the way to one side of the stadium and all the way to the other and out on. You know, I don't know how long

he'll be able to do that. He's still doing it, but I know and but at the end of this tour, which more or less, you know, may end at the end of 2025 with scattered dates, I don't think they're going to be hitting the road as solidly as they did the last couple of years. But they've got some make up shows to do and they've filled in and they may just get inspired to do do a little bit more. Who knows? I'd feel he's going to keep going at this pace and then he can do solo acoustic.

He can do that way. He can put together like an R&B band because he's gotten into R&B in a big way in the last few years. Interesting. So he can do things that are less physically demanding, you know, maybe even less vocally demanding because, you know, an E Street Band show. He does a lot of, you know, singing and screaming at the top of his lungs. And that's part of the appeal and part of his of his, you

know, personality. But you know, you do something like a solo acoustic, he's barely even on the mic. You know, he he shows some subtlety when he does that. And I think that would be something that would appeal to him. So anyway, long long answer. But the rest, the rest of the street band, they hold up pretty well, like Van Zandt and and like are the rest of them. They're they're doing OK too, because they're all getting up there too. Absolutely, yeah.

We're all aging. I had a discussion with Max Weinberg, the drummer. Last year and we're just kind of talking about, you know, our lives and we kind of got back together after not seeing each other for for a couple of years. And, you know, he's saying, yeah, that, you know, with drumming is, you know, perhaps the most physically demanding

job in the band. And he said, well, I've learned how to, you know, play harder without working harder, you know, and a guy like that, he's spent so many years, you know, at the kit. He knows how he can get the sound he wants without, you know, at working every muscle in his body to, you know, 100%, right, Right. That's kind of what it's all about. I mean, you can, you know, tennis preservation, how to do that. Everyone you know figures that out at some. Point.

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, the young ones are always preservation. Like. Man, you know you don't have to put, you know 300% of yourself into it if you know what you're doing. Well, it's similar to athletes like, I don't know if you're a tennis fan, but everyone always said Nadal was going to, you know, there's no way this guy's going to even make it to his 30s. But but he he changed his tennis style as he got into his 20s and especially into his late 20s and

early 30s. And eventually he did have to retire, but but you know, he was a crazy like 17 year old, like he, he got every ball that he wasn't supposed to get and stuff like that. But I remember, you know, McEnroe and others would always say this guy ain't going to last. He needs to let some of those go by him, you know, because he's killing himself going after some

of these balls. Yeah. And similar thing, you know, you got to start thinking longevity and and sustenance, you know, how can I keep this thing going as long as possible? Right. You know, right. I did see his last match on TV and yeah, it was the same thing. He was running after every ball, going for it, you know, as hard as he could. And so. Yeah, what about Djokovic? Like Federer, who doesn't seem to exert nearly, you know, the

energy. No, he seems like he's putting no effort into it. Yeah. Djokovic to me is, is a phenom. Like this is a guy that could possibly play till friggin 50 years old, you know? Yeah, yeah. He'll just, he'll find a way because he's so in charge of of his physical body and his his strength and his fitness and all of those things. He's just got such a better, you know, understanding of what he's capable of than anybody else does.

And you know, I hated when they booed him when he exited the Aussie Open because that's a guy that's super authentic. Like he's not leaving because he's down on the scorecard or something. He's he's leaving because he knows his body and he, he can't, he can't keep going, you know, so that's why he walked away because I've seen him come back way too many times from 2 sets down. He's not going to quit, you know, he's, he's not that guy. Yeah. So exactly. Exactly. Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, I remember that. Who? Who? So you said three artists that you're still working with. Who are the other two? Not Styx, right? Not no, actually it's only two. I'm not really involved with Styx anymore, OK? And and that was almost a 50 year relationship, yeah.

I know that was a long one too. But it was just time for me to, you know, Libby Gray, who's who was our tour lighting director for many years, had taken the show to a really good place in my absence there in other parts of the world. And with her improvising and taking, you know, the bones of what what had been created before really turned it into something of her own. And so it was time for me to

step back and let her do that. But I'm still involved with Ringo and kind of in the same way I designed the show. I'm, you know, maybe a creative consultant. I do the plot and I you know, but but there are some really talented. Yeah, you don't tour with it. I don't. I don't tour with it. Yeah, You know, Greg Classen is out now. Susan Rose was with it for, yeah, 20 years.

She did a great job. And yeah, both of those lighting directors really take it so much further on a day-to-day basis when they have to improvise, use local equipment and that's, that doesn't really match up to the original plot. So, but I am still involved, you know, with Ringo and then and then Bruce. So I'm really not out there looking for touring work at the moment. I'm, you know. I mean, it's funny because there's so many people that I talked to.

Obviously my podcast is called Geezers of Gear, but there's so many people I talked to whose artists are getting close to aging out. And I always ask those questions like, OK, so you out looking for 25 year old artists, you know, to replace them? Or are you going to phase your career into a different stage? When, when, when those artists phase out and you get a different bunch of answers?

Obviously for everyone it's a different, you know, life plan or whatever you want to call it, a strategy that says, you know, I'm going to go spend more time doing whatever, learning how to water ski, you know, or whatever it is. I don't know but. I was always interested in so many different things. And there was something about, you know, being on the road and touring that I felt, you know, for me anyway, was sort of a self limiting scenario.

And as I toured less and even though I was, I was given the, you know, the privilege of designing these shows, rehearsing them and then exiting, you know, the, the tour, that gave me the opportunity to get into some different things. And I thought, well, maybe something like architectural lighting would give me the opportunity to travel less and use my brain in a different way. And I did that for a, for a number of years.

It wasn't really, you know, something that I that that I enjoyed all that much, but TV had been something that had always sort of ran an undercurrent throughout my career because it was there early on when when I first began is when MTV suddenly, you know, arrived on the scene and everybody had to have a music video and teams of video. People would come in and and and shoot a live show or take the band into a studio and do some sort of like semi scripted

thing. And I would sort of watch that in with with great interest. And I thought, you know, later on, Fast forward many, many years, I thought, well, television is something that I could probably grow older more gracefully in because, you know, it's a, it's a field where you know, they, they value the experience And you're, there are a lot of, you know, older people, you know, 50 plus people in it, whereas the touring industry, they are, you know,

recruiting from the cradle. Yeah, it's a young man's game right now on people's game. I shouldn't say man, because there's a lot of fortunately. I mean, I think it's a really great thing. You know, I'm not, I'm not a big DEI guy, but I love that more women are coming into our industry and and young girls and stuff. I think it's good for for them and it's good for the industry. It's a great career. You know, yeah, I, I, I totally agree. And I, and I do think that it's

a younger person's game. And when you've got younger acts who are the ones that are really, you know, charting highest, they want, you know, people that they can relate to. Those artists want somebody that's more or less in the in their age group and somebody who is attuned to all of that music, liking that music better. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Although it's, it's funny because I, I recently had Marty Homme on the podcast again and, and we were talking about that and you know, he's, he's not what I would call that new generation young person or anything. But you know, he's got Olivia Rod Rodrigo, he's got, he's got a few young artists and that are very hot. And so I don't know, I think well at the tour, he's not designing for them. He's the tour manager. He's. The tour manager you sort of want, you know? The experience?

Yeah, that's true too. You know, so, but yeah, I mean, I, I agree. Now I have the advantage of working at Coachella every year. Yeah. And that gives me an opportunity to plug into a lot of artists that I wouldn't be paying that much attention to otherwise. And so I get like, a full, you know, master's degree in new music every year. Yeah. So what is your what, what's your basic, you know, in a nutshell, responsibility with Coachella?

Well, I'm, I'm there as the broadcast lighting consultant, OK, for whatever that's worth. And how much I really accomplish is anybody's guess. Most of the headline acts come in with what I'm supposed to do is help all of these acts understand that we are showing this streaming around the world, 80 million plus hits every year and growing annually.

And just to understand that it it's important that those people that can only see the show on their computer screen or their phone or whatever need something to look at that is friendly to the camera. That doesn't mean blow it out, make it look like the 11 O clock news. Now the headliners on the big stages really understand that before we even begin. And the only thing I really have to remind them of is levels. We don't really care about weird

color and things like that. We're not trying to necessarily make everybody look that pretty, you know, unless, unless they want to be. I would assume that if you're Beyoncé's lighting designer or Taylor Swift's or Lady Gaga's, you're going to do your best to make them look really good. Anyway. What they need to understand is sometimes levels can get way very uneven and I can help them smooth those those sorts of things out.

It's the smaller tent. So, you know, Coachella has a couple of big headline stages and then they've got the smaller tents where the new acts and the indie acts and the acts that are just almost ready to, to burst onto the headline stage are playing. And a lot of those acts say my artist wants no light on them. And so when you look at a, a, a smaller lighting system of maybe 100 lights, none of them are aimed at the stage. It's all out, you know, at the crowd. Yeah, that part looks good.

And I say, look, if you could just devote 10 lights, that one, that one, that one, that one onto your artist. And it doesn't have to be even lighting, and it doesn't. It just needs to be some level of illumination. To see the artist. Yes, there are people that would like to see your lead singer, they'd like to see your guitarist, etcetera, etcetera. If I can do that, if I can take it from zero to four. Yeah. On a on a zero to 10 scale, I feel like I've accomplished.

A lot interesting. Yeah. You know, it's funny because I can't remember which who it was. Somebody on my podcast said it to me one time where he said, you know, I'm designing a show for 20,000 people right here, but like 2 million people that are going to be viewing it on a on a four or five inch screen. And I'm very thoughtful about that. So he's, he's actually designing it. And as he's looking at the show, he'll look at it on his on his iPhone or whatever as well.

Because you know, by the time the show ends, there's going to be 10,000 of those videos that are uploaded to YouTube or whatever. And so many people are going to see it, so many more than those in the audience. And so why wouldn't we give it some thought even at that level? But then you talk about a Coachella. So I mean, I think it's really wise that they have you there that and my guess is that you're just trying to get them to be at least thinking about that. If nothing else.

You know, like just think about the fact that there's more people seeing it on a phone than are seeing it in front of that, you know, B or C or D stage that you're on right now. That's exactly right. That's exactly right. You know, the live audience is perfectly OK with the big broad picture and with the ambience in the room, they can probably see what's going on on stage anyway. There's a lot of video, there's just a lot of bounce light. But that doesn't work for the

cameras. So it is those people that are just watching on their phone. And so it's gratifying if I can bring it up a couple of notches. I hate to make it seem like my bar is set so low that if I take it from zero to four, that's sufficient. But believe me, that's a good day. Yeah, yeah, I'm sure it's really complicated, you know, because again, everybody has, you know,

their set of goals. And then I think the when you have a lighting designer for some small up and coming act or whatever, and then you have this other lighting designer who's coming in and saying, hey, we want to make sure that, you know, his, his back's going to go up a little bit. Right. Like you can't come in here and tell me what to do. I know. Sent on my work many plans. Yeah, well, you're not the most physically, you know, frightening food either.

So. So if you're coming out to my front of house location and telling me what to do, you know, I'm not sure that you're going to scare me much. Just like, who's talking? Oh. There he is, that guy. That's funny. So are you serious? And in saying that, the television thing was just kind of like a almost accidents like where you just went well, you know, this MTV thing is getting kind of popular. Like, these people are going to need somebody who knows how to like these things, and maybe I

should do that. It was a little bit of that. I mean, I was intrigued by it as well. For one thing, I was intrigued by the fact that it wasn't as easy as it looked. I thought that, you know, what they would do would be bring in some big 10 KS and just flood the stage and that would be that. And that's not what they did at all. They came in and they made it, you know, by and large they made it look, you know, fairly interesting and did change a lot

of my levels. And I thought, wait a minute, if there's more to this than than I realized. And then I kind of the light bulb went off and I realized it's so much about the close up because 90% of the shots are more or less some kind of a close up or A2 shot. And, and it's not easy to make those, those shots look good and make people look, you know, decent. And, you know, that little smear of color that looks so good to the live audience looks a little weird when it's out of context.

And that's all you're seeing. And you're seeing somebody with a big smear of orange or, or blue on their face. It doesn't make as much sense. How can you do that same thing and sort of impart that color statement but not make it look so strange to the people that are that are watching on on their TV? So I did get intrigued by it, but I also saw it as the future. I saw it as, you know, a different way, you know, to operate. And I like the precision of it for some reason there.

There was something about the mechanics of how light and and the camera and the iris of the camera work that that I enjoyed. And then I partnered up with Jim Moody. Well, that didn't hurt. That didn't hurt. And he had a lot to say and a lot to share with me. And, you know, just really, I, you know, I developed kind of a love for, for the art form. How could how could I make those shows look as good as possible on camera without robbing the live audience of the experience also?

And that that was early 90s, I think, right? Yeah, yeah. I mean, it started in the 80s and. And the other thing about it was that I, I resented the fact that the video crews would come in and they'd sort of push me aside and try to relight my show. And so I thought, well, I want to learn more about this so that I'm valuable to them and they won't feel so compelled to to Get Me Out of their way. Right. So that was so. And then by the 90s is when it

really started to to take hold. And then in the 90s is when I partnered up with Jim and really started seeing the stuff he was doing and, and befriended people like Bill Klages and Bob Dickinson and watch what they did and saw how artfully they they did what they were doing. And I thought, OK, this appeals to me. Yeah, yeah. And I know I should know the answer to this, but I'm going to ask you anyways. Really specifically like live music and and sports and stuff like that.

Not television or, or film or any of that kind of lighting, right? Yeah, I, you know, I wasn't really equipped to go into film. I suppose I could have tried to become a cinematographer, but that really wasn't on my plate because I had, I was so firmly involved in the live entertainment industry. And. And I saw that there was this whole thing about live entertainment being shot for TV. That was an enormous market.

And there were all of these people there that didn't understand it. Yeah, you know, they didn't understand what that transition was going to be and these other consultants and you know, so-called experts had to come in and help. And I thought, okay, I can be that person. So when I aged. Out. Of the touring industry, that's something that I can, you know, that I can do.

Plus, I find it really interesting, other than the one-on-one, what friction that I might have dealing with, you know, an LD that I would whose show I was adapting. And so I thought I was a recipient of that for so many years. I should know psychologically how to approach these people. And that's what I did. I tried to create some sort of a bedside manner that wasn't so

off putting. Yeah. Yeah, I know that. I I've been witness to some of the situations where, you know, somebody's got a tour out and then Brandon or you or someone is brought in to light it for an HBO special. And you see some of the discussions, let's call it that, are not always extremely productive. But I think by this point, we've all gotten pretty used to it because of all the streaming and all the different things that go on now.

Like, I think more shows are shot for television than are not at this point, you know, or shot for some type of a device anyways. Plus iMac. Yeah. Yeah, iMac. Yeah, of course. Have digital cameras made it so

much easier now? Well, I mean, for sure there was a time when the cameras were so much less forgiving for light levels and colour and certain colours were, you know, you were taught like the first lesson you learned when you were getting into television was no red because cameras couldn't register red. Now they can. And there's so there's so much more.

And now of course. You can go down to super low light levels, which you wouldn't do for a concert necessarily where there's a live audience, but you might do for a show that's on a sound stage where you're not worried about the audience. And there's so many advantages to working at lower light levels that that the cameras allow you to do that. What? Why wouldn't you? Yeah. What about video, though? Like, like all the LED screens

that everyone has? Is that a real problem when it comes to shooting it for for television? Yeah. Oh, yeah. It just seems like a brightness war, you know, like you're going to go that bright, we're going to do this, you know, and everything. The levels just keep getting higher and higher and we're getting lights that are now 6070 thousand lumens on these rigs. And it's like, what for? Like when did we ever decide that it needed to be bright as the sun, right? Right.

Well, you know, and whoever ever has their their hand on the dial wants their toy to be the biggest I guess. Right. Yeah, yeah, that's true. But. But but truly, you know, there was a time when the screens needed to be brighter just to register properly. If you took it down to the level that you know the lighting people wanted, it would start to flicker and lose, lose quality. Now the screens can go down to much, much lower levels, but the problem is the brightness.

I mean, you can never get anybody on stage bright enough with the stage lighting to match what those screens are putting out right in your face. You. Know on the face, on on. It is like reflective. The screen is direct light right in, right into the eye and right

into the camera. So there's that, and then the that's gotta be. Difficult that that's tough because I mean, it's even hard when you're trying to take a selfie or something, you know, just to, you know, to light your to light your face enough with, with an LED screen behind you that's just blasting forward or whatever. Well, it's like it being in front of a window. Yeah, of course. And trying to take a picture and somehow your face gets really dark and the window looks great,

right? So there's that. And then the color is usually way off. And like for any, for instance, situation like Coachella where they spend the entire first half of the show day in daylight. And so of course, the screens have to be bright and they and they're usually matched to daylight as you get closer to night time and then completely, you know, night, night time, those screens need to come way down because the stage lights

just can't compete. And so it is, it's a little bit of AII don't want to say battle because the technicians that are all starting to understand what the objective is, but it is a coordination and it is a little bit of a of a waltz. Yeah, or a battle. Yes. Yeah, it was a bit of a battle. I think I called it a war, so I was even less diplomatic. But yeah, I can see that being problematic. And light to the stage too.

I mean, somebody that's standing next to a screen is getting all this weird color and and brightness on them that doesn't necessarily look that good. Yeah, yeah, You know, I, I, if you've ever listened to my podcast, I usually start out with how do you start? And honestly, I don't even know the answer to that even as long as I've known you and and you've been on the podcast, but you were part of a group of people. But like, did you go to theater school or did you?

Yeah, yeah. I'm, I grew up just outside New York City, the New Jersey part of New York. And I, I got exposed to some Broadway shows when I was young. My dad took me to some shows and I really kind of got into that and theater and always kind of pursued that throughout school. So I, I, I thought I was going to the theater. There was no rock'n'roll on those days or what in television or film, which really I didn't see my way into.

And I love the idea of, you know, the connection between the show and the live audience. It was something that even as a kid that intrigued me. So I did go to college for theater where you study everything and do everything. So you know, and and that's good. You know, you you learn every your craft from both sides of the stage. And when I got. Out you studied acting as well I. Studied acting, you know, I mean, I, I, I saw that as a

potential path. I've got to say where I grew up, I, there wasn't much exposure to stuff like lighting and the tech side acting seemed to be acting or directing seemed to be what you would do. And when I got college, I suddenly realized that there were a lot of people that were studying the technical side. And as it turned out, my college roommate was really into lighting and got me to take some classes. And I just gobbled it up and, you know, really, you know, connected to it.

So when I got out of school, I actually did act for a couple of years, but I was also lighting simultaneously. I just, you know, take whatever I could to pay the bills. And at one point it just sort of flipped because I'd been a, a musician in, in high school, I played keyboards in a rock band that I, you know, had with my friends and I had a little bit of local success. So I always miss that. And I just put it totally aside when I went went to college.

But one day shortly after I graduated, I saw an ad for in in one of the arts magazines in Chicago, because I went to school in Chicago and they were looking for a lighting director for National Recording Group. So I thought, OK, called the number, had an interview, got the job because I was one of the few people that had any lighting experience. So we're all kinds of people applying for the job, but none

of them had any experience. We're talking about the early 70s where everybody just wanted to, you know, join the circus or join rock. Band. It's just wild though, that they'd advertise for a lighting guy in the local, you know, newspaper or whatever that's. Hilarious. Yeah, no kidding. That's hilarious. And you just happened to see it. I just happened to see it. Destiny.

I had seen a Grateful Dead show in Chicago about a week before and it was one of the first shows that had real production. And I think Candace Brightman was probably there, but I certainly didn't know, know her. I mean, I'm sure she was there. We talked about it when it when I met her years later. And it was all like Lycos and Pars and beams and and haze and, you know, kind kinds of things that production turned into. But it was one of the few shows that really was carrying that

that level of production. And it was everything that I had learned in theater school you weren't supposed to do. The lighting was supposed to be invisible. You maybe you were creating a, a Thunder and lightning effect. But aside from that, you were supposed to be realistic, you know, unless you were doing some sort of, you know, abstract show that required, you know. Some stuff was on display and part of the show, basically. Yeah, right.

That's interesting. I never heard it, never heard it described like that, but it's so true. And, you know, all this lighting that was really tangible, you could reach out and touch it. And I thought, wow, that breaks every rule I've ever been taught. But I like it. So here I was just maybe seven days later and I saw this ad and I thought, OK, you know, let's

let's give it a try. And you know, like 2 weeks later I was in a nightclub lighting lighting a band and taking it and going around playing colleges and opening for bigger bands where I kind of saw what the early level of production was, you know, trees and you know, no trusses yet pre Truss. Wow. Yeah, I mean even that great for bed show that I saw they had scaffolds but they didn't have Truss. Wow, that's amazing. And. That band wasn't Styx, was it?

That wasn't Styx, but they were. But they were in Chicago, too. So I was working for this band and we opened for Styx and I got to know them. And so that was sort of my graduate band. Yeah. So yeah, I mean, what? They needed someone, and I was one of the few local LDS in Chicago that understood the the vibe and the art form of rock'n'roll. At that point. I'd had a year or two in into it and so I got the you're a. Crusty old veteran now. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, exactly those terms.

That's wild. So that's how it all began and it was really one thing led to another. But Styx was really good for me because they they really sky rocketed to fame. I mean, it was a time in history where, you know, they were, you know, considered, you know, that prog rock, A lot of people thought they were British just because of the style of of music and, you know, the sound of the lead singer's voice. But they weren't, they were just from Chicago. But we did some really

theatrical things. And when they said, well, we're we're doing a new tour and we're about to release a new album, what do you what do you want to do? I would always throw backdrops in and scrims and all these theatrical techniques that I knew were fun and they were willing to spend a little bit of money.

And then we would. I mean, I, I don't want to say I choreographed the show, but there were times that I would say if you guys on this particular guitar moment where everything stops and it's just you 2 guys playing the guitar riff, if you guys would stand like back-to-back over here, I could have this light on you and then.

Very dramatic effect all. That kind of thing, you know, when it was really simple to do. And so little by little, we kind of had this, you know, theatrical repertoire growing. So was was the first band that you went out with the the club band? Was that your first paid gig or? And. Then don't tell me Styx was your second. Well, I had worked around around Chicago for some other small, small bands and then I had gone out on the road with the with the Corons. Oh. Really Beijing.

They they invited me to go out on a Kiss tour and it was Kisses first big arena tour. It was right after the Kiss Alive album came out and I want to rock. Was that cheap trick opening? Everybody opened for them, you know, so. I'm just trying to 'cause I remember I saw KISS when I was. I had to be 12 years old or something the first time I saw KISS. What are you? Doing and it was in the Calgary Corral, the the old hockey arena in Calgary.

And it was just, it was for me, it was life changing. Like it just changed everything I believed about music and shows and all that kind of stuff. I was in in bands at the time. But yeah, that was it was everything. Yeah, it was everything. It was just, yeah, fun. Just spitting blood and lighting things on fire and stuff. I was, I was hooked, you know, that I was so into KISS at that point. It was like, wow, this is so amazing. I didn't know what to expect.

I was not aware of them at all. I went out really on the 1st show and I remember being in the back of the house and we were playing some theater in Buffalo or someplace and they were testing out the flamethrowers. You know that big flame pots which happened to be. They bought them from the original Wizard of Oz production where if you remember when the Wizard is first seen, there are these flames that are shooting up around him. They bought those devices from. That. And that's.

An interesting story. Cuz it wasn't something that was like around that you could just buy. Yeah, there was no. City. Nobody was using anything yet back then in live shows. It was obviously they were one of the first big real show bands like that, if not the first. I don't know, I guess the Dolls. Or so I think so. Yeah. But I felt this heat on the back of my neck. I was setting up a console out front. And I turn around and I see these flames and I'm went, OK,

this is gonna be different. Yeah, I bet you see these. 7 foot tall guys and high heels and right crazy outfits and you're like, what, what were you telling your parents about all this stuff? Because I mean, you're, you're a fairly young Jewish kid, you know, from New Jersey. You know your parents had to be going, Jeff. Now what are you doing? No, I got to say they found it kind of interesting. I mean, really knew I was off the off the deep end when I went to theater school.

Yeah, and. I know. Thank goodness. They were really supportive. That's awesome. Found it interesting. Crazy fun. Yeah. That's cool. Yeah. I wasn't getting myself into trouble. So. Yeah. Did they were they able to get out to any like Springsteen shows or anything along the way or they go or of them did they Good. That's amazing. Yeah. That's amazing. That's so much fun when you're able to share your work with your parents like that. Yeah, Yeah.

So I've got to say, they were. They were happy for me and so cool. Although if they would have seen Kiss, they might have been like Jeff. Yeah, they never did see KISS. Yeah, we should have a talk here, Jeff. Yeah, that's wild. And so that was your first time that you actually went on tour was was with the Crones and, and, and the Crones being upstaging, of course or eventually, I don't know if they were upstaging yet. But they were, they were OK.

I met, I met Robert Crone at a show that my original club act was was performing at. And so he was standing back there because upstaging it provided the gear and we just got to talking and kind of exchange numbers. And the next thing I know he had actually called me to do a

couple of small shows with him. It was literally me and Robert Carone in a in a U-Haul or a Ryder truck taking a bunch of car cans out of his garage or renting them from one of the local vendors in town to get what he didn't have, and the two of us driving somewhere like Wisconsin and doing a show for a day. So I had done that for a while. Yeah. That is wild. And and did you go? To their party this year at UPS, at LDI. Yeah, I did. I saw you there. I can't remember.

I think I had about 12 glasses of wine by then. Yeah, right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. There was some good wine. Yeah, the wine is always good at that party. It's it's crazy. But I had a really nice. So it was kind of a funny moment because I saw Seth kind of Houdini out the door and I was super tired because I I can't change time anymore. So I've been getting up at 3:00 in the morning in, in Las Vegas or four in the morning every morning, right?

Yeah. And so I was dead tired and it's like, I don't know, 9:00 or something. And I, Sarah was with me and I said, let's Houdini, let's, let's pull out. I'm just going to wait for the right moment. And I see Seth duck out the door. And so I go, oh, Seth, Seth, you know, like I wanted to talk to him. And now I'm out the door, you know, into the restaurant part. And I'm like, ha. And he goes, whoa, something up. And I go, no, no, no, I was just using you because you just left.

So I'm using you. So then I'm on my way physically like to go up the stairs to get out of there and I run into Robert. He's been coming back from the bathroom or wherever he was, but and I ended up in probably, I don't know, a 30-40 minute talk with Robert. We just had this very cool, very long, nice talk. I, I love that guy. Yeah, they're, they're such nice people. They really. Truly and deserve all their success. Oh heck yeah, yeah. And they do have a lot of success. Yes, yes.

They got some success, so. So that's why I thank for getting me getting me in the door. So they called me for for Kiss, met a bunch of bands and, and, and all of their tour managers and so forth doing that. And Styx actually opened for for Kiss several times. And I remember one night, weird fit. It was actually pretty good. Really. I mean God playing bands but. It was early earlier in Styx's career also. It was pre Tommy Shaw. Yeah. Do you know anything about them?

You know, Tom, Tommy had joined them in like 76 and and gave, you know, an interesting shot in the arm, a really good, you know, to the band. So Stick got Styx got the band. The crowd really, really revved up. So they were a good opening act for yeah, yes, people were that. Was like, that was like Lorelei and light up and all that stuff, Yeah. Exactly. I I got so into sticks when I heard that.

Like I heard Lorelei and Light Up and I don't remember if there were other songs on that album, but I was just like, wow. And it is incredible. Yeah, they were huge. And I just, I flipped out when I heard that. I was like, this is the coolest band I've ever heard. And so, yeah, that's cool. And, you know, Tommy Shaw is one of those guys that have such a high degree of appreciation for because he is still doing it and not mailing it in.

Like, he's like Steven Tyler, but Steven Tyler can't quite hold it together completely, you know, But sounds good. Looks like a rock star, does the songs as well as he ever did. He's amazing. That guy. He just totally agree. Doesn't seem to age. You know, he's amazing. And and, you know, the rapport with the audience I think is better than ever, you know, yeah, so good how they've managed to just get better over

the years. Yeah, I mean, even when I see people uploading iPhone videos or whatever and I'll watch them do whatever it is and I'm just like, man, he's still so good. Like he sounds incredible at whatever age he is now. And you know, God bless him. And, and Lawrence Gowen's a funny one because I knew Gowen personally in Canada when he was Gowen and, and you know, he, he got a little big in Canada, but nowhere near as big as as Styx, obviously.

So that's been an incredible ride for him as well. Absolutely, and he's been good for them. Oh, amazing. Like he was such a good fit for what they needed. You know, they needed a showman. They needed a good singer who could do those parts that Dennis did, and they needed a great keyboard player. And he just really fit the bill. He's very, very. Flamboyant. Not flamboyant might be the wrong word, but he is kind of flamboyant. He's a showman, you know? And a good way.

Absolutely. Yeah, Yeah. Yeah, physically great on stage. Yeah, no, he's fantastic. They God bless him and the the longevity that that band has pulled out and they just keep packaging them with Journey or with REO Speedwagon or with all of those bands from the same basic era. Yeah. And it just keeps going. The train keeps on a roll. And they were just here in South Florida recently. I got invited and I didn't go, but yeah, Yeah. That's cool. So.

So what did that lead? So by this point, do you know that this is the career I want? I want to be a touring lighting guy or or. Yeah, absolutely. At that point, there was no question in my mind. I still have. You ever on a crew, like did you ever have to be a tech, a lighting tech or anything, or did you just go straight to lighting director, lighting designer? No, actually when I when I did kiss, I was on the crew and so and that was good.

That was really good for me because that was a bigger show than I had ever been involved with on on sticks. They hadn't done anything quite like that. So I got to see how all of that worked and, and just live that life and work that schedule and I got to run the opening act. So that was always fun. So I got, you know, a little bit of LD chops doing that so. That's amazing experience.

Yeah, that took off a lot of the the pressure of having to learn that stuff on the fly later on, obviously. Yeah, it's huge value. Yeah, I mean, I had to learn the terminology and you know, just the literally the the route from the dimmers to the light to the console.

And figure all that out. So, but I did that for six months and then I, I left and I went back to Styx and I had left, I had left Styx, you know, for, you know, little, little sabbatical and no, excuse me, I'm, I'm not to get too bogged down in the, in the details. It was that that club band, I left the club band, went to kids, went back to the club band and within a month I got the, the offer from Styx and so on again. So I had a couple of, you know,

quick turnarounds and the. Styx thing lasted like you said, 50 years, 15 years. Incredible. That's. Wild wild. You made some good choices on artists. You know, I, I guess I was in the right place at the right time and, and yeah, fortunately I, I said yes. Now, when I, when I was offered Bruce, I said no initially. Really, a lot of people don't know that, but I was I, I was with yes at the time, and I was you. Can't say no to yes. That exactly that's.

Sure. That's probably the dumbest joke I've ever said. No but but good good so and I didn't. I couldn't see my way to extricating myself from from the yes tour initially but thought about it for a couple of days and turned around and re accepted the the offer so. Which yes, tour was that? It was at nine O 2. One O 2, one O yeah. Smeeton ended up doing it, didn't he? Well, after I after. After you left. Actually, he came in as a programmer, believe it or not.

Yeah. So I was, I was out there with them for about 6 months and I got the Springsteen offer. So I turned it over to a friend of mine named Merle McClain, who if you know, but he was, he was a good friend of mine who I thought musically and and lighting designer wise, he was permed for it. And then I had just seen Jonathan's Thompson Twins show. Jonathan was just really kind of newly out-of-the-box as this, you know, lighting as this Varilite programmer slash designer.

And that Thompson Twins tour was really groundbreaking, as small as it was. And he programmed the whole thing and and designed it. And so I went to see the show and I said please, you know, come and program varilites for us, which he did. And between me, Merle and Jonathan, I thought we did, you know, we created a pretty good show and I got the Gabby there. I went to Bruce. Yeah, I saw that show. It was good.

Yeah. So so you said no because you were with Yes, but you you did want to like by that time Bruce was had already taken off, right. Well, it was pre born in the USA. Oh, it was just after the river tour and he hadn't done anything in a in a in a a few years because he was recording the album and doing some other things. So I, I didn't feel inclined initially to, to leave the Yes

tour. But, you know, I thought about it and, you know, discussed it with some friends and thought, well, that's an insane decision on my part. So I quickly backtracked and, and, and accepted the offer. And on that show, born in the USA, of course, turned out to be, you know, Britain's most successful album. He went from from star to, you know, mega superstar on that tour, right and we so we were all there.

It was a two year tour hitting the entire world and just had a ball doing it and it. Still hasn't ended that tour still hasn't ended. He's still touring. Price of tickets has gone from like $5.00 to 5000. But you know, aside from that, you know, it's, it's all pretty much the same. Crazy that all on on the Bourne in the USA tour, that was just when the Jacksons Victory Tour was out as well and we all were invited to the Victory Tour but they said but you have to buy your ticket.

So it was a $75 ticket. This is 1984. Bruce was the best seat in the house for Bruce was 1875. That's what I'm thinking. Yeah, that's wild. 75 bucks for the Victory Tour. Yeah. And you had to pay. Did you pay? You know, we were supposed to pay and somehow I never did. I think that you know, the tour manager must have bought. Somebody, somebody's going to be come and look and going. Hey, $75. Yeah, plus interest, plus the Houston $5000. Yeah, yeah.

Oh my God. You know, Bruce, OK, so the artists, I guess are somewhat responsible for ticket prices, but the the whole dynamic pricing thing gets a lot of artists in trouble. And you know, again, I think it's one of those situations where things are done maybe for the right reason and then it spins out of control and it becomes all wrong and all bad and everything else.

But you got to do something. Because what's happening is if Bruce is selling tickets for 300 bucks, call it, none of them end up in the hands of fans at that price. They're, they're all bought up by, by resellers and then they're sold again on the, on the secondary markets and they become $5000 anyways. And now Bruce isn't making any of the money. The promoter is not making any of the money. Certainly Jeff Rabbits isn't making any of that money. And you know what I mean?

So like, why shouldn't the artist at least get a piece of the fans that are willing to pay $5000? Why shouldn't you get a piece of that? So I see some common sense to it. I see some logic to it. And, and guess what people could say, but he's greedy. Well, you know, people don't do things because they don't want to make any money usually. Like generally there's going to be a commercial side of

everything we do, right? We all want to be able to survive and God forbid, be able to afford, you know, a vacation or a a meal every once in a while, you know, like. Yes, absolutely. Well, and and I'm not defending the whole dynamic pricing thing, but I, Bruce did put out a statement saying anybody that doesn't feel like they got their money, money's worth may go to the box office and get a full refund for whatever you paid. And I guess to date, there's been none of the. Refunds.

Yeah, well, because probably half those $5000 tickets are reselling for 10, you know, because there's so much friggin available cash out there right now that people, if they want to go see Bruce and they want good seats, what's the price that they won't pay? You know what I mean? That's like I just, I just saw, what's his name, Hendricks the OR Hendrick the guy? Rick Hendrick, he owns a bunch

of car dealerships. I just saw on one of these auctions, I think it was a Meekum auctions, he paid like $3.5 million for the 1st 2025 Corvette CR1 that's coming off the line like it's serial number OO1. He paid $3.5 million for it. I mean this is a Corvette that will sell for about 175,000 in the dealership. But you want serial number OO1 Guess what you know? And when I start going up over 2 million, I was like, you gotta be shitting me. It's a it's.

Worth whatever anybody will pay for it. Correct. And, and the problem with tickets is that when you're talking about Bruce Springsteen or Taylor Swift, name the price because you're going to find people and there's and so you have to adjust to the market you have. To yes. You know I. Just from the consumers point of view, when you look at the website and there's a ticket for $800.00 and then you look 5 minutes later and it's $2000, then you really feel kind of ripped off.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, I completely get it. I get it from both sides though. Because again, the problem is that rich guy who wants to go see Bruce Springsteen is going to pay 5 grand. He'll pay it from some seedy scalper somewhere. The tickets, you know, pass through several sets of hands or whatever.

Why shouldn't that be a controlled situation where, you know, the money is going back to the artist and to the promoter, the people who actually paid the money and put in the effort to put this show on and everything else versus the scalper? So I don't know. It's it's a problem that's as old as as concerts. You know, the scalper situation. But I get it. And actually, the way you the way you phrase it makes sense. Yeah, well, that's something no

one's ever said to me once. You know, Marcel, you just said something that really makes sense. Let this date and history show. Exactly. Well, it's recorded. This is a good thing. So now, now it's there in Forever, you know, I'm in Forever's Ville having made sense. So Styx, Bruce Springsteen. And so that just lasted a few years, like where you were just touring and being real happy and everything, and then you discover this MTV thing and.

Well, so that that's when I thought there there really is a way to make a lateral at least a lateral move, if not an upward move in into this field. And I was always interested in that field, never thought that I would be able to find my way into it, didn't really understand it.

And once I started to get a feel for what it took, and there would be years off sometimes between Springsteen tours and I would either fill it in with some other tours or I would start to find, you know, through Jim Moody and some other friends, start to find some television work. I, you know, gaffed a show for Jim once so that I could see what was going on. And then he slowly began using me to substitute for him on shows where he was double booked

and he couldn't be there. He would kind of help me through the design process until I kind of had a firm grasp on my own. So I was doing studio shows as well as as rock shows, really starting to understand how the camera works and that's kind of what it's all about. So at that point I saw, OK, this is something that I can do almost as a parallel career to working with Bruce and working with a a few of the other rock bands that I was doing it. Seems to have worked out OK.

Yeah, yeah. Well, and I, I love that idea of the live show being turned into, into something that could be consumed by, you know, TV viewers. So and then at one point it just sort of like turned around. I still have a couple of rock things, but I would say 90% of my year is doing television style things. Yeah. And, and sports was just sort of a natural extension of that. I'm sorry, what sports are we

talking? About Super Bowl, just the sporting events that you've been involved in, in lighting for television as well. Yes, yes, yes, yes. Sorry, I haven't actually lit a sports event, but I have, although I did did one that I'll mention. But yes, that was just the first Super Bowl that I was involved with was produced by the Disney people that I knew from several shows that I had done at Disney World.

And and so I went up against, you know, several other designers in a bid process and was was selected. So that was an exciting thing to be a part of because it was so enormous and outdoors dealing with, you know, a kind of a transition from day daylight to night time in a, you know, in an enormous stadium where you had to set up in a 12 minute commercial. Yeah, and I and I seem to recall that was Miami. That was Miami.

That was Joe Robbie Stadium. I I was there because that was the first time that we put those robo scans onto something and it was a nightmare. That's right. That's right. Well, it was certainly a a big show. I think I was probably in a little over my head as well, but we had a couple of technical snafus that. And that we did. And it it, it was a big enough show that we that we really couldn't afford to lose many of the lights that we had.

My recollection is that by Showtime, everything was back where it needed. It was, it wasn't easy. I had a lot of guys that didn't sleep for a few days and we had to bring some guys in from Denmark. We, I don't know if you remember, but we brought in Finn, who was the head engineer for Martin in Denmark. I remember. And yeah, I mean, it was, it was just, that was one of the hardest weeks, I think of my life because it went from, you know, excited as hell.

Oh, my God. We got lights that are going to be on the halftime show for the Super Bowl to, you know, could this week just be over already? Please, please just survive and get through it. But you know, anything like that. And there had not been that many Super Bowls that had turned off the lights. Most of the Super Bowls prior to that just had supplemental fill lighting and it was marching bands and so forth. And so I don't know whether that many companies had all the

infrastructure. Right. No. And they? Handle that. And it was the 12 minute thing, yeah. Well, now it's so much easier because you have IP rated lights and we've all done it 1000 Times Now. And you know, like I remember one of the things was you guys were programming and we had lights all over the field and all of a sudden the sprinklers came on. Yes, that's. Right. These were not IP headlights.

And I think one of one of our texts, like mistakenly yelled at one of the the NFL, you know, runs for guys. And that was like a no, no, because those guys are God when it comes to the Super Bowl. It's like, you know, you don't mess with our field. You know, this is our field, and this is sacred. And so it was like, OK, better put, you know, garbage bags over the lights or whatever because this is bad. Yeah. Yeah, well, it was a learning experience for all of us.

Yeah. And, you know, I came away from it with, you know, lots of notes on how I would do it if I ever had the opportunity again. Yeah, yeah. Well, and by the way, quite possibly the worst lip syncing I think I've ever heard was Patti LaBelle. It was so bad. It was like not even believable. It was just like, what are you doing? Like she's singing different words and stuff. Well, I I guess it's been enough years since then that I could

tell this story. But, you know, audio wise, Tony Bennett and Patti LaBelle were on the show. Tony Bennett insisted on singing live. Yeah. And Patti LaBelle insisted on pre recording track that she would sync. Well, Patti LaBelle couldn't remember her words, so she wasn't lip syncing to the. Track. Even though the track continued, Tony Bennett forgot the words to his song. He was standing there with a live mic and nothing coming out at all.

Yeah, I know it was funny. We had so many things that didn't work. Yeah, on that. You know, it was tough. It was tough, but there was one cool moment. So I, I, I think for one of the nights where you guys were programming or something, maybe the night before the Super Bowl or two nights before, I was there just checking on my guys and I was taking my father-in-law and my ex-wife out for dinner.

And so they were with me. I think my ex-wife might have stayed in the car, but my father-in-law wanted to come in with me and just see what it looked like. He's a big Super Bowl guy. And so he's like for sale. Marcel, he's pulling on my shirt. And I think I'm talking to one of your guys or something and he's pulling on my shirt. Marcel, Marcel, Marcel. And I go, yes, Tom. What? And he goes, that's, that's Tony Bennett over there. And he was sitting in a golf cart just by himself, nobody

around him or anything. Right. Yeah. And I go, we'll go say hello. He's like, no, no, no, I can't do that. And he's old school Chicago, my, my father-in-law, right? Old school, like he, he grew up seeing Tony Bennett in bars in Chicago and stuff, right? And I can't, I'm like, he's sitting there by himself. Go say hi. He ends up talking to him for like 30 minutes. I swear. I could have, I could have murdered his wife at or his daughter at that point and he

wouldn't have cared. You know, he would have been like, oh, I'll look away, you know, because he was just in heaven. He'd never met somebody like that before. So it's just such a moment for him. Pretty cool. About the only cool moment for me the whole week. Yeah, it was stressful for everybody. Yeah, it was a stressful week. Sorry to sorry to remind you of that one. No, no, not at all. It's all part of it. So of course we lost Mr. Moody,

I think last year or 2023 maybe. It it was in 2024. Oh no. Excuse me, 2023. Yeah, well, they all blur ever since COVID. It's like this one BLOB of time since COVID, truly. But yeah, it's obviously sad losing anybody right now and we're losing way too many people, but. Jim Moody was a big one, So Moody Rabbits ended in 9796. While it really just, you know, extended itself into Moody

Rabbit Hollingsworth right. So we, we felt that adding the architectural component to our practice was going to be something that would round us out, get, you know, fill in a whole sector that we weren't really taking advantage of. I was really interested in it. I had gone, yeah, go and taking a bunch of classes in architectural lighting and I was hot to do it. And some of my clients were hiring me to do, you know, houses or restaurants that they owned. And so I, I thought I knew what

I was doing. But I had a friend from my Chicago days that was who is now living in LA, Dawn Hollingsworth, who was a bona fide architectural lighting designer. And so we managed to get her to join us and did that for a few years, really trying to grow the architectural side of things, which.

It was an interesting period of time too, because it was sort of when like this arc attainment thing started when so many like especially corporate things we're we're adding automated lighting or color change technology or whatever into their retail environments or into their sometimes even conference rooms and offices and stuff like that. Exactly. Exactly. But bridges were starting to be lit and and all kinds of things. So that's. Right, that's right.

LE DS were just beginning to, you know, rear their heads so that there was, you know, color changing possible without a whole lot of external technology on them. Yeah. So yeah, it was a good time to be getting into that. We had one client, Gameworks, which was, you know, it like a big nightclub, restaurant gaming chain that was really good for us. And it was exactly what you just described.

So we did that. And then moving along, we we saw a friend of ours, Lisa Passamante Green, who was, you know, kind of a competitor in the architectural lighting side, but she also had a firm grip on the theme park. And, and she was suddenly left without her staff who had gone off and began working with somebody else. And we were lending her staff. At this point.

We had, you know, 15 or 20 people in our office and we thought, Lisa, why don't you just join us and then you can have, you know, a little bit of safety in the entertainment side and so forth, you know, kind of protecting the overall enterprise. And so she did. And so that was, that was when we, we decided we couldn't add another name to the list. So we we called it Visual Terrain. Yeah.

I remember that change. So was that set up like like a collective or or like a partnership or what was sort of the company structure? It it, it was a partnership and you know, we were all kind of in charge of our own little sector, but we spilled over. I could do architectural work.

Anybody could do anything they wanted to, but that partners brought in the work and our compensation was more or less tied to the the clients and the income that we were able to bring in. But the as a collective, we were paying the salaries of everyone and the any, any, anything else that we needed in order to run business. Yeah, that makes sense. So I did that for, you know, between 91 when I started with, with Jim and 2010 when I left. So there was like 20 years, yeah, of doing that.

And I just decided I wanted to concentrate on the TV side. I didn't really want any of the other corporate responsibilities that, you know, that I had and, you know, sharing expenses with all the other sectors as well. I just really wanted a few years, you know, that kind of the fourth quarter of my career to run things on a slightly simpler level. So I did that. I brought one employee with me and and just kept it, you know, lean and mean. Yeah. And that's you today still.

So you're. You're today that one employee left for for Disney about five years into the process. And so right now I'm, I'm doing it entirely on my own. If I need to support help, I just hire people in buy the job, which is a much simpler way for me to operate. Yeah. And you know, I'm, I'm happy doing it the way I well. You're not in a, you're not in a growth mode, like you're not out there trying to fight everybody to bring in every account you can and stuff.

So you don't need a bunch of employees, right? You know, So it makes a lot of sense what what you've done and what you're doing. And, and I like it.

I like it a lot. So, you know, one of the one of the things that you would know better than so many people is just the general evolution of lighting for TV, for music on TV, for live events on TV. And I mean, obviously cameras, obviously going from, you know, stationary lights to moving lights and going from moving lights to better moving lights and, and better moving lights to LEDs.

But aside from that, like as far as the style of lighting and and the the skill set involved and all of that, has that evolved as well? Well, AB absolutely. I, you know, I think that since the 90s when this really began till the, the present day, I think that the lighting has gotten a lot more cinematic. I think that, you know, the lighting designers and the and, and the lighting consultants, the TV lighting consultants are much more tied into a cinematic

kind kind of look. And the cameras allow us to do that in order to make things look a lot more interesting and not quite so not quite so bland as they might have been in the 90s when the cameras needed that much more light. And I think the style was, you know, a lot of the lot of the directors of photography that would work on.

Rock. Videos were from the commercial world where everything is, you know, or in those days fairly flat, fairly even to, you know, these days when everybody is looking at the most interesting cinematography and wanting to transfer that to to a rock show when when it's appropriate. So I think in in that respect. And that's something that, you know, kind of speaks to me as well.

So when I speak to students, I try to, you know, help them understand it's not about a traditional look anymore. Somebody, I was just attending a webinar the other day with a cinematographer and somebody posed a question about soft light and what is soft light? An ineffective way, an uninteresting way to light people in in today's day and age. And the, the DP said, and I totally agreed with him. It's all about where the light comes from, how you control the light, how you control the

shadows. I talk an awful lot about shadow management, you know, when I, when I teach students and, and so I think understanding that developing your eye, I think that's really what's come a long way since since the early days. It's no longer just a matter of is there enough light, but how do you use? Light, yeah, what about what about AI? Is, is AI having any impact yet

on lighting for television? Like is AI doing any of the analysis on how much light, how little light you know, how things are going to need to be done, or is that all still done by the lighting designer and you? Well, I'd be curious to know if anybody else is using it that way. I'm not. I haven't really seen the tools yet.

I know Vectorworks has some tools that will allow a set designer to, to say, OK, do do this set in a modern, modern way, do this in an Italian, you know, Renaissance way and, and the AI will simply just change it all and suddenly it's a it's, it's a new look. I haven't seen anything like that. I mean, there's certainly a lot of computerization when you think of what we can do with previz these days, but I haven't really seen anything that does either calculations or design itself.

Yeah. Are you using AI at all yet? Like for any kind of even just fixture mapping or writing or. Anything. I've begun using AI for a little bit for writing, you know, I try not to rely on it, but sometimes I just want to think of something, you know, a different way and I'll see what I And I've just really started doing this, yeah, You know, playing around with it for a little while and trying to understand what it can do. So I've. I'm fascinated by it.

I'm going to get more into it. I am completely in favor of it. I don't want it to replace people, but I think if it's used properly it won't. It'll just make us all better. Yeah, I think there's certainly an aspect of that where it does make us all better. But I do think that ultimately it's going to replace many, many, many things. And how that happens and how eloquent it is and or how rough it is when that happens, we'll see.

I just think it's another as big as it is because I think this is probably the biggest technological shift that that man has has witnessed in in since the beginning of time. Maybe fire would be the other one, but but I think that that this is that impactful and it's going to be a wait and see kind of thing. It depends on so many people doing the right things, you know, all these, you know, trillion dollar companies thinking in our best interests and stuff. And that doesn't always work.

And but I just, I see a lot of opportunities for it to simplify and streamline a lot of jobs. You know, when, when I think of the lines of code that you have to write to program an MA3 console these days, some of it is just not work that an LD who's been being paid a lot of money should be sitting there doing like, I mean, that stuff that AI can take.

And that's where I use it the most is like, sometimes somebody will send me a document that's 10 pages of a lot of the same fluff and I'll just feed it into something and say, you know, explain this to me like I'm like, I'm a 6th grader. Not just summarize it, but sometimes it's explain this to me like I'm I'm an idiot. And because I am and, and you get really great results from stuff like that, you know, like it does a very, very good job with stuff like that.

Sometimes I just say, Hey, take all this information and put it into a, an 8 by 4 table with this and this and this and, and boom, all of the information is laid out exactly how you want it. And it's just like, I'm very visual. So a lot of those types of tools help me a lot. But I agree, I've done that too. I've I've recently had to read some legal documents and some of it was just, you know, gibberish to me. And it's amazing how AI can just, you know, break it down,

give you examples. So, you know, as as long as you can trust it, you know, you don't want AI to say I think we should launch the nuclear missile.

Yeah, Yeah. That's a great example because you know it will at some point, you know, it would like at some point, I think we'll all be guided by AI to a certain extent in, in our decision making process, whether that's driving or whether that's flying an airplane or whether that's, you know, the guy in charge of the nuclear button or you know, whatever it is. Or medical analysis.

That's a big one. Well, but that's one that I'm super in favor of. Like, you know, I've had friends who have done these robotic surgeries for for like pancreatic cancer and stuff like that very successfully. And so if you ask me, do I want surgery performed by a robot or by a human, I'll pick a robot every time because humans make mistakes. Robots don't, you know, as long as they're programmed properly. And you would think that they

are by now. I think medical AI is going to be probably one of the most exciting and incredible areas of AI in the next 5 or 6 years. Like I, I predict, you know, a cure to cancer, Alzheimer's, all kinds of really, really big things that have been plaguing us for many, many years and with no real success as far as cures or, or even, you know, pathways

to cures. So because of the ability to research, like that's where AI comes in so effectively and efficiently, as in research, it can like let's say you have to go research a project because you're lighting a, you know, a 15th century act or something, whatever it is, and you need to do research on that period. You know, AI can do in 10 minutes what you could do in in two weeks. So that's the incredible thing. That's what I love about it so much. But yeah, I mean, it's common.

It's just going to be interesting. Like I think for now, there are commercial roadblocks that are keeping companies like MA Lighting from from putting AI in consoles. I think that there's going to going to be, you know, sort of a slow move into that.

And then all of a sudden everybody all at once, because once somebody sort of cracks the seal open and says, hey, look, you know, because right now designers are going to fight it, especially people who are in their living programming consoles are going to fight it. And, and so they should, I mean, you know, you don't want to, you don't want your rates to go down or to lose days or anything because AI is doing it instead of you, right, Right. Exactly, exactly.

But I mean, can you, can you then just say to the MA, give me a stone's cue? Yeah, yeah. That's the other thing is, is the whole copyright and who owns the the IP of all of the stuff. But that's the other problem.

And you can, you can like I use the music one quite often or one of the music ones called Suno. And in SUNO, you can say, you know, I want something kind of jazzy, but a little bit Earth, wind, fire and and, you know, a little bit of this and a little bit of that boom, you get that style now. They're not copying songs, but they're certainly, they're certainly pulling some of that styling into it, you know? Yeah. Yeah, exactly.

Yeah. So yeah, I mean, Suno, the music one, their new the iPhone app anyways, I don't know if it does it on the Android one, but the iPhone app, you can hum a few notes into it or a few bars into it and then say, now create a reggae song around that, that little melody that I just gave you and make it in, you know, whatever beats per minute and in this style with this type of a singer and you've got the song. I mean, it's just incredible how.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, as much fun as that is, and I guess it gives us, you know, gives the world more variety of music, Does it take something away from it does now? We don't need humans to do that. Yeah, I know. Of course it does. Of course it does. Like it's. Yeah. So that's some of the stuff where I wonder where it's all gonna go because, you know, of course musicians are gonna push back on all of that stuff. But our audiences, like, I don't know. I don't know where it all goes.

And then if, if audiences accept AI music, well, what happens to

live music now? Because there's such a massive need for and and passion and desire for live music right now and market for it. You know, if music is suddenly AI robots, you know you're not going to have unless it's just a big video screen with cool visuals and and you're listening to music in a crowd with a video screen like that sounds awfully boring to me so. Well, I'll tell you, in 100 years, they're going to be listening to this podcast and

probably laughing at us for knowing so little about. What you idiots? Going to be commonplace in a. 100 years. Well, by the way, it wouldn't be the first time I screwed up a prediction because you know, COVID I, I created a, a phrase called day 91. I said this is going to be a nine 90 day problem and what do you want your business to look like in day 91? And, you know, people threw that at me for about the next 380 days or something. You know, it's like, yeah, day 91, huh? Yeah.

Well you just said it out loud. I think everyone else thought it was just going to be a 90 day thing too. Yeah, well, I say everything out loud that most people just think and keep quietly because they're smart enough not to say it. Yes, yes. So show light. Tell me. Tell me about show light. Show light, from what I understand is sort of get together of of these really great minds of the lighting

business. Yes, I'm, it was started, you know, maybe 25 years ago by some Brits and they, they do it once every four years. It's kind of a convocation in a different city. They've been to several cities in Europe. They did one in New York but I think they they much prefer doing it in Europe and they get people sort of like a Ted talk. For lighting designers.

The format is 3/3. Lighting designers are on stage each give a 20 minute presentation with or without visual, but most have some sort of visual support. Then those 3 speakers stay on stage and they take questions for about 1/2 an hour and this happens and then there's a break for food and there's some manufacturers that have tables that you can visit and then you go back and you do it again.

So they bring lighting designers from all walks of lighting design and try to get as many different, what they call them presenting a paper. But you know, it's this presentation on so many different things. So it's been. Directors, directors of photography, it's been theatrical lighting designers that have done in, you know, big Broadway musicals, but in in a diner, you know, rock'n'roll people, BBC lighting directors, etcetera, etcetera. Less architectural, but there is

a little little bit of that. And somebody from the architectural world wanted to propose a paper. They very well could be accepted. So it's three days of this at the end of every day. The first day everybody's matched up with a manufacturer and they take you out to a fabulous dinner somewhere in the city that you're in. So far, the ones that I've been to have been outside Prague in a little village about two hours out in the Czech Republic mountains.

And I went and I went to one in Florence, Italy, which was great. They took a long break because of the pandemic. And so they're just doing a new one this year in Dijon, France, couple hours out of Paris. And so I'm going. And so, and then there one, one of the three nights, there's a big gala reception where everybody gets together and people give a few speeches and you are encouraged to change your location from table to table to speak to certain people.

Like if your napkin has a certain color sticker on the bottom of it, you're the one who is chosen when they ring the bell to go to another table. So everybody gets to talk to everyone else. There are a lot of lighting celebrities there, Broadway people, rock'n'roll people, TV, etcetera, etcetera. So I think it's a learning experience. It's fun. You get to go to a really interesting city. They haven't, they break early one day and take you on a tour

or the city. And so it's just really, and so it who, who? Runs it. Is it like a not-for-profit or something? Yeah, there was a show light committee that was based in in the UK and a few of the founders retired or passed on in the last few years. So there's a new group of people, but it's mostly a consortium of five or six organizers that are based mostly in the Uka little bit in the US.

And people just put it all together from a finding the venue standpoint to selecting all of the people that do the presentations. And so you can imagine. So you get selected every year. You're getting or not every year, but you're getting selected. You don't just raise your hand and say I want to come. No, no, you, oh, you you have to buy a ticket. You OK? Yeah, yeah. So you can go to their website which is I think show light

hell, I'm not saying. You, I'm saying you, you Jeff Rabbit. I was. I was invited to to do a presentation last time. This time I decided that I didn't have anything really new to contribute more than I did last time, so. You're going just as an audience. I'm just going as an audience member, a punter. Yeah, Exactly, exactly. Interesting and. Is it mostly students and stuff who are in the audience or? No, no. There are some students.

There are some students, but it really runs the full spectrum of student to geezer. And how how many people are in the audience? 3 or 400? Oh wow. Yeah, interesting. I'd say probably closer to 300. And yeah, I mean all the manufacturers, all the kingpins of the manufacturing, you know, companies, it's always sponsored by one of the big manufacturers. So this year I believe it's being sponsored by Juliet because they're they're in France.

And when we were in the, the Czech Republic, it was Roe Bay, of course, you know, and, and then Clay Paki when we were in Italy. So, so you know that they sort of inject the flavor of their, you know, their own style and their company into the the overall event, but all the others are there as well. Interesting. And then you know the, the little lobby manufacturing tables, manufacturers tables are much more intimate than you would get at LDI, which is so, so much busier.

So you have good one-on-one time, you're only out there for about 20 minutes and then you're back inside the auditorium for another set of presentations after they have applied you with food and drink during the break. It sounds fun, I'm going to have to check it out probably. Not in May. Yeah, go to showlight.org and, you know, give it a try. Yeah, it's a Dijon France, but wow, it's fun.

Sounds sounds amazing. And the other thing that I wanted to get to before we leave because we're getting pretty long in the tooth here, you and me talkers. So I know that you've been big on, on helping people, not only through education, where, where you've been extremely giving of your time. You're, you're always involved in these things where you're either speaking or you're, you know, you're, you're teaching somewhere something.

So it doesn't shock me that you're going to show like, because it's another one of those types of events. But I know you also get involved in more structured charities and things too, right? Yes, yes. And there there are a couple that I really love. Feeding America is a national organized food bank that has contributed a lot to all of the the United States based

disasters over many, many years. They were very instrumental in helping out along with, you know, World Central Kitchen and so forth when we had the recent wildfires here in Los Angeles that were so devastating. Food Bank, which does things on a much more local level here in in Los Angeles for the many homeless people that, you know, really benefit greatly from their generosity and outreach. And then there's also on North Hollywood, the North Hollywood Food Bank that I occasionally go

in and, and do some cooking for. Oh, wow, that's cool. Good for you. Yeah, Yeah. So I, you know, for a couple. Of years when my son was really young, I used to take him and my business partner at the time and his two kids and we'd throw them in the back of the pickup truck. And we'd go to one of the churches, would make Turkey dinners in a box. And we'd go load up with like, you know, 2-3 hundred of these Turkey dinners in the back of

the truck. And the kids would just jump out and go door to door and hand out all these Turkey dinners. And we'd drive around, you know, I don't know what you call them, but less advantage neighborhoods or whatever. And you know, they just knock on the door and say, hey, do you want Thanksgiving dinner? And they'd be like, Oh my God, yes. And you know, they'd they'd. And I loved it. I always said, I want to get way

more involved in this stuff. And then life grabs you and you get busy and of course, but you know, I say if everybody does it when they can, then then we've. Got it much more covered. And, you know, food insecurity is just heartbreaking in this country where so many have so much and so many don't that, you know, I think we can even score a little bit. Yeah. No, it's so true.

You know it's Tony. Robbins I think it's a bad rap from a lot of people in our industry because supposedly he, he walks away without fully paying the bill occasionally, but but he's done so much for feeding, you know, people and like he's, I can't remember what number he's at now, but something like 100 million meals. You know, he's got like this mission to to hand out a billion meals and he's like over 100 million or something.

And I'm probably way off on all these numbers, but it's just an enormous number that you're going like really that many. And so, you know, he's constantly. Collecting money from. His billionaire friends and stuff to pay for this stuff. And, you know, it's hard to believe, like you said in, you know, as much money as there is flying around right now, it's hard to believe that people are starving, you know, that people don't know where they're getting

their next meal from. So. Yeah. And how awful is that? Yeah, it's always an incredibly. Important thing so. Thank you for being so charitable and taking care of some of that stuff. Yeah, yeah. And we're talking about it. We're at two hours, so I think we got. To go, but I I appreciate you so much, Jeff. I could sit and talk to you and listen to you for hours on end. I, I think you're one of the

nicer people in our industry. I'm super glad to to have you as a friend and to be able to talk to you occasionally and love seeing you at trade shows and stuff. And and I'm just glad you're still working and, you know, you're not like we don't have to set up a GoFundMe for Jeff Rabbits. You know, that would suck. Yeah, well, thanks, Marcel. I mean, you're, you're great to talk to as well. And, and a really great

interviewer. I. Enjoyed this a lot, and yeah, I I, I've enjoyed all your other podcasts as well. Oh well, thank you so much. We're going to have to do it again though, because we didn't even talk about Morpheus. And you've been the most loyal Morpheus user of any Morpheus user, I think, ever. And and so, you know, that's a whole story unto itself. So we'll save it for the next one. Cool. So thank you. And and you have a great rest of your week. You too. You too.

Thanks, friends. I'll be well. All right. See ya.