It only makes sense for Green Day to perform on an epic custom set for their first album in four years.  In December 2016, Gallagher Staging welcomed the challenge of fabricating custom set elements for Green Day’s Revolution Radio Tour. 

When it comes to custom fabrication capabilities at Gallagher Staging, we use the most cutting-edge techniques and materials that flawlessly complements our rental stock. With safety as our top priority, we designed the Gallagher staging system in order to incorporate a desired vision within the client’s’ budget.

“I consistently go to Gallagher Staging because they deliver. They deliver on customer service, they deliver on quality,” said band manager for Green Day, Greg Dean. 

With an approximate one-month deadline in hindsight, Gallagher constructed a custom circus style marquee sign boasting 729 RGBW LED lamps and custom blinder lamp steps holding 190 bulbs.

Ready, Set, Build! 

Within 24 hours upon Dean’s request, a Gallagher team member hopped on a plane to collaborate with designers and their ideas in order to render the specific vision Green Day desired. By the next evening, the band, management and designers granted our fabrication team final approval to begin transforming the pre-production plans into a reality.  

“We’ve got a full Gallagher team here working away on a Saturday and making sure that we meet our deadline — and we will meet our deadline,” said Operation Manager, Adam Swingler, two days prior to load-out date.

Here’s a look at what exactly went into the custom set elements for Green Day’s Revolution Radio Tour.

MARQUEE SIGN

Rigged off of truss, the custom Green Day marquee sign holds 729 RGBW LED lamps. Since each bulb uses four channels, the entire sign is capable of producing an excess of 16 million colors. To explain further, as the lighting designer alters the colors, each separate colored bulb fades through a thousand different colors to obtain the desired color.

Each bulb is individually wired to the power supply, which travels with the set piece, and the power supply connects to the lighting designer’s PC console. The network processing unit converts data from the software to the hardware, and outputs on the DMX screen. The sign runs on 8 DMX universes, where the lighting designer drags a finger across a touchscreen to navigate through colors.

For convenience, the LED sign is modular. In order for the sign to travel nicely, the sign is broken up into three separate pieces that ride on set carts.

Although the aluminum powder-coated units are wired individually, they are easily fixable if something happens to go wrong on-site. The convenient, schematic wiring cables are all labeled in relation to the DMX system. One can easily remove the panel, replace the fixture entirely and continue the show.

*SAFETY FIRST* Since the marquee sign system rides high upon truss, we built custom brackets that will keep everything safely attached.

CUSTOM STEPS

Why settle for plain, black steps on deck? For Green Day, our team built aluminum, powder coated curved steps that contain audience blinders — 190 bulbs to be exact. We cut holes throughout the steps to individually position each bulb through its own light holder.

Similar to the sign, each bulb individually connects to its own circuit with a multitude of lighting effects. Thus, the lighting designer has the ability to create endless pattern variations.

On the backside, the steps are wired with 19-pin socapex through dimming control. The intricacy of the wiring calls for clear labelling for easy identification during possible troubleshooting. We provided extra cable to easily remove bulbs before hitting the road, and replace bulbs while on the road.

The stair units are made of super lightweight aluminum, providing a great range of mobility. We positioned each stair unit  on opposite sides of the set as a mirror image — stage left and stage right. — to create one giant stair unit. For convenience, we installed removable legs in order for the crew to  quickly pack up after the show.   

*SAFETY FIRST*  Safety measures for these stairs must be taken prior to the show, during installation. We made safety both a top priority and fairly easy. On the back of each stair unit, we installed locator pins. The setup crew lines the locator pins up flawlessly with a coffin lock, ensuring absolute safety for the band to walk up and down the steps.