Martin MACs make waves at Wakestock 2006

This year saw the bikinis and boards out in force for Europe’s largest Wakeboard music festival. In its seventh year, Wakestock enjoyed a record sell-out crowd of 20,000 people over the weekend. The festival increased their production levels and included a more exciting line up than ever before with headline acts including Welsh rockers Feeder, The Zutons, The Delays, Carl Cox, DJ Yoda and mash DJ's The Cut Up Boys.

There were three days of wakeboarding events in Pwllheli Marina and two of music and performance at the main Abersoch site which is a beautiful location on the Llyn Peninsula in North Wales, encircled by sea and mountains.

Lighting, sound and video for all three stages and the VIP tent on site, was supplied by VME, who fielded a crew of 20, getting in on the Monday for a Friday opening.

This year, for the first time, Wakestock hosted an open air stage. Alongside this was the Tent 1 stage for rock orientated acts, and Tent 2, which saw the best of Dance vibes. Martin lighting was abundant in Tent 1 and consisted of most of the MAC family; MAC 500s, MAC 600s, MAC 700 Profiles, MAC 250 Washes, MAC 250 Entours and MAC 300s. Tent 2 was managed by Dave Gate and was set up with; MAC 250s, MAC 300s and JEM Hazers and the VIP tent with EGO X5s.

Lighting designs for all three stages were created by Paul Moss, who was also VME's crew chief and looked after FOH for the Main Stage. He designed each area's rig to be as flexible as possible to cater for a wide variety of acts.

The Main Stage was an 18 metre Orbit structure. Trussing was arranged to curve around and hug the shape of the orbit, maximising the headroom. The structure boasted a full Martin rig which consisted of; MAC 2000 Profiles, Martin MAC 2000 washes, MAC 600s, MAC 500s, Atomic 3000 strobes, JEM Roadie X-Stream.

Paul Moss commented on the MACs, "They have worked really well and proved totally reliable in the heat, dust and difficult operating conditions" He explained, "The clarity of the optics in the MAC 2000s is amazing, they have no trouble cutting in daylight either."

Paul talked about the Roadie X-Stream too, "It's been perfect for the job. The output is phenomenal, but you have to remember to only have it on for a few seconds at a time".