Monster Jam hits Abu Dhabi
Published: MEA
UAE: Delta Sound provided the audio and communications, while Eclipse provided the lighting and power for the recent Monster Jam in Abu Dhabi. The event was organised by Flash Entertainment and Feld Motor Sports and held at Zayed Sports City Stadium.
Monster Jam offered a mix of monster truck racing and freestyle stunts, quad bike racing and FMX motocross. Thousands of man hours went into planning and pulling off the show, with the Flash, Feld Motor Sports and Zayed Sports City teams working together to transform the stadium into a playground for the Monster Jam trucks.
Away from the physical appearance of the stadium, there was also some work to do to ensure the venue’s sound system was up to the challenge. ‘We augmented the house PA system which consists of 19 clusters, with 16 L-Acoustic SB28 subs run off LA-Raks,’ explained Delta Sound’s Liam McGrath, sound co-ordinator for the event. ‘The PA was fed from a DiGiCo SD9 desk, which was setup to be controlled wirelessly to allow the system to be EQ’d away from the desk, and we also sent signal across a fibre network down to the pitch for the subs.’
Added to this was a mic package which put products from Shure and Sennheiser to use. Equipment from XTA, beyerdynamic, Pioneer, Crown and Electro-Voice was also called into action.
‘The comms consisted of a multichannel Clear-Com party line system that stretched the full circumference of the stadium, interfaced with the OB truck, and also was transported down the same fibre to the pitch for pyro and safety crew,’ added Mr McGrath.
Gregor Murray from Eclipse took on the roles of lighting co-ordinator as well as lighting designer and operator.