As you walk through this castle of construction, you encounter scaffolds, trusses, circular structures, and sparks shooting as guys weld metal skeletons.
What’s it all mean?
Then you come across something that really welds it all together: Hanging high on a white wall, silver edifice spelling AEROSMITH.
This magnificent visage has never been presented publicly. As SGPS Showrig Vice President of Touring Benjamin Lampman explains, “We built it for them, and then they found out that it was too close to a curse word in another language, with the way it’s stylized.”
Darn!
“So we ended up actually having to build them another thing that was just an A, which is what they used on their tour and in their residencies,” Lampman says.
Make it happen
Adaptability is crucial to the Showrig operation. So is variety and grandeur. The company is that largest entertainment operation you know nothing about.
Its warehouse is massive but somehow insular, taking up its own industrial neighborhood in North Las Vegas. The 250,000-square-foot fortress is barely branded, identified only on its main entrance.
But inside is where the greatest tours and residency productions are created.
Think Trans-Siberian Orchestra, in its 20th year with SGPS Showrig. Or New Kids On The Block’s current Dolby Live set, the BLOCK PARTY sign and five pods hoisted above the crowd. Or the individual risers, fireworks blasting in the background Kiss has employed on tour. Or Jennifer Lopez’s arched JENNY backdrop, giant champagne bottle and silver staircase from her Colosseum show.
The company’s Las Vegas residency clients include Shania Twain’s “Let’s Go” residency at Zappos Theater; Aerosmith’s “Deuces Wild” at Dolby Live (Steven Tyler’s piano lift the signature element); Motley Crue’s production (with Tommy Lee’s roller-coaster drum set); Luke Bryan at Resorts World Theatre (with the catwalk on which he twerked above the crowd), and Robbie Williams (with its upstage “telescope lift” for the headliner and his showgirls) at Encore Theater.
The company’s touring shows include Bad Bunny, Post Malone, Jelly Roll, Blink-182, Billie Eilish, even Zedd (known for his custom “Orbit Tour” DJ booth).
There seems no limit to the Vegas company’s reach. Kanye West’s floating stage (which we saw at T-Mobile Arena in 20165) was a SGPS Showrig innovation. MGK, formerly Machine Gun Kelly, indoor helicopter was born in Vegas.
“We’re based in Las Vegas,” Lampman says, “but we hit all over the country. We can go anywhere for what anybody needs.”
Such as, the 5,000 torch-holders used at the annual Rise Festival at the Jean Dry Lake Bed.
Or, consider the stats for Bad Bunny’s touring show: Three unique stages, 600 platforms (200 per stage, all custom wood-grain finish), a traveling crew of 12 stagehands for each show on a 55-date tour.
Framed for action
The company essentially makes the bones of sets and stages. Modern-day touring productions need flexibility in the lifts and trusses that move stage pieces. Rotating stages, video walls, auxiliary stages, the stuff concert-goers take for granted, are built at SGPS Showrig.
Many pieces are used in multiple productions. A lift for Bryan’s residency was effectively sustainable.
“We used it on Travis Scott’s show at Coachella last year, and on Trans-Siberian Orchestra’s tour,” Lampman says. “The big thing that gets tough is, these shows have to tour. These shows have to be able to move. The question is is, can we come up with a way that they can do it fast enough to get it in and out? If it takes too long to move in and out, it gets cut from the show.”
The company employees 180 full-timers in Las Vegas and 800 in its five warehouses across the country.
A long run
The Vegas institution was launched in 1974 as Showlites, its late founder Eric Pearce a trailblazer in theater lighting. His gifts to the live-entertainment industry were advances in cable systems and connectors, dependable and durable touring gear. Boring stuff to concert-goers, but crucial to concert performances.
Company president Ned Collett, too, is a longtime Vegas entertainment pro. Having assumed his post in October 2023, Collett served as Oak View Group’s vice president of arenas and stadiums, forming the Arena Alliance of the top 24 sports arenas throughout North America.
Collett has also served as Live Nation’s executive vice president of venues, and he held top-level positions with BASE Entertainment and Pure Management Group. He is a full-tilt company man now, saying upon his appointment, “I can unequivocally state, the legacy of ShowRig continues.”
Viability in live experience
The company’s future depends on how extensive and imaginative are touring productions and residency shows. Currently, business is as booming as Lee’s drum solo inside his percussive rollercoaster. In single week in April, the company was on tour with Demi Lovato, Kaskade, Nine Inch Nails and Carol G.
Lampman has worked on projects ranging from the lighting system at LIV Nightclub at Fontainebleau to Queen + Adam Lambert’s world tour to the “Book of Mormon’s” U.S. tour.
The live-entertainment vet earned a master’s degree from University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. He is a theater guy at heart.
“I think seeing shows is something people will always want,” he says. “Look, the Greeks did it, you and we’re going to continue to do shows for the rest of humankind. There’s still something totally different from being in the space, live, with a person than just watching it on a screen.
“That is how we’ll survive and continue to be there, as innovators and as fans.”
John Katsilometes’ column runs daily in the A section. Contact him at [email protected]. Follow @johnnykats on X, @JohnnyKats1 on Instagram.
‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source neon.reviewjournal.com ’
