Lorde: Melodrama Tour — North America

Project Description

New Zealand native Lorde captivated the international music scene in 2013 with her debut single “Royals” and album “Pure Heroine” which topped charts around the world. In 2014, she curated the soundtrack for “The HungerGames: Mockingjay- Part 1” and provided the song “Yellow Flicker Beat” as its lead single.

In 2017, her sophomore album “Melodrama” was released to universal praise and she launched a worldwide tour to support it in September of the same year, Throughout 2017 the tour crossed Europe and Oceania with an L-Acoustics K2 sound system.

For the North American leg of the tour, “Melodrama” became the first international production to deploy L‑ISA technology, using it on all dates.

Sound Design Solution

L‑Acoustics Certified Provider Firehouse Productions would typically have used a classic design with a left-right configuration of 14 K1 plus four K2 per side along with 12 ground-stacked KS28 subwoofers.

For all North American dates, an L‑ISA Focus (patent pending) configuration comprised of a Scene system made of three hangs of 16 K2 and two hangs of 21 Kara were spaced above the performing zone, providing source separation and localization.

An additional Extension system of four hangs of 15 Kara provided an extended panorama extending the span of the system to 60 meters. While for even distribution of low frequency across the entire venue, two centrally flown arrays of eight KS28 were deployed in an end-fire configuration.

Setup

L-ISA Design L-ISA Design
L/R Design L/R Design
Technical Information
TypeArena
Venue100m deep x 100m wide
Stage19.5m wide x 1.83m high
FOH40m from D.S.E.
Constraints
Min trim height 12.2m (above floor)
Rear video wall9.7m
Truss trim12.2m
Sound Design Target
Program typeElectropop
SPL max average>= 105 dBA
SPL distribution6 – 9 dB
Frequency contour12 – 14 dB (@ 100hz)
Frequency contour14 – 16 dB (@ 40hz)

Mapping

L-ISA Design L-ISA Design
L/R Design L/R Design
L/R Coverage

Strong Imaging

Weak Imaging
L-ISA Coverage

Strong Imaging

Weak Imaging

The new L‑ISA technology created a kind of multidimensional sonic field Wednesday night — a nuanced but impressive display that served up the best-sounding show we’ve heard yet at Detroit’s young arena.

Detroit Free Press