SISTERS WAKE THE ALBERT HALL, 1985
During a busy spring in 1985, The Sisters Of Mercy crossed the Channel to kick off their fateful Armageddon tour. Taking them around the clubs and theatres of Europe and the USA, this 33-date schedule saw the band – founders Andrew Eldritch and Gary Marx, Wayne Hussey and Craig Adams – start in Belgium fully intact. Halfway into the tour, however, personal struggles led to the band being reduced to a trio.
Reportedly in a fragile state of health, Eldritch called time on the Sisters at the end of the tour and planned a “farewell for the fans” at London’s Royal Albert Hall on June 18th. Filmed by acclaimed director Mike ‘Supersonic’ Mansfield for the Polygram video release ‘Wake’, the show relied heavily on lighting designer Phil Wiffen’s creative skills and helped strengthen his ongoing relationship with Entec.
“From the early ’80s, I was using Entec as my rental source for the Postcard Records acts I was lighting [Orange Juice, Aztec Camera] and we hit it off from the start,” Phil recalls. “When I began working with the Sisters, it was a foregone conclusion that Entec would continue to be in the frame and the company is still run by a lovely bunch of people.”
The sense of grandeur and occasion present at the Albert Hall was evident well before the band played the first note. In place of a regular support act, Sisters manager Boyd Steemson decided to show an old art house movie. Once completed, the crew flew the projection screen out, leaving a black gauze drape behind which the band enigmatically opened their set, appearing as silhouettes.
Says Phil: “By the time of the Albert Hall gig, I had been with the Sisters for nearly three years, My design was similar to the approach I’d taken for recent tours and, at Andrew’s request, smoke effects played a huge part.
“For this show, I positioned smoke and wind machines in front of some balcony boxes, so at any given moment I could blast the auditorium with smoke. With a light behind that, I could achieve a really stunning effect – in fact, despite everything else that was happening, the smoke is what most people remember about that night, The thing is, if you use too much, everything starts to look a horrible brown!
“In terms of lighting, I concentrated on floor-based fixtures and side lighting with bars of six Thomas PARs on tank traps, or bars of 12 as was the case when we got to the Albert Hall. As there was no drummer, Andrew programmed the band’s new Oberheim DMX drum machine [a.k.a. Doktor Avalanche] and I accentuated the high energy beats and fills with plenty of fast changes on the Alderham 60-way console. As this was being filmed, we had to rig some Profiles on a back truss to gain height. I remember we had nine- and 12-inch Lekos, and I used either break-ups or the shutters to create a slit of light.
“At this point in the band’s history, The Sisters Of Mercy logo borrowed the head from the cover of ‘Gray’s Anatomy’, inside a star, and I was able to create that by using five Profiles. Due to the amount of smoke, you could easily distinguish a star shape.
“Moving lights had begun to come on to the market but they were beyond our budget. Of course, this presented a great opportunity to be creative and conjure something interesting from a less sophisticated palette of tools.”
These tools also included strips of black cloth that were used to break up the background. Phil explains: “it was quite normal for bands to have painted backdrops of their latest album cover but the Sisters didn’t want anything like that. In the Gothic tradition, the black strips which broke the beams up and were very effective when blown by a wind machine.”
He adds: “Earlier in 1985, I had joined the BBC, so I was using up part of my annual leave. Due to my very limited availability, there was a lot of rush and dash, but Entec were very helpful with the preparation, and I ended up having great fun.”
