American rock band Halestorm are on the road supporting their latest Everest album – which dropped in August 2025 – with the ‘nEVEREST’ world tour, complete with an epic lighting design by Mathias Kuhn matching their drama, energy and great music … with Robe moving lights among other fixtures on the rig.
Mathias has worked with the band for three years, and for this tour, they wanted a slightly retro aesthetic and a raw, in-your-face lightshow! With no video or other potential distractions, all eyes were on lighting plus some scenic elements – also designed by Mathias – to provide an eye-catching visual backdrop to their gripping performances.
The LD was inspired by the original 1980s high PAR can wall-of-light rigs made immortal by the likes of Queen, AC/DC, Judas Priest and more in the 1980s. To replicate this classic look using the power and dynamics of 2020s tech, he added 78 x Robe MegaPointe moving lights, 8 x FORTES (BMFL WashBeams in the US) and 30 x LEDBeam 350s to the plot!
The tour kicked off with some support dates for Iron Maiden, so Mathias also wanted some sort of distinctive set that could be swiftly deployed and cleared from the stage.
Inspired by the original Spinal Tap movie, he and the band’s guitarist Joe Hottinger came up with four custom mobile stage carts containing Marshall stacks – modeled on the idea of Stonehenge, but full size!
The higher Marshalls are scenic, but the lower ones are a working part of the backline setup. Upstage of this is a scenic curtain complete with rock formations, mountains and a magical curving stairway.
These dollies have 6 x LEDBeam 350s on top (ACL style) and 4 x MegaPointes in the base. The amps and their lights all travel together and are simply wheeled in / out of the trucks and on / off stage … and they were the starting point for the rest of the lighting design.
Both LEDBeam 350s and MegaPointes were chosen in this context for their compact size and power.
Central to the concept was being able to scale up / down to fit an eclectic array of venues on the first legs of the tour, so the challenge was to ensure it looked equally good in small or large performance spaces and was practical and adaptable to work day-to-day in these different situations.
The overhead rig was defined by six flown, raked lighting pods that complemented the four mobile stage carts, and Mathias chose lighting fixtures that he knew well for the design, which included the Robe products.
“LEDBeam 350s are so small and light with a massive output, and they work brilliantly alongside MegaPointes in beam mode – they are a great match and super-fast!” enthused Mathias.
MegaPointes are an all-time favourite of his and were perfect for this design and for Halestorm’s desired look due to the intensity and gobos effects.
The MegaPointe aesthetic is mirrored in the roof with each of the 6 flown pods populated with a 3x3 grid of MegaPointes, making a total of 54 in the air, joining the 18 in total on the floor.
Mathias also comments on how these two fixture types work extremely well together.
For front lighting and specials on the front truss are 8 x FORTES or BMFL WashBeams, chosen for their brightness and solid performance.
On the recent UK and European dates at the end of 2025, these luminaires were FORTES, and the full lighting and audio package was supplied by Liverpool, UK-based Adlib, together with audio.
The floor set was supplied by Go Audio from Hamburg – also Mathias’ hometown – for the European tour, and in the US by Bandit.
Mathias personally hates leaving anything in the truck because it won’t fit in the venue, so a lot of pre-planning and thought went into making the lighting / set flexible enough to deal with everything from the most intimate rooms to massive stages, always filling the space and looking cool.
While no video meant all the pressure was on lighting to make the visual impact, this was a challenge appreciated by Mathias for the opportunity to work with additional SFX – low fog, bubbles, confetti, etc – which he loves, for the additional texturing and dimension it brings to live sets.
He enjoys working with Halestorm because they are always open to ideas and suggestions, they take an active interest in how they look onstage … and he loves the music, so gigs don’t come much better than this!
The tour is being production managed by Joe DiLeo, the lighting director out on the road in Europe and the UK was Alina Schmidbauer, and in the US the lighting director and programmer was Rodger Pugh.
Photo Credit: Alan Evans
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