DPH Sound and Lighting

contact: 877-281-0565 By 18 he got his wish. In 2009 the real break for DPH Sound came. The owner became friends with a lighting designer. It is a labor of love.

DPH Sound started as the dream of a 17 year old boy with naught but some funky old recording equipment and a desire to make awesome concerts. Selling his car, (counter intuitive, I know,) He purchased a pair of speakers and set them up with some borrowed equipment to do a series of concerts at a local “venue” Making a whopping $40 a night yon 18 year old, now successful business man, had finally a

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03/06/2024

Great event from ! DPH provided audio and lighting.

13/09/2023

well this past few weeks has been eventful... (Aug 30-Sept 12)

It started with helping do a video wall for an Artist Swimming performance. (apparently it's not synchronized swimming anymore), then I did a movie night for a Harry Potter themed event. I thought using socks for a Dobby corn hole game was very creative.

I Spent labor day weekend building a light rig for a show that would be used the following weekend, but ultimately ended up going a different direction.

The next Tuesday I set up a virtual corporate event. this turned out to be pretty interesting because I did some creative modifications with a grinder to get the lights to mount to the ceiling.

Wednesday was rehearsal for the virtual event. no excitement here.

Thursday turned out to be a pretty long day where there was almost no breaks though the work was easy.

On Friday I worked for a company that had only worked with once before on a corporate gig. this time it was a concert. I was just set/strike, but it is fascinating to me to see how other people do things. I ended up building some stage decks, pulling Camlok, placing monitors, and running drive lines.

Saturday is when all the real fun was. We had two shows for this day. Hannah Nicole, and Discovery Bay Summer Jam. Hannah Nicole is normally a pretty easy show for us. it's a series so it's pretty dialed. this time there was a band that needed backline. the venue signed the contract and didn't realize what that meant. fortunately I was able to get that to a backline company in time.

Loading in first that day was the discovery bay show. I knew we were really down on people since Hannah. Nicole needed 4 and we really needed 6, I planned on having the stage guys meet us at discovery bay first, get the truck unloaded and the PA built first, and then go do the stage for Hannah Nicole.

I got a call from Ricardo, and the tire is flat on the stage trailer. this is bad because I'm. It really certain there is a spare that fits it. he ends up crawling the trailer to America's Tire where it takes several hours to fix.

the remaining two stage guys (who were excellent by the way) came helped us build stuff. Ricardo was just barely able to get the trailer back in time, audio was pushed back to 2pm, but only half they guys got the memo...

Stage guys slap up the stage in like half an hour, and the show gets out together.

The band at Hannah Nicole was a Beyonce tribute. the plot showed they needed side fills, keyboard riser, drum riser, and a guitar riser. when I talked on the phone to the manager I let them know that this is a pretty small stage. (20'x16') well, that didn't seem to matter. there were 10 people on the tiny little stage apparently. 4 of them were dancers. I guess the stage was shaking all over the place. I was at the other show but fortunately the guys over there were able to get the stage good enough that the show continued.

Meanwhile, setup at discovery bay was tough. we did not have enough guys. on challenge was the LED curtain. When I talked to the staging company, I was under the impression that there was a truss or a bar to hang it from. when I got there, there was nothing in the back, just two truss uprights on the edges. there was really nothing to be done but grab a ratchet strap and hang the curtain on it. it sagged terribly but it blinked most of the time so we were ok.

another challenge was the lighting computer. that morning, I tested the computer and packed it all back in the bag and put it in the van. halfway through the day when I pulled it back out, there was no interface. I had a computer and all the other parts, but no way for it to talk to the lights. I searched everywhere, and even sent my dad to the shop to find it, but it just disappeared. In a moment of desperation, I had him grab an American DJ "dmx operator" light board that was in the shelf. Nicole spent all night looking at the manuals for the lights and creating some sort of show. I thought it was pretty good for the extraordinary amount of effort it took to get any type of look.

all in all, the show went well, it was just a tough day to get it there.

Sunday was church and then went back out to the Dock of the Bay festival for strike. I caught a few bands before it was over. I left at 1:40am and headed home. it wasn't anything complicated, just lots of heavy stuff.

Today, I was asked to repair some stuff and paint at an escape room. I went to go to home Depot at 9pm and as I was leaving the escape room parking lot, the van broke the AC mount. this meant that not only did I lose ac, but water pump, power steering, alternator, etc. I made it a good half mile before the van got really hot. I parked in front of the Monument Crisis Center, which Andrew felt was fitting.

30/08/2023

Finally getting around to talking about last week...

On Monday, Andrew White and I drove to San Diego for the Nucleate Phase 6 Summit. We provided Audio, lighting, Video Wall, and Power. there was a small main stage and 4 breakouts in tents scattered around the peninsula.

We learned on this one that sometimes there are some challenges that you didn't plan for, like overnight parking for a 22' trailer and two behind generator in downtown San Diego.

Tuesday was load in and a small event. we got to the park at 7am, in time to see the fog over the bay. we pretty much worked all day until the event started getting the other parts of the park running. once the event started, Andrew did sound while I kept going on getting ready for the main events Wednesday and Thursday.

All in all, the event went really well. it was a ton of work, but we pulled it off and everyone was happy.

We drove back to the Bay Area Friday. Andrew went straight to an event in Oakland, and I went to visit my Grandmother in the hospital in Antioch.

Saturday was a fairly easy event in Brentwood at Hannah Nicole Vineyards. We had a Journey tribute band. we also found out last minute that there would be a cooking demonstration. I had. no idea at them time but it was Chef Yan. I didn't recognize the name and until he said, "if Yan can cook..." and the audience yelled, "you can too!". that was probably the highlight of the event. lol

the hardest thing about the day was Andrew's keys getting locked in the trailer. Fortunately we were able to get another set of truck keys delivered, and after the show, took the trailer to the shop where I had a cut off wheel to cut the bolts off the lock mechanism. finally got in bed around 12:30.

It was a super long week with days that went on forever, but after all of it, the events were successful and everyone was happy.

21/08/2023

This Friday was the final Brentwood Concert. after doing 10 weeks in a row, it's always strange to think that it's over. you get used to the routine of rolling into the shop, fixing the truck again, leaving super early so you know you'll make it, grabbing a sandwich from Roadies, etc.

This week's truck repair was unexpected. I went to open the lift gate to put some gear back on the truck, and one of the pins was missing. it's super fortunate that I did this at the shop and not at Brentwood because it was unusable. it was also fortunate that I happened to have an extra pin.

it took about half an hour to trim the super hard metal pin with a metal chop saw, for some strange reason I thought I could pick up this pin with my leather gloves on and put it in the truck. what I actually managed to do was burn my fingers and make my leather gloves smoke.

It was odd to only have one show this weekend. we had a video wall rental lined up but that fell through. I was grateful for the extra time to get everything loaded for the Nucleate conference in San Diego. (yes I know there is a hurricane, we are missing it)

The original plan was to load everything into the new 22' trailer, but then after getting everything in it, we came to the realization that whatever we are hauling is exceptionally heavy and dragging an overloaded trailer 450 miles is less than ideal.

Back at Andrew's house with the van, we pulled the video wall, powered speakers, and a pile of miscellaneous cabling out of the trailer and put it in the van. I figured the trailer is probably good to go now after feeling how heavy the van was going down the road. I will certainly not be winning any speed contests going up the grapevine...

After getting home, Saturday I put some new mirrors on the van since someone has managed to drive into both sides and shattered the glass out of them. (thanks muni bus)

We are pretty close to being ready to head out in the morning. just need to load up the charging battery uplights, generators, and pipe and drape.

DPH Sound and Lighting