While celebrating the accolade of being voted ‘No. 1 club in the UK’ in the summer of 2002, a fire gutted Liverpool’s popular Garlands club, leaving thousands of clubbers devastated and without a home. Sixteen months later the club rose from the ashes in one of the most eagerly awaited club openings of recent memory.

Garlands had enjoyed a unique popularity as a flamboyant venue that welcomed people of all sexualities, races and cultures. After these loyal patrons were asked how they would like the club re-built, designers were given the task of duplicating the Garlands formula and recreating the original design, restoring the magic that made the venue so special in the first place.

Total Audio Visual
The rebuild included Martin, Mach and Jem gear designed, specified and supplied by Total Audio Visual (TAV) who liased closely with the owners on the project. Installation was by Neil Riley of absolute Lighting and Events.

David Martin, Managing Director of TAV, is a former Martin employee and therefore knows the Mach product line well with a history of using and specifying it. “I’ve been involved with the Mach products for some time, grew with the product itself and believe in it,” David stated. “Now as a freelance, having my own company, it’s a product that I will sell against all other audio products.”

Because of his past sales rep experience for Martin, David has a good rapport with club owners and has speced many clubs and bars in Liverpool with Mach kit. In fact, he completed a large Mach install at the popular and well-established 051 Club, one of Liverpool’s favorite venues.

Mach sound system
Before it burned down, Garlands did have a smaller Mach system. The new audio install however consists of a full Mach sound system using M14T mid/highs – the first installation in the UK to feature this product – plus M218T and M118T subwoofers.

Garlands consists of two main dance areas, the downstairs Soho room (Hard House) and the upstairs Vegas room (Funky House), as well as a series of smaller rooms. “I had seen the M14T, M118T and M218T at PLASA and with Garlands’ smaller rooms, I decided to go with these smaller SlingShot units and it’s worked very well. We used ten M14T tops in each main room, two each side of the DJ in a two way array facing the crowd, and the rest around the peripheral of the dancefloor.” Mach M218T and M118T subwoofers are used for bass reproduction with a pair of Mach M154i medium throw speakers serving as DJ monitors.

Soho and Vegas feature identical sound systems both of which sound extremely good reports David. “World class renowned DJs play at Garlands every month and they love the system. It’s the right boxes for the environment, for the style of music that DJs play, and it sounds gorgeous. I find that the Mach speakers are better than many of the other better-known brands.”

The Boudoir is a separate room next to Soho, an eclectic space of diverse people and music. The audio system consists of six compact Mach M72i near fields and two Mach M151i subwoofers. A pair of Mach M-Flex 12 powered speakers serve as monitors. A separate chill out room pumps in music from the Soho room via Mach CS8 in-fill ceiling speakers while sound at the bar area is from six Mach medium throw M127i and two Mach M151i subs with processing from a Mach 20.02 controller.

Garlands lighting
On the lighting side, the Vegas room features some of the newest Martin gear – MX-10 Extreme scanners and MAC 250 Kryptons. “The MX-10s are very bright and complement the Kryptons well,” David states. Also in Vegas are Wizard effect lights in each corner for light fill in, Atomic strobes and generic lighting covering the stage.

Some of the original lighting equipment did survive the fire and was consequently refurbished, namely some hardy MAC 300s and RoboScan 918 scanners kept in Soho, which has more of an underground club feel. Wizard effects and Atomic strobes add to the atmosphere. Some 88 LED lighting heads and 4 projection screens were also added to the install.

Dual head Jem Club Smoke systems provide atmospheric haze in both of the main dance rooms. “The Jem Club Smoke is so simple to use and they work forever,” David states. Control both up and downstairs is from a Martin Fingers with LightJockey.

Lighting Equipment:
Soho:
4 x Martin Wizard
3 x Martin Atomic 3000 strobes
1 x Jem Club Smoke (2 head)
1 x Fingers controller
1 x LightJockey
1 x Martin 2510 back-up controller
6 x Martin Mac 300
4 x Martin RoboScan 918
4 x Generic Par Cans
4 x colored floods under glass floor
4 x large mirror balls

Vegas:
6 x Martin MAC 250 Kryptons
8 x Martin MX-10 Extreme Scanners
3 x Martin Atomic 3000 strobes
1 x Jem Club smoke (2 head)
4 x Martin Wizard
1 x LightJockey
1 x Fingers controller
1 x Martin 2510 back-up controller
4 x Generic Par Cans

Boudoir:
LED lighting
2 x ½ mirror balls

Chill out bar:
LED lighting

LED:
88 x Alkalite Riva LEDS for Bar areas and peripheral of club

Audio Equipment
Soho:
10x Mach M14T
4 x Mach M218T
4 x Mach M118T
2 x Mach M154i
3 x Technics 1200
1 x Pioneer CDJ 1000 mk2
1 x Allen and Heath Xone 62 mixer
1 x Pioneer DJM 600 mixer
1 x Sure SM58 mic

Vegas:
10 x Mach M14T
4 x Mach M218T
4 x Mach M118T
2 x Mach M154i
3 x Technics 1200
1 x Pioneer CDJ 1000 mk2
1 x Allen and Heath Xone 62 mixer
1 x Sure SM58 mic
1 x Sure SM58 Radio mic

Boudoir:
6 x Mach M72i
2 x Mach M151i
2 x Mach M-Flex 12 powered monitors
2 x Technics 1200 mk2
1 x twin CD player
1 x Mixer

Chill out room:
4 x Mach CS8 ceiling speakers

Bar area:
6 x Mach M127i
2 x Mach M151i
1 x Mach 20.02