> I'd much rather see a well oiled team perform crazy feats to get the stage set Not quite the same, but I witnessed a performance of Jeff Wayne's War of the W

> I'd much rather see a well oiled team perform crazy feats to get the stage set Not quite the same, but I witnessed a performance of Jeff Wayne's War of the Worlds where there was a complete failure of the stage systems about 15 minutes before the end. All the audio-visuals died and the mics cut off, screens died, animatronics went still, complete silence on the stage and only ambient light. For about 10-15 seconds there was stunned silence on the stage and then one of the drummers in the orchestra started drumming his part again. A couple of the other musicians joined and quickly there was music. From our seat we could see the stage's equivalent of mission control - three people who'd been quietly sipping their coffee while the playlists unfolded. They went into overdrive like movie hackers trying to enter some system before the corporation goons reached them. They quickly got the audio side back and then worked on the lights and screens. They left the giant Martian war tripod to last but even that was moving within a few minutes. It was one of the most impressive system recoveries I've seen.