NEW YORK — Showtime Sound is providing EAW KF740 loudspeakers, SB1000z subwoofers and KF755 and JF80 units for outfills and downfills to support the wide range of venues on hip-hop artist Mac Miller’s current tour.
More details from EAW (www.eaw.com):
WHITINSVILLE, MA — Mac Miller knows how to reach for the heights when it comes to moving his career forward. He famously titled the first single from his breakout mixtape “Donald Trump,” which garnered over 53 million views on YouTube and elicited a favorable comment from Trump himself, via Twitter, who stated when it reached 20 million views, “Who wouldn’t be flattered?” and declared Miller the “new Eminem.”
So when it came time to choose a PA system for Miller’s first major solo tour, Showtime Sound, of Glenelg, MD, put together a touring EAW PA system consisting of 24 KF740 line array modules in two hangs of 12 modules each. Six KF750 modules were used for flown outfills, three per side, with six KF755 modules hung beneath as downfills, also three per side. Another six EAW JF80 systems were used as front fills positioned along the front of the stage lip.
The system was anchored by a massive low end provided by 24 SB1000z Large Format Subwoofers. The system was powered by Lab.gruppen PLM10000 and PLM20000 amplifiers using the Greybox settings from EAW to deliver EAW Focusing.
On the tour are Robert Anders, FOH Engineer and Tour Manager; Travis Walat, Monitor Engineer; and Alex Silver, Audio System Tech.
“The system was perfect right out of the box,” says Scott Tydings, president of Showtime Sound. “We knew what would work well for Mac’s tour, and the EAW equipment was the perfect choice for it. The bottom end was exceptionally good. It just sounded great, no matter what size or type venue we were working in, from 1,500 people to 6,500. It was such a flexible PA that sounded great in any configuration, which is exactly what you want when you have an artist who is on his way up and the venues will be varied from night to night.”
Robert Anders, FOH mixer and production manager for the tour, which did 32 college campuses in 42 days this spring, says the system performed flawlessly. “It was our first large-scale use of the PLM amplifiers and they worked exceptionally well with the EAW gear, thanks to the Greybox interface,” he says. “It was also our first large hang of the KF740 units, and their SPL over distance was right on target for what the EAW Resolution modeling software had predicted.”
Anders also noted that the new ground stack adapter kit accessory available for the KF740 module (allowing simple, reliable and safe ground-stacking) was also put to use on several of the college dates, such as in gymnasiums where there were no fly points to attach a flown array configuration. “Everything about the EAW equipment performed flawlessly, from the software and the fly bar to the PA system itself. We couldn’t have asked for more.”
