LOS ANGELES — Panic! At The Disco toured North America in late summer with Chester French, Fall Out Boy and reunited headliner blink-182, and that meant lugging racks of wireless equipment from one RF-congested city to the next. But Panic!’s production manager and FOH engineer, Jason Decter, credited Sennheiser’s wireless technology for keeping the panic behind the scenes to a minimum. The gear list included a Sennheiser SKM 2000 handheld microphone and EM 2050 receiver for lead singer Brendon Urie. The combination is part of Sennheiser’s newly introduced 2000 Series, which uses auto-scan and equipment synchronization features to make channel selection faster and easier.
All four bands used wireless mics, wireless instrument packs and wireless monitors on tour. In addition, several channels were used for backstage communication.
“Together, with all the background RF, which changes from city to city, we had two ranges pretty well tied up,” Decter said. “The auto-scan and frequency selection on Sennheiser’s new 2000 Series made it simple to negotiate all that. It takes the unit literally 15 seconds to locate an open frequency, select it, and program the transmitter for that frequency using IR. There’s no possibility of errors, even in stressful situations.”
Decter travelled with two Sennheiser SKM 2000s — one for Urie and one for backup — but as it turned out, the backup wasn’t used. The EM 2050 receiver also connected to his laptop via Ethernet, where he could get a visual depiction of the entire RF spectrum. “The unit would constantly scan,” he said. “I could see channels open up and shut down. If I noticed that a channel was getting weaker, I could make a switch.”
In addition to the RF functionality, Decter had a choice of Sennheiser capsules for the transmitter. Urie used the MMD 935-1, the same capsule used with the Sennheiser e 935. “I love the 935’s tailored frequency response,” he said. “It sounds great and gives me plenty of rejection. Of course the SKM 2000 looks cool too — it has a nice sleek look for Panic!”
Panic! At The Disco toured with other wireless and wired Sennheiser gear as well. Sennheiser e 901, e 902, and e 905 microphones were used with Spencer Smith’s drum set, while e 906s cover the guitars. All four members of the band used Sennheiser ew 300 IEM G2 wireless personal monitors on stage. Three techs use them as well.
“Since I’ve seen the magic of the new 2000 Series functionality, I think we’re going to upgrade the monitor transmitters to the SR 2050 IEM, which has the same laptop interface as the EM 2050, for the next run,” Decter said.
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