BABSCon 2014
Sound Cos
Blue Pegasus Productions, Sonic Solutions
Venue
Hyatt Regency/San Francisco Airport
Burlingame, CA
BABSCon 2014
The Pro Bono Soundco?
Most of us are, by nature, really nice people. When there’s a noble cause or need, we’re all too glad to chip in. Truthfully, there are a lot of important, meaningful charitable causes out there who could well use our services, and since most of them are non-profits, well it would be nice if we could just donate some of our time, staff, trucks and gear to the cause.
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Bonnaroo: It Takes a Village
While the 13th annual Bonnaroo Music Festival included a Friday the 13th, it was nothing but good luck, good music, and good times for the 80,000 music-loving fans that showed up for the Manchester, TN event. With more than 200 acts over four days from June 12 to 15, 2014, including headliners Elton John, Kanye West, Jack White, Lionel Richie, Vampire Weekend and the Avett Brothers, it took several sound companies to make it a memorable festival.
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PreSonus StudioLive AI-series Active Integration Loudspeakers
Well, it took a while, but PreSonus is finally shipping its much-anticipated StudioLive AI-series live sound speakers. The line includes three 3-way top cabinets and an optional single-18 subwoofer. The top cabinets have LF response extending well below 60 Hz, making them well suited for use without the subwoofer. They are fitted with 12 M10 rigging points and dual (flat and -10° downward) 35mm pole mount sockets, except the larger SLS315AI, which has one socket.
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Handheld Condenser Microphones
Dynamic microphones have pretty much been the standard in vocal performance mics for decades. However, if you’re looking for extended bandwidth and fast transient response in a handheld, a condenser mic is just the ticket. With that in mind, we present this look at some current condenser models. All models listed require phantom powering. No frequency response data is given; simply stating that a mic has a 20 Hz to 20 kHz spec is fairly meaningless, and many models include LF or upper mid presence boosts to add character or intelligibility, so a “flat” response is rarely desirable. Weight is often a factor, particularly when using a handheld mic over extended periods with certain vocalists. And MSRP list pricing is listed; microphones are often greatly discounted and “street” pricing can vary dramatically.
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dbx DriveRack PA2
It has to be at least 15 years since dbx introduced the first DriveRack, and there is no doubt that since then, the DriveRack family has improved sound systems across the globe. That may sound like a huge, sweeping statement, but it’s probably true. A few years ago, I got a dbx DriveRack PA+ to go with my self-powered speaker rig. In a very short time, the DriveRack became my favorite piece of outboard gear. Mainly because dbx has skillfully crammed so many useful functions into a single rackspace package. Well, now there is the DriveRack PA2. After my experience with the PA+, I decided I had to get my hands on a PA2. However, it occurred to me that some of you may not know exactly what a DriveRack PA2 is, or what kind of magic it can do. So, here we go…
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FCC Reallocation Update: Is There a Frequency in Your Future?
If there was ever an area of constant activity and interest within the live audio community, the Federal Communication Commission’s proposed reallocation and plans for an upcoming auction of the 600 MHz UHF spectrum would surely head the list. Currently, the auction is scheduled for mid-2015. Meanwhile, well-heeled companies in the telecom industry — including AT&T, Verizon and Sprint — are anxious to pony up as much as an estimated $20 billion for that chunk of prime cyber real estate. And it’s a big-stakes game, with the winners set to take a commanding position in the burgeoning mobile device market.
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Console Change, Part 4: Making the Leap
In the days immediately prior to this year’s James Taylor tour, I cajoled my nephew Gabe Morgan into helping me move the DiGiCo SD5 console out of my living room and out to the garage for pickup. I then I traveled to New York City where James and his band were performing at a private event that took place in the Marriott Marquis Hotel in Times Square. For this show, I would be using the familiar Avid D-Show desk for the final time this year. The band configuration was the same as it was for our final 2013 show in Honolulu, and I could quickly recall that complete setup from USB drives. Under the time constraints one encounters working this type of event, that strategy was definitely the best available option. The show went very well, but I was eager to move forward with the process of changing console platforms.
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Bose Knows a Bit About Pro
I recently attended an all-day technology demonstration at the Bose lair outside of Boston. On the way, there were lots of Bose active noise-canceling headphones visible onboard the flight. And in the room at The Charles Hotel in Cambridge, there was a Bose Wave radio, as iconic as a Herman Miller Aeron chair or a Le Corbusier chaise lounge, sitting on the nightstand. All this foreshadowing might have seemed like a PR person’s dream, as though somehow Ford had managed to make every car on the road taken to one of their dealerships a Mustang or an Escape. The reality is that it’s a fact of life: Bose has built a tremendous brand in the consumer electronics business.
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Avoiding Feedback
Feedback occurs when the output of a device is fed to its own input. An example that most of us have heard is guitar feedback. Let’s say an electric guitar player turns his amp up loud and faces his guitar toward the amplifier. Sound from the speakers excites the strings, causing them to vibrate. The pickups change the string motion into an electrical signal, and send the signal back to the guitar amp. The guitar amp magnifies this sound and sends it to the speakers — so the process repeats.
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