Recent Nightclub Projects
This month, FRONT of HOUSE takes a look at some recent installations nightclub sector — in particular, the new sound systems deployed for Hudson Ultra Bar in Hoboken NJ, Hard Rock Live in Las Vegas, the Oxford Social Club in San Diego, the Blue Whale in Los Angeles, Switch in Southampton, U.K. and LOFT in Dushanbe, Tajikistan (pictured here).
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Covering Your Tracks
Diners should sometimes be cautioned against looking into the kitchen of a restaurant they plan to eat in. So it goes with live music shows: the audience comes to be entertained, not edified. There is no need to look behind the proscenium curtains to see how the tour sausage is made. Too bad, since these days there’d be a lot to see, including the category of playback systems for live tracks and effects, and people to operate those systems. The expanding dominance of pop divas and divos has only accelerated the need for complex backing tracks in the live mix, as has the demand to have the recording-studio experience recreated live on stage for every show.
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Mid-Sized Digital Consoles
Bring on the revolution! Ideal for install or portable applications, here’s a snapshot look at some digital consoles capable of 24 or more channels, while having a fairly compact footprint and — at under 60 pounds each — could be moved by an average person. Prices are somewhat variable, depending on options and selected system package configurations, so check before purchasing.
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Bruno Mars 24K Magic Tour
New FOH and Monitor Engineer Keep the Party Going
For the Bruno Mars 24K Magic world tour, the purpose is to party.
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Knock It Off!
Recently, I was approached by one of the better audio engineers with whom I work, and he was excitedly and earnestly trying to interest me in some Chinese knock-off audio gear. He informed me that he received the information from another reliable and well known engineer who has used the gear and wholeheartedly vouches for the same. He showed me photographs of amps and speakers that appeared to be from top name brand producers that looked just like the real thing. Lab.gruppen amps, L-Acoustics and d&b speaker knock-offs were all on display at a fraction of the cost of the real brand name gear. For a mere seven thousand dollars I could be the proud owner of four brand new L-Acoustics ARC knock-off speakers with Lab.gruppen knock-off power amps and, as everyone knows, this is a deal, considering what the real gear sells for new.
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Headsets vs. Lavaliers
It is an age-old question for a house of worship audio engineer or technical director: Headsets or Lavaliers? As with most things in audio, the answer is, “It depends.” It depends of what you’re using the mic for, how discreet it needs to be, the personal preference of the pastor or performer, the gain before feedback and monitoring requirements, your current inventory and other factors.
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Off-Time Projects, Part 3
Last month, I discussed first deconstructing and then re-imagining the input channel settings for one our touring acoustic guitars. That article focused on using the various tools available within the DiGiCo SD5 mixing system. I re-auditioned and modified the onboard settings for channel delay, tube emulation, parametric equalization and dynamic equalization and the Waves V-Comp compressor plug-in.
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Product Hits from InfoComm 2017
InfoComm (infocomm.com), North America’s largest audiovisual trade show, welcomed more than 40,000 visitors for the first time in its history at the 2017 event, held in Orlando, FL from June 14-16. By the time the doors closed for the week, InfoComm 2017 had logged 44,077 registered attendees from 50 states and 117 countries.
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