PROVO, UT – Randy Lane, front of house engineer for Carrie Underwood's Play On Tour, is using Countryman Associates' Type 10 DI for stringed instruments including acoustic guitars, fiddle and bouzouki.
The Countryman gear lets Lane, whose has also worked with the Spin Doctors, Three Doors Down, Joe Satriani, Steve Vai and Julio Iglesias, avoid the problems that might have been associated with long cable runs from the stage to the FOH mix position.
"The Type 10 reproduces the instruments as if I'm standing right beside them," said Lane, who also credited the gear for build quality and a design that guards against accidental changes in PM levels and other settings. "I was very impressed."
Another potential challenge resolved by the Countryman Type 10 DI:
"We have moving risers on this tour for the band members to change positions during the show. These risers are moved with large electric motors that generate intense RF fields and this noise was being picked up by several of the band's inputs. Once we changed to the Countryman Type 10, the issue was eliminated."
Lane also had good things to say about Countryman's customer and technical support. "When we had questions, the company was very responsive and clearly understood what we were looking to accomplish. They helped us secure the exact product we needed to make these instruments shine.
"The change to the Countryman Type 10 was made in the middle of the tour and the results were stunning at first listen," Lane added. "My console EQ went from creatively trying to place the instrument and make it sound real and believable to flat on the channel strip and absolutely sounding like the instrument itself-as if a straight connection to the instrument was what we had. I was no longer fighting for ‘space' for the instrument to fit. With the Type 10 DI, it fit into the mix right away."
For more information, please visit www.countryman.com.
