At the end of each touring year, I try to go over what was done right, what was done wrong and what we could do better while out on the road and performing night after night. This past year was particularly interesting because of the variety of geographic locations to which we traveled and the diversity of gear packages that we encountered along the way.
At the end of January, the 2017 tour commenced in Auckland, New Zealand. After visiting Australia and Southeast Asia, the tour also included several stadium shows in South America. We finished up for the year at Fenway Park in Boston, MA after a strong U.S./Canada run with Bonnie Raitt.
While the vast majority of these shows were performed on a Clair Global Cohesion-12 rig, we also encountered several K1/K2 systems from L-Acoustics, J and V systems from d&b audiotechnik and Leo/Lyon systems from Meyer Sound Labs. This was definitely a good year for large-scale outdoor P.A.s. In addition to the South American stadium shows, our summer itinerary was punctuated with big shows at Nationals Park in Washington, D.C., Wrigley Field in Chicago, AT&T Park in San Francisco and Fenway Park in Boston. We were able to achieve excellent results with each manufacturer’s products. Carrying a full arena-size Cohesion-12 system was an eye-opening, ear-pleasing experience. Clair Global has created an amazing machine.
Console File Conversions
It was my good fortune to use either my preferred DiGiCo SD5 console or a DiGiCo SD7 console for each of the shows I mixed on tour this year — with the exception of one show in Buenos Aires and another in Santiago, Chile, for which I used an Avid VENUE Profile. As it turned out, the console for the New Zealand shows that opened the tour was a SD7. It was therefore necessary to use DiGiCo’s file conversion software to transfer my SD5 files over to the SD7 format. I learned a few lessons — the hard way, of course — about implementing this process.
If you have moved module strips around on the control surface to customize your input or output banks, the file conversion puts them back into cardinal order. After four years of mixing the show on a SD5, I had moved quite a few strips around. This had me a bit mystified when I first turned on the SD7 in Auckland but didn’t represent a major hiccup. I just had to put things back where they belonged.
The second transition from a SD5 show file to a SD7 occurred in Singapore after a long run in Australia. I had made quite a few changes to the show after we left New Zealand and I wanted to use the latest saved versions of SD5 files to load onto the SD7 in Singapore. But when I loaded the converted show files after powering up the SD7, we were very surprised and dismayed to see that the entire Waves rack had been patched incorrectly. We couldn’t immediately determine exactly what had failed in the loading process. We just dove straight in to manually re-patch everything connected to Waves as quickly as possible.
After we corrected the mysterious mis-patch, I started searching for what had gone wrong. The steps for converting files must be followed without deviation, and I started retracing my steps. The culprit turned out to be a typo in the name of the “.mrdb” file that contained all of the Waves information. The converted “.ses” show file and the attached “.mrdb” show file must have exactly the same names to the left of the period, or the saved information that needs to be shared will not sync correctly. The correct gear choices had populated the SD7 Waves racks, but the software error caused every rack to become a stereo in/out rack, so we had to start all over again.
Rapidly re-patching every Waves connection contained within a 74-input show, effects-rich show because of a self-inflicted wound will definitely cause anyone to be far more careful in performing future file conversions.
We were lucky enough to have a load-in day in Singapore so that we were not completely under the gun to make the necessary fixes on a show day. But, needless to say, the next time I worked on an SD7 in Brazil, the files were loaded very precisely, using correct procedures and nomenclature for each step.
While I am off this winter, I plan on performing a few file conversions among the various DiGiCo platforms so that I may learn about any other software idiosyncrasies or gremlins that may pop up. I am particularly interested to see how much I may have to alter in order to fit our large band show onto a SD10 if that necessity should ever arise.
Enter the SD-NANO Rack
The other console-related project I would like to initiate over this winter will be to incorporate a DiGiCo SD-NANO Rack into my FOH setup. The SD5 console has eight AES digital inputs and outputs in its local I/O module. We use these to connect to the various system control elements. Employing the rack-mountable, Optocore-addressable SD-NANO Rack would add 16 more AES inputs and outputs of digital connectivity. I have been mulling over giving up in-the-box IR reverb algorithms and going back to some outboard digital effects devices.
Now, be assured that I am never, ever going back to the huge, heavy and hot outboard racks from the analog console days, but I am considering deploying units that would fit within my present FOH footprint and currently available rack space. By carrying a TC 6000, a TC 4000 and a Bricasti m7 connected to the SD5 console through the Nano Rack via Optocore, I will be able to eliminate five separate Waves racks in my console setup that now contain Waves IR reverb algorithms. Removing these particular DSP hogs should significantly reduce the usage peaks in the Waves system and free up overall DSP power for other tasks.
A four-engine TC 6000 would provide the VSS3/VSS4 algorithms I currently use for background vocal reverb, piano reverb, percussion reverb and guitar reverb. The TC 4000 has the DVR2 algorithm I use for horn reverb. And, finally, the Bricasti m7 (not my old favorite Lexicon 480L) would be used for lead vocal reverb. This setup would take up 12 of the AES I/O pairs within the added SD-NANO Rack. When the NAMM Show in Anaheim rolls around in January, I plan to visit with my good friends from Waves and DiGiCo and solicit their various opinions related to enhancing/maximizing overall system performance.
Outboard Preamps
The master plan for this chunk of time off the road also includes researching and auditioning the Grace Design m108 mic preamp system with ADC and the Millennia HV-3D-8 with the AD-596-DR A to D converter option. I am familiar with the sound of both manufacturers’ products and I feel either might provide a useful second option to the excellent mic pre’s and converters already present in the SD5 console system. Not surprisingly, the DiGiCo preamps are true to their English heritage and produce a fat, warm and punchy sound that has served us so well for the last four years on the road. No complaints here at all; just an ongoing interest in exploring artistic alternatives.
There are a handful of inputs in our show that could possibly benefit from preamps with a different characteristic sound. Both the Grace and the Millennia units produce excellent, pristine audio with slightly less coloration than the DiGiCo console system. It is my belief that the analog to digital conversion systems that each manufacturer provides with their products would assure the best marriage of the analog electronics to digital technology. In theory, the manufacturer’s provided converters should be included to best retain the unique sound of their proprietary products. Onboard conversion allows one to then bypass the console’s preamps and converters and maintain the audio integrity of the preamp output through the digital inputs.
Using an integrated preamp/conversion system makes more sense to me than outputting a specific stand-alone analog preamp into the console’s redundant input system for conversion. That additional processing may result in a sound that is different than expected from hearing just the preamp’s analog output. The idea of searching the audio universe for the most compatible converter for a specific preamp is not an attractive option either.
The End Game
Touring is all about streamlining and secure packaging. A one or two rack-space analog preamp unit that provides eight channels of ultra-high quality digital audio is what truly fits the bill. I have the space to accommodate all the devices I have listed in the dual 10-space rack on which the SD5 console sits. The drawers that now hold the tablet computers can be moved to another small case that we could the use for a worktable at FOH. Suggesting changes that could take up more room at FOH may not fly with production, but improvements that fit within our existing footprint could be more easily seen as progress.
Safe Travels!
