Last month a relationship I have been building and nurturing for several years paid off in the kind of gig that companies like mine rarely get called for. A couple of days before the Academy of Country Music Awards were held at the MGM Grand, we did a "pre-concert" show in conjunction with the ACM and The Fremont St. Experience. With 25 or more A- and B-list acts doing one or two songs each and two primary headliners doing full sets, we had our hands full. Planning started about three months out, and early on we established that all of the acts doing short sets would share backline and basically plug and play. We also added a 16-foot by 24-foot riser to the back of the stage to roll the headliners' set carts on and off. The production manager for Fremont St., Darrin Grauman, and the ACM had decided early on that we would minimize and combine all 25-30 act's riders since most were doing about 10 minutes. The event was scheduled for a Sunday, but there were other events on the same stage Friday and Saturday.
What we had to do was advance all three days with the tour managers for the smaller Friday and Saturday gigs, as well all the tour managers for the 25-plus artists playing Sunday. The obvious goal was to make a rig suitable for all three days, which, after much sweat, we did. Then we found that the main headliner, Big & Rich, was carrying everything except racks and stacks. Oh, and they would be expecting an 8 a.m. sound check on Sunday with an overnight load in. Back to the drawing board.
On Wednesday morning we built the ground support for the truss system that would hold the DAS Aero 48 line array system. We flew six per side with Meyer 650 subs ground stacked and Turbosound TQ-440 for front fills. Crown I-Tech 8000, 6000 and 4000s were used for the rig along with the new XTA and Klark Teknik EQs. We decided to keep consoles simple–a trusty Yamaha PM4000 out front and a Soundcraft Series 5-M at monitors. This would be an easy "walk up and mix" setup for any visiting engineer.
As far as processing, at FOH we had one Eventide H3000, a Lexicon PCM 90 and 80, a TC Electronic M5000 and 2290, eight channels of Drawmer gate, 12 channels on a dbx 160A, two dbx 162s, five dbx 576s and four dbx 1066s. For monitors we had two TC Electronic M2000s, eight channels of Drawmer gates, 16 channels of dbx 160A compressors and four Aphex Dominators. This was a combined processing set up that seemed to make every FOH guy happy. Everybody was able to tweak what they wanted to, even if it was only for a couple songs. We had 16 bi-amped mixes powered by Crest 8200s and 5200s, with dbx 480s and a 480R as control. The sidefills were powered DAS Compact 2 with DAS Aero 215 subs.
We set the stage with six mixes and eight wedges across the front and six midstage, plus a drum fill, two utility mixes and sidefills. This gave us the ability to accommodate pretty much everyone in a few minutes. We did the same type of thing with mic and DI placement. We had six Audix OM5 vocal mics across the front along with six BSS direct boxes, allowing anyone to plug in and sing. The communal backline was miked by Audix D series i5s, CX 112s and Sennheiser 609s. With so many open mics on stage, the tight pattern of the Audix mics seemed to help us keep control. We also used one of our new CBI three-way splits with mass pin stage box system. This worked out extremely well as we were able to unplug one box with lines in it and put another in its place.
Crew call to set and sound check Big & Rich was Sunday morning at 7 a.m. This was a good rehearsal for pushing set carts on and off the stage. Martin Frey, FOH for Big & Rich and a class act, was carrying the new Digidesign VENUE console and was happy to take the time to show me around. (No joke, he spent more than an hour giving me the grand tour. Thanks, Martin.) After a couple of hours sound check was done and the set carts pushed back. Now we set the stage for the rest of the day.
Event time was 2 p.m. and the first act up was Montgomery Gentry. Up they went, and we were off! We worked non-stop with no breaks and change-overs every 10-15 minutes for most of the day. We had to put Music Mafia (co-head liner) on at 8 p.m. Music Mafia did use the community backline, however we were only given 20 minutes to set it the way they wanted. We stayed on schedule all day until a special guest appearance by Gretchen Wilson three-quarters of the way through their set. For the first time all day we fell a little behind. Of course, with a celebrity like that no one complained. At 10:15 (about 15 minutes late on the overall schedule) we put on Big & Rich.
Again, Martin Frey never batted an eye about starting a few minutes late even–to throw another wrench in–when Big & Rich's tour manager decided a few minutes before down beat that they needed to record the show. With no hesitation or frustration he broke out the Pro Tools setup and got it ready. While all this was going on, Martin was still showing me around the console!
When Big & Rich finished around midnight, my crew and I sat down on a riser for the first time in about 14 hours and reflected on the good, bad and ugly of the day. No equipment failures, no personal failures, no arguments, no issues. As we struck the FOH position we got another surprise, getting help pushing the consoles and FX racks off the FOH risers from… Martin Frey. He should have been on the bus relaxing and no one would have thought anything of it. Instead, he not only helped with his gear but with ours as well! At 2 a.m. that was as nice a gesture as anyone could ever ask for. And Martin, if you're reading this and are ever within 5,000 miles of Vegas and need an XLR or anything else–call me!
The last truck was packed at 3:30 a.m., the show was over, and I gave the crew a few days off. What a day!
Great gig, but why write about it? Like the last time I filled this space, it is about relationships. In a lot of situations it's normal for the venue to hire a bigger company for a gig like this, despite the fact that we do all of their other shows. But since we had spent a couple of years doing shows of all sizes at Fremont Street, from B-list acts for 1000 people up to gigs with two stages for Cheap Trick, Gin Blossoms and Spin Doctors performing in front of 11,000 people, like last New Year's Eve, since we had taken care of them through all of that, when it came time to do a big national show (taped for broadcast), they stuck with us. That's the power of relationships, and that's pretty cool.
