A Quartet of Exceptionally Talented Young Guys “Know What All the Knobs Do” and Are Turning Them for Some Big Names
“I’m not sure what I wanted, but I knew I wanted to take what I learned there and try to have fun,” says young FOH engineer Eddie Map. “There” is a school for sound engineering, and it’s interesting that three of four of the “young guns” highlighted in this article all have that formal training, and the fourth has formal music training. In the past, most got enviable gigs by just figuring it out as they went, driven by passion and persistence. But while today’s gear seems to demand serious education, these four certainly are not lacking any passion and persistence — or exceptional talent for that matter. They all come from different places and got where they are in different ways, but they are already out with big acts doing a remarkable job like a seasoned professional.
MARC DUFRESNE
Age: 27
When Not in a Bus: Two years as a vocal major in an East Texas Community College
Currently With: Jars of Clay
First “Gig”: “I think I was 15 years old and I worked on this musical theatre review show at a community theatre. Did I know what all the knobs did? [Laughs]. I think we all thought we knew what they did at first….”
Currently Drives: Yamaha PM5D
“I worked with every local and regional band out of the state of Texas as far as I can tell,” laughs Dufresne about his career beginnings. But really, it begins way before that: “Even as a small child, I was pushing buttons and turning knobs — I knew I was destined to be doing that!” So after two years as a college voice major, he walked into the local sound company, Soundtech, and asked for a job.
“I knew it was something I could do,” he says. “Music makes sense to me, and hearing the placing of instruments in music makes sense to me. The technical things I knew I could learn. Since then, I’ve just kept up with the technology.” Eventually he went to work for Audio Analysts, who sent him out with Jars of Clay as an assistant tech, and when the FOH guy left, he stepped in. He found himself tweaking the previous mixes a bit. Then the show went on a break, and he rebuilt the show more to his liking.
As they don’t tour with their own gear, his biggest challenge is the different P.A.s from local sound companies. “Companies spend way too much money on nice P.A.s, these line arrays, and don’t k now how to work the processing. They expect those to sound good every night, but without understanding the processing, it sounds worse than old-fashioned stacks. It’s interesting to hear all the different P.A.s, but the challenge is making it work for the band.”
Toolbox-wise, DuFresne says he doesn’t leave home without his Lake Mesa Quad EQ and the Lake Contour — they are the only reason he’s able to go from P.A. to P.A. and get the sound he needs for the band. Otherwise, he and the band recently switched to Sennheiser 903 Evolution Series mics, which has cleared things up and allowed him to put the vocals in the mix where they are supposed to be. “It’s a dynamic mic with very condenser-like characteristics and a warm low-end, which is what I was looking for. I’m loving it.” The band is using Westone PMs.
Flush with learning that he will be a dad in the late summer, his immediate goal is to be home as much as possible. “One day I’d like to leave the touring world, but never the business,” he says. “That’s one thing I love working with Jars of Clay. They, too, like being home on the weekends with their families.”
BRIAN THORENE
Age: 22
When Not in a Bus: Detroit, Mich.
Education: Full Sail (2006)
Currently With: Rod Stewart
First “Gig”: “A buddy and I built a stage for the Country Thunder Festival, and basically we were stagehands, set up and tear down. That was my first experience.”
Currently Drives: Yamaha PM5D
Thorene, by his own admission, is fortunate enough to be stepson to Paul Owen of Thunder Audio. In addition to being part of a successful international audio company, Owen is monitor engineer for Metallica. When Thorene was eight, Owen took him to a Metallica show to watch him mix monitors, which by any kid’s standards is beyond cool. After high school he did a year at “regular college, but it wasn’t for me.” A friend went to Full Sail and talked about how great it was, so Thorene was inspired to enroll. After he got out, he worked for a local small production company and eventually found himself in the fold at Thunder.
He got sent out with Metallica, where he was noticed and asked to join Rod Stewart. “It is even better than I thought it would be,” he says of his experience — not that he didn’t have challenges and a big learning curve. “They were flying Meyer Milo speakers and I hadn’t had much experience flying those, but I just dove into it. That was a huge challenge when I first started, and it’s just a matter of keeping it all running as well as it should be.”
Stewart is using a lot of AKG D5s, and Thorene says he also likes Shure. Otherwise, the rig includes all Meyer speakers, which he says are great, particularly because they are all self-powered. “No amps — that’s so awesome,” he smiles. “I think the only amp we have on Rod is for the drum thumper.”
Not surprisingly, growing up in the shadow of the most respected and admired sound companies like he has, long term he’d like to own a production company. But that’s very long term, as right now he’s “having a blast so far — it’s been great.”
JON JON GARBER
Age: 28
When Not in A Bus: Nashville, Tenn.
Education: Full Sail (1999)
Currently With: Rascal Flatts
First “Gig”: “I worked for a band called the Cadillacs, and I’m pretty sure we played every Moose Lodge and VFW Hall in central Tennessee.”
Currently Drives: DiGiCo D5
“I went to Full Sail, then worked with the Cadillacs before Sound Image hired me to work with Brookes & Dunn and some other bands,” Garber says. Eventually, he wiggled on with a fairly unknown act called Rascal Flatts as assistant engineer, and about three years ago got to take over the console for him. The band has since exploded, with tours getting significantly bigger each time they go out (and they go out a lot). “The biggest challenge is the different rooms we’re in day to day,” he says. “I have to adjust things to make it all consistent — that’s important to me.”
Even when he finds himself in a venue that is definitely on the small side, he says he still likes to hang everything he has like it was a big arena. “It’s better to have more than not enough!” he grins. In addition to the DiGiCo board, he loves the dbx DriveRack 4800 system processor. To power it all he uses the Crown I-Tech 8000 power amplifier.
He says he’s grateful for the chance to work with this band, noting how it changes all the time and “doesn’t get any smaller! Next tour we’ll be playing in the round, 360°, and that will be challenging. The challenges get greater and greater, and that’s why I’m out here — for the challenge.”
A challenge he’s obviously talented enough to meet. He just won the 2007 EventProForum’s “Rising Star” Award given to individuals working less than five years in the live event industry who have demonstrated exceptional achievement, creativity and perseverance. His goal was always to be FOH for a major act, and while he’s grateful that’s he’s already accomplished that, he’d be happy doing it for another decade or more. “Maybe in the future I’d like to own a sound company — that would be my long- term goal.”
EDDIE MAPP
Age: 23
When Not in a Bus: New Orleans, La.
Education: Conservatory of Recording Arts & Sciences, Tempe, Ariz. (1997)
Currently With: Evanescence
First “Gig”: “After the Conservatory, I went back to Alexandria, La. and did my internship there, as opposed to New York or L.A. I mixed for different local bands around there — just a handful of country or metal bands or whatever came along.”
Currently Drives: Digidesign
Mapp played guitar in local bands and “always by default was also the sound guy.” Now if most dads saw their kid approaching adulthood wanting to work in the world of rock ‘n’ roll, he’d push him or her toward accounting or something — unless the dad and the mom were in the medical profession, then the push would be in that direction. But check this out: “I didn’t want to be a doctor or lawyer or anything like that; my interest was in music. And it was actually my father who suggested this career. He was looking through a magazine and saw something about the conservatory and suggested it.”
After he got out of school and cut his teeth with the locals, he got what he considers his first “real” gig with a legend: Ellis Marsalis. He had planned to work in the studio, and did do some of that work, but, “showing up at the same place day after day felt too much like I was punching a clock. With live, it’s different every day and that was more appealing.”
Working the Ozzfest for Black Label Society, he garnered enough attention to be asked to come on the road with Evanescence. Modestly, Map attributes his break with “word of mouth,” but obviously he has the chops to do the job.
“The biggest challenge I have is trying to shoot for some consistency — especially with this group,” he says. “I strive to make sure the vocals are on top of everything and make it a comfortable show where everyone can enjoy themselves, as opposed to killing them at 130 dB.”
He’s a fan of Audio Technica, and says they have always taken care of him and have a lot of great products. Interestingly he’s using their AE2500 dual-element kick drum mic on the guitar, a trick he learned from Big Mick Hughes, FOH for Metallica. Otherwise, he’s pleased with all the plug-ins that come with the VENUE, so he’s hardly using any outboard gear. He is using the Crane Song Phoenix Tape Saturation plug-in, as “it helps warm up everything in the digital domain.”
Looking down the road, he hopes to do some more studio work, if it can be on his own terms. “But really, I’m just looking forward to learning more every day and try to do the best I can — and be around for a while.
