It is somehow appropriate that my first contact with Jon Martin came, not at a show, but online. When we first opened ProAudioSpace a couple of months ago, Jon was one of the first to join and was the first of what we hope will be many-a-sound-dude-or-chick to at least take a stab at blogging a tour. In fact this is a real cyber-interview. I went to the show, met Jon and we chatted some during the show. After, he went to work tearing down, I went home and we did the interview via messages on ProAudioSpace. Pretty Jetsons, eh?
Actually, when he came through Vegas with the Plain White Ts the timing was bad and I did not think I would make it out to the show. We had just finished the 2009 EPD, the April issue of FOH was set to go to the printer the next day, my sister (who I had not seen in probably a decade) was in town just for the day and it was the day before my 49th birthday. Getting to the Hard Rock for his set, which did not even start until 11:30 p.m. on a Wednesday, was not looking good.
But a series of events, including the cyber-disappearance of some photos for another interview, culminated with me arriving at the venue about 15 minutes into the set and staying for the whole thing. And I’m glad I did. First, the band was way cooler than their one hit single might indicate. (I love it when a group of twentysomethings does a real classic and just nails it. In this case it was “California Dreaming.”) Better, Jon had a better than decent mix on a weird system in what can be a very tough room where the ambient crowd noise had to be in the 95dB range.
As a capper, just as he was telling me how the band had just added a week in Hawaii to the end of the tour, the apparent girlfriend of a drunk guy being escorted out of the club went wacko and put the serious hurt on three or four security guards, and it all went down on the opposite side of a railing less than two feet from where we stood. Awesome…
FOH: How long you been at this?
Jon Martin: 25 years. I went out on my first tour when I was 20 years old.
And what was your first “real” gig?
I guess that would have been my first “real” gig. After that tour I came back home and went to work at Wolf Sound in Miami. I went in and said “This is what I really want to do with my life, I’ll load trucks, build amp racks, sweep the floors, make coffee, whatever it takes,” and they hired me on the spot. At Wolf, I was mentored by two great people, Mike McNeil and Tony Ezzo. I will forever be indebted to them. (Thanks, guys!)
OK, time for the obligatory client list…
Hah! How many hours do you have to kill?
No, Really…
Okay, recently? Plain White Ts, Panic at the Disco, Atreyu, Yellowcard, Brand New…
So you have been around the block a few times. What is your favorite gig ever, and why?
Wow, that is a hard one, there have been so many over the years..
Doing monitors for Prong at the Dynamo festival in Holland and looking out over 120,000 people was pretty cool. Many of the early tours I did because it was all still new and exciting.
Working with these guys (PWT) has been fun. We’ve done a lot of TV shows… Leno, Conan O’Brien, Good Morning America, Regis and Kelly, Good Morning L.A…One Life to Live. Hanging out with a bunch of hot soap opera stars did not suck…
OK, so what was the worst gig ever, and why?
Ugh. Can we not go there? I’ve been trying really hard to forget them.
Dodging bullets at a reggae gig sucked…
What are you carrying in terms of production on this run?
Backline, IEMs and consoles. Two Yamaha M7CLs. At the Hard Rock show I used the house M7.
Do you have a current “secret weapon?”
The Waves MaxxBCL. I’m currently carrying a Yamaha M7CL and I’m using the Waves to do my D/A conversion. It makes a world of difference. Plus, you have the benefits of the bus compressor, a limiter and the MaxxBass thingy.
What is the single biggest thing—tech or gear or whatever else—that has most changed the way you do your job in the past 20 years?
Gear wise, digital consoles. They have really opened up a whole new world, especially the Digidesign D-Show and the world of plug-ins. Also, being able to use virtual soundcheck and going back over your mix is just fantastic, and being able to do it with one cable now is nothing short of amazing.
To think how much cabling you would have to use doing it the old way and to have it all down to one cable just astounds me.
And, of course, you can’t forget the EZ-Tilt. Probably one of the best inventions in the last 20 years. (Fun fact: the first version of the EZ-Tilt was invented by two English gentlemen, Chris Beale and Jon Martin @ SSE for Big Mick Hughes on the Metallica Load tour. )
The other thing is all the amazing audio people I have had the honor of working with over the years and the knowledge they have passed onto me. I really owe it to those around me.
So you have been with these guys for how long?
About a year.
So you have taken the whole ride up. A year ago no one outside of Chicago knew who these guys were and now my guess is they can do 4K easily in most markets.
It’s been really fun. Like I said, we’ve done lots of TV and just recently we did a private gig at a winery in Napa, Calif.
Like any gig, it has it’s ups and downs. One day they will be playing to 10,000 people at a city festival and the next day it’s 200 in some dingy ass club. I’m just happy to be working at a time when many are not.
What do you know now that you wish you knew when you started?
How hard touring was going to be on my family and personal relationships. It’s a pirate’s life…
One last thing… Was that a bitchin fight or what?
That was a bitchin fight! That girl had a lot of chutzpa.
Do you think you can find her and get her phone number for me?