The Weeknd’s “After Hours Til Dawn” tour is big. And it’s tall. And it’s loud.
That said, the audio crew is dealing with unusual challenges on this tour in that the towering post-apocalyptic set of a city skyline is dictating where the speakers are hung (high) and where the band goes (behind it). How high you ask? How about 30’ higher than usual with a 52’ trim? It means singer Abel Tesfaye is out front of the speakers 95% of the time — and they are some very loud speakers. “Abel wanted that nightclub vibe and so it’s loud,” says systems engineer Randy Weinholtz. “Sometimes the low end coming from the stage is like a wave, and on some songs when the beat drops, the whole building jumps. We rattle buildings.”
To get more insights about this Clair Global-supported sold-out stadium tour/ wildly successful dance party, we also chatted with FOH engineer Derek Brener and monitor engineer Lewis Lowder.
A Magical Mix
Brener grew up in San Diego and in high school was working with Moonlight Amphitheatre, a community theater that did Broadway-level shows. “I was patching wireless mics and then I moved up to handling the main wireless mixer — that’s when I really started learning the craft of audio engineering.” From there, he headed to California State University in Chico, CA where he earned a Bachelor’s degree in music/recording arts, but “honest to God, I learned more by moving to L.A. and doing it.” In Los Angeles, he landed an A2 gig at the Ford Theater and picked up work at the Wiltern Theater. A connection led to the FOH spot with the indy pop rock group Nico Vega. Along the way he had met musician/songwriter Ari Levine, who told him about Bruno Mars — could he mix a show for him? It apparently went well, as he stayed with Mars for five years. In 2015, the phone rang about some new kid named Abel Tesfaye, a.k.a. The Weeknd. “I had no idea who he was, but I went to Coachella with him,” he says, adding carefully: “And I don’t like to say this about myself, but I hit a home run that night.”
With Mars, Brener worked with a DiGiCo console, but then his buddy and FOH engineer Toby Frances told Brener to try the Yamaha Rivage. “There were some learning curves, but that desk has never given me any issues. It’s rock solid,” he says. “At the end of the day, what’s most important is that the board works. There are a few limitations from working with a DiGiCo, but I enjoy the limitations — it keeps my head in the game. The main point is, it sounds great, and the onboard plug-ins are fantastic.” He calls out the Neve preamp emulation plug-in and the Bricasti reverbs in it. “It’s amazing to the point where I don’t need much else.” The few toys added include the Waves X-FDBK Feedback Eliminator plug-in. “I swear I would not be able to succeed in this configuration and at the SPL without it — it’s so fast and intuitive.”
In the FOH rack is a Neve 1081 preamp/EQ module, which Brener calls “the most amazing EQ, and I’ve always used it on Abel’s vocals. The frequency points work so well with him.” That rack also includes a Rupert Neve Designs PSE 5045, a Maag EQ4 on the stereo bus and a Sonnox Oxford Limiter. And there’s an Overstayer Compressor on the drums.
The Band is Behind the Set
“In the beginning, they tried to put the band onstage, but the size perspective created by the set didn’t work,” as it made the members look like giant creatures lumbering over the city skyline. Mix-wise, having the drummer further back and behind the set clears up some latency issues he might otherwise be struggling with. The speakers being hung usually high required some juggling. “I decided it didn’t sound ‘shiny’ enough, so I pumped the top-end and really put the vocal out front,” Brener explains. “That was scary, but thank God for that Neve PSE 5045. It’s been the weapon that allows me to pull this off.”
There’s an embarrassment of riches in terms of the variety of mics on the stage. The bass drums have Shure B91 inside with a Telefunken M82 outside. Drummer Ricky Lewis uses two snares, and Brener sets Shure SM57s on top and bottom of one, another 57 on the top of the other and a Telefunken M81 under the other snare. “I process that second snare to sound almost electronic, and that snare is an extremely processed Kayne-like snare.” On the hi-hat and ride, he’s placed Shure KSM 173s, with Sennheiser 604s on the toms. Overhead is a Shure VP88 X-Y stereo mic, which “works great, as both snares arrive at the same time — it’s cohesive.” On the clean guitar amp, Brener employs a Royer 122 and a SM57, and on the “dirty” amp, a SM57 and a Sennheiser 421.
Getting all the right mics in the right place happened during the month of rehearsal. “We had the time and motivation for mic shootouts,” he says. This included Tesfaye’s vocals and the idea of moving from the now-discontinued Sennheiser 5200 series wireless to its replacement, the 6000 — but to no avail. “He just loves the way the SKM 5200 handheld [with an MD 5235 cardioid dynamic capsule] feels in his hands and really knows how sing into that specific mic, so we stayed with that.”
Monitor World
Lewis Lowder was born to parents who worked in China, and growing up in Hong Kong and Beijing, he took up guitar but became more interested in the “wanting to take it apart than playing it.” That led to being interested in sound, and he would help his church during services and do some recording. He settled in Nashville and attended Belmont University, graduating with a major in music business and a minor in audio. “I loved my audio classes, but I hated the studio,” he says with a laugh. ”I had so much respect for studio engineers, but as someone new to sound engineering, the time constraints were frustrating. I’d have to bang out a mix really quickly and then live with it the rest of my life.” A class in sound reinforcement pointed him to doing live sound where “I could live in the moment and mix by instincts. I loved the unique energy of live and the fleeting nature of the live music experience.”
He connected to Clair Global and was soon coiling cables in the company’s Nashville shop. They eventually shipped him off to their HQ in Lititz, PA and started sending him out on the road. ”Then I got to walk around the [venue] room with Brad Madix while he’s mixing Van Halen and ask [FOH engineer] Tom Abraham questions. At that point, it all just clicked.” His first gigs behind a console were at FOH, where he mixed for artists like Khalid, among others. He then made the switch to monitors, mixing for 5 Seconds of Summer and Maroon 5.
In 2020, Lowder got the monitor gig for The Weeknd. “I was incredibly fortunate to join the crew at that time, because they kept busy during the pandemic, including doing the Super Bowl.” After doing several tours with an older Avid Profile, he switched to DiGiCo SD5 and “never looked back — I love all the applications,” he says. “Especially for monitors. The utility of the macros and the ability to restructure mix sends with control groups is so powerful and fast.” He also uses two DiGiGrid MGBs for virtual playback, along with a Waves SGS Extreme SoundGrid with SuperRack for vocal processing and drums. Also for the vocals he has a Bricasti M7 which “beats the hell out of any plug-in I’ve tried.”
Also backstage is one more exciting tool — and brand spankin’ new: a prototype of the Owon HSA015-TG wireless frequency spectrum analyzer. “It’s like a TTi PSA on steroids,” Lowder explains, “and it allows our RF tech Diego Correa to walk with it and look at the noise floor around the stadium. You can even test RF cables with it, which is important, because our longest run is 400 feet to the last antenna, and that’s a huge advantage when gear is getting beat up on the road.”
Lowder also deals with the challenge of his frontman being in front of the speakers so much of the time, so he’s using Rupert Neve Designs’ Primary Source Enhancer to fight room noise and tighten up the mix in his ears. Tesfaye is using JH Audio Angie in-ears. ”He has a very intelligent and practical way he approaches monitors, so it’s been a fun mix to build.”
It’s All About the Video Screen
System Tech Randy Weinholtz grew up in the Philadelphia area and started working backline before moving over to audio engineer, system tech and/or audio crew chief with Paul McCartney, Alicia Keys and Aerosmith, among many others. “It’s all about the giant video screen,” Weinholtz says of this tour. But he too credits that month-long rehearsal for being able to adapt to the challenge of the high hang. “It was just a matter of putting it in the air and finding out the restrictions and what angles we needed.” Weinholtz got it down to a science and then called every stadium and arena they were playing in to model via eFocus modeling software. He worked it out so that the main hang was the same every day, although the side hangs change, depending on the venue.
Weinholtz does get creative with the delay towers. If he could put them 20 feet taller, it would be fine; but as it is, he can’t get the 30-degree uptilt to reach the highest upper seats. “We just send two guys out to take care of the delay in the upper levels and tie into the house system for those last six rows and any corners we’re not quite getting.” As far as the speakers doing the work, “Derek loves the Clair Cohesions and I’m a big fan as well.”
A Team Effort
Summing up the experience of doing a huge stadium tour, Brener notes, “mixing is one thing, but I want to mention there’s nothing more important than a great crew and a banging system. The crew on this tour has been exceptional. This monstrosity of a show is a tough one, and the folks at Clair and my boys on tour are such an important support system, I can’t begin to tell you how grateful I am to have every one of them.”
The Weeknd’s “After Hours Til Dawn” tour wrapped up its North American Leg with two back-to-back shows at the Rogers Centre in Toronto (Tesfaye’s hometown) on Sept. 22-23, 2022.
The Weeknd After Hours til Dawn Tour
AUDIO CREW
- Sound Company: Clair Global
- FOH Engineer: Derek Brener
- Monitor Engineer: Lewis Lowder
- System Tech: Randy Weinholtz
- RF Tech: Diego Correa
- Monitor Tech: Brandon Bowman
- P.A. Techs: Kyle Bush, John Giacomazzi
- Delay Techs: Brandon Alison, Kas Solemn
- Stage Tech: Mike Fronk
FOH GEAR
- FOH Console: Yamaha Rivage PM10 CS-R10 Control Surface
- Mix DSP: Yamaha DSP-R10 Engine Rack
- Outboard: Neve 1081 preamp/EQ module, Rupert Neve Design 1081 and PSE 5045, Maag EQ4 EQ; Sonnox Oxford Limiter; (2) Empirical Labs EL-8X Distressors; Overstayer SFE 3706 compressor
- Drive: Lake LM44 processor
MON GEAR
- Monitor Console: DiGiCo SD5
- Outboard: (2) DiGiGrid MGBs; Waves SGS Extreme SoundGrid with SuperRack; Bricasti M7 reverb; Universal Audio UAD-2 Live Rack; Rupert Neve Designs Primary Source Enhancer
- IEMs: JH Audio Angie
- IEM Hardware: Shure PSM1000s
- RF Test: Owon HSA015-TG spectrum analyzer
- Wireless Mics: Sennheiser EM 3732-II receivers, SKM 5200-II handhelds with MD 5235 capsules
- Hardwire Mics: Shure PGA81, SM48, Beta91A, Beta 52, SM57s, KSM137s, KSM32s, SM58s; Sennheiser e604s, e-815s; AKG C-414B/XLSs; Audio-Technica AE2500s
- Direct Boxes: (5) Radial Engineering J48s
