Sound Company
Clair Global
Venue
Various (Tour)
Crew
- FOH Engineer: Bryan Campbell
- Monitor Engineer/Drum Tech: John Meyers
- Tour & Production Manager: Ivan Copelan
- Stage Manager: Todd Moody
- Guitar Tech: Tom Reardon
Gear
FOH
- Console: Avid S6L 32D
- In-console Effects/Plug-ins: Soothe Live, Waves Plug-ins
- Outboard Rack Effects/Plugins: Ferrofish A32 Pro I/O, SPL Iron & RND MBT on master bus, (5) SSL Bus Comps on drum groups, band group & vocal group, (6) Empirical Labs EL8 Distressors on kick group, snare group, toms group and overhead group, (2) Universal Audio UA 1176 on main & spare vocals, (3) API 5500 & (3) API 2500+ on three different guitar groups
- Speakers: Venue-supplied or locally sourced P.A. systems for North American dates; Clair-supplied Cohesion P.A. for headliner dates in Europe including CO12 (main hangs), CO12/CO10 (side hangs), CP218 (flown & ground subs), CO8 (front fills).
MON
- Console: Behringer X32
- In-console Effects/Plugins: Hall Reverb, Plated Reverb, Stereo Chorus, Stereo Delay
- Vocal Mics: Sennheiser MD & MM 445
- Drum Mics: sE Electronics BL8 & sE V-Kick (Kick), Lauten Audio (Snare Top & Bottom), sE V-Beat (Toms), sE8 (Hi-Hat & Ride), sE4100 (Overheads)
- IEMs: Sennheiser EW G4 (Band Owned); JH Audio Roxanne, JH Audio JH16, Ultimate Ears UE11
Tour Notes
Canadian rock band Sum 41 released their final album, Heaven :x: Hell, in late March, 2024. Their tour in support of the album, “The Tour of the Setting Sun,” is set to wrap up with a final show in Toronto on Jan. 30, 2025. FRONT of HOUSE caught up with the band’s FOH engineer, Bryan Campbell, and monitor engineer, John Meyers, for a discussion on how they optimize the band’s “super tight” sound using a combination of components supplied by vendor Clair Global along with band-owned and their own gear.
FRONT of HOUSE caught Sum 41 on opening night of the band’s farewell tour in support of their album Heaven :x: Hell. With a dose of alternative punk-pop-rock, the band members are a force to be reckoned with of non-stop energy on stage, performing a set of hits, fan favorites and songs from their newest album. We got a few words with the bands engineers- Bryan Campbell (FOH) and John Meyers (Monitors).
Bryan Campbell
FOH Engineer
Sum 41 band members are “super tight,” notes Campbell. “They play with great tones and attention to detail. I lovingly say that they’re so good that they mix themselves. [Singer] Deryck Whibley is an audio guy and has written, produced and mixed several things for Sum 41, so he’s very in-tune with everything and knows exactly what he wants to hear…This has been great to have someone to explore ideas and techniques with.”
Campbell’s approach to mix routing can be a little convoluted for some, he explains. “The way I route things helps me to control the mix subtly at multiple stages, rather than all at once with more heavy-handed techniques. I mix off of groups, so everything sums to groups, with multiple instances of group-to-group routing. All the drum inputs sum to Kick, Snare, Toms and Overheads Groups. Those Groups are sent to Parallel Compression Groups which are then routed to a Final Drum Group. The Final Drum Group is sent to a Band Group and finally the Master Group. The Guitars and other Instruments follow the same process and meet up with the drums in the Band Group. Vocals are all processed individually and then sent to a vocal group to be processed together. The only two things assigned to my Master Bus are the Band Group and Vocal Group.
“I try to keep input EQ to a minimum and do all my ‘character’ EQ-ing in the groups,” Campbell continues. “As for dynamics, individual input compression on instruments is super light with 1-2 dB of gain reduction. I’m just trying to control things. I’m not looking for a finished signal at the input stage. When I get to Group compression, I’ll start applying heavier compression techniques with outboard analog equipment. I’m looking for saturation and more control at this stage of compression. I’ll use a lot of dynamic EQ techniques in the Final Drums, Guitar/Bass, Band and Vocal Groups to make sure everything lives together in the frequency spectrum.”
Campbell says his preferred platform includes Avid and Waves equipment. “I literally spec/rent the exact same setup for all my clients lately,” he notes. “The outboard gear is all stuff I own. Over the years, I’ve constantly gone back to the hardware or plug-in versions of the gear, so I finally broke down and bought the hardware versions. I still have a few other pieces I’m looking to pick up. I know people go back and forth between plug-ins and hardware and whether or not it’s worth it to carry the hardware versions over plug-ins. I don’t think you need fancy hardware to achieve great mixes. [Even so], there’s no denying that there’s a distinct character enhancement when running through the outboard gear. And more importantly, it’s way more fun!”
John Meyers
Monitor Engineer
Monitor engineer John Meyers is using the band-owned Behringer X32 console primarily because the artists are comfortable enough to use it themselves, and they have historically done so. “One of my favorite features of the Behringer X32 is its portability. I can fit my entire monitor world in a single-wide rack, which makes it possible for us to set-up in any variety of venues. That makes us popular in places like TV studios where there typically isn’t room for outside productions to bring a full complement of gear.”
Sum 41’s band members own their own IEMs, which include (2) JH Audio Roxanne units, (1) JH Audio JH16 and (2) Ultimate Ears UE11 units. Transmitters and receivers, meanwhile, are Sennheiser’s IEM EW G4. “I will often have extra iPads around the stage for the band members to adjust their own IEMs if they want during sound check,” Meyers says. “For Deryck’s vocal chain, I use the onboard Hall Reverb, Stereo Delay and Stereo Chorus. I’ve also got a plated reverb on my kick and snare drums. I’m not using any outboard gear on this run.”
