The topic of “rider-friendly” gear is an ageless debate among sound company personnel, and a beauty contest of what is currently rider-friendly and what is not. In this column, I will throw out some thoughts on rider-friendly, and see if the readership can concur.
Quality or Capability
When a fledgling sound company chooses its gear, just having something that fills a basic capability is the game. We all know the infamous MI brands and the types of speakers, consoles, signal processing and accessories that are provided by the weekend warrior sound companies (anklebiters). Examples like piezo drivers on wedges, 15-band graphic equalizers, carpet-covered main speakers and an outboard rack that looks more appropriate for a guitarist than serious sound reinforcement are common. These are dead giveaways for a soundco still in the "capability" stage of the business.
As a live sound company transitions from merely capable to more quality performing gear, the “rider-friendly” question begins gnawing on the subconscious of ownership making new gear decisions. Media such as FOH are great at showing you the newest offerings from the live sound gear manufacturers, but are these offers rider-friendly? The answer is often no, at least not immediately.
Old School
By definition, rider-friendly gear tends to be older gear, just from the idea that industry consensus takes time to build. Great examples of rider-friendly gear are EAW KF850 speakers, Yamaha SPX-990 multi-effects processors and Klark-Teknik DN360 dual graphic equalizers. All of these items are nearly 20 years or more in service to the pro audio consumers, but very few professional act production crews will object to these gear items. Granted we have tour grade line arrays, higher-fidelity effects and digital equalization available, but the risk is that the wrong gear for the rider may come up and bite you.
If you do not have many clues on what is rider-friendly gear, you can use the Internet review act/agent Web sites or rifle through your recent stash of A and B act riders to gain this knowledge. So, if you’re bent on procuring rider-friendly gear, do not look at eBay pro audio listings. Rather, check out the more popular acts in the FOH Showtime section and similar rundowns of gear from other trade magazines. You can take chances on new gear, but it is not the kind of gambling I would do if rider-friendly is the quest.
Your Customers
The tough question to ask of yourself is, “are you after A and B-level acts, or are your current and future customers local acts without much technical specifics on production?” While you may fantasize about pulling down regular touring acts with your C-rig while taking every club gig that pays, paying up for rider-friendly gear may turn your profitable, small business into a money-losing hobby. If you are on the verge of chasing after infrequent B-level acts in small festivals or special events in medium clubs, do a sanity check first using typical B-level acts that frequently come into your region of the country.
For example, I know a well-known rock/country B-level act that has a rider, and in that rider there is need for: decent FOH and monitor consoles (VCAs at FOH), six monitor mixes to 10 tour-grade quality bi-amp wedges, quality sidefill speakers, and plenty of famous brand mics, DIs and stands. If you do not have the majority of these items, then bidding that show next time is going to cause you some problems. And B-level acts are pretty flexible on gear brand names.
B-level acts are great places to break into the rider-friendly business. These acts are typically rising stars or former top acts (A-level) that are making a graceful decline in show business. In any case, they are generic but picky about what you have to offer, and generally have good experienced-based instincts if you are going to come up short in a rider-specified technical aspect.
Building In the Basics
Thankfully, most B-level act riders are getting more production provider-friendly by specifying capabilities and mentioning less specific brands. A good example is contract rider verbage like “shall provide a house speaker system capable of 100 dB SPL peaks in the back seats of the venue”. It sounds fairly straight-forward, but if you do the acoustics math you may suddenly realize that you need 140 dB+ of SPL (at one meter) mains speakers or additional delayed rear-fill cabinets to get the required SPL to the rear seating. Beware of the technical rider words, as they can catch you at a point of weakness.
When thinking rider-friendly, be thorough when running through your gear list. Are your stage monitors bi-amped and configured with enough cabinets with 15” plus 1.4” horn throat, or double 12” plus 1.4” horn throat, tour-grade cabinets that can be physically abused by artists standing on them? Are your wireless mics of tour-grade quality with diversity receivers, plus enough of them for acts with multiple-lead vocalists plus a couple back-up units? Do you have the middle- to high-end analog or digital FOH console with the standard premium-quality name dynamic processors from Europe, and the same for equalizers, plus the standard top names in digital reverbs and delays? Does that console have at least 32-channels going back to the stage? Can your monitor console handle a half-dozen stereo in-ear mixes with six equalizers and reverbs enough to get the job done? Are your racks and stacks of the popular brands and tour-grade lines, or are they music-store brand offerings in disguise?
In general, think like a tour manager/production person for a B-level act; and scrutinize how your equipment list fares. Sound companies taking on A-level acts do not get much accommodation, and are expected to have rider-friendly gear top to bottom, plus artist special requests. There is nothing wrong with gear not rider-friendly, just keep that gear in the shop or out on those club gigs where it belongs.
Contact Mark at marka@fohonline.com
