Said to be the world’s most commercially successful solo guitar performer, Joe Satriani has sold more than 10 million albums and earned 15 Grammy nominations during his career. Last month, he completed the 47-date North American leg of his “Earth Tour,” which supports The Elephants of Mars (his 19th studio album) that debuted earlier this year.
After being forced to postpone numerous tour dates over the last two years, Joe Satriani was anxious to return to performing live shows for his legions of fans across the world, hence the 2022-2023 “Earth Tour” name. Accompanying Satriani on the tour is a world-class band featuring drummer Kenny Aronoff, bassist Bryan Beller and keyboardist Rai Thistlethwayte.
Sound for the tour is being handled by Clair Global, who is supplying all the consoles, front-end and monitor gear, and relying on locally (or venue-) provided P.A. at each performance.
The “Earth Tour’s” North American leg kicked off Sept. 21, 2022 at the Fox Performing Arts Center in Riverside, CA, and wrapped up Nov 19 at the 1,704-seat Majestic Theatre in Dallas. Along the way, the tour played 46 U.S. cities, plus a Canadian stop at Toronto’s Danforth Music Hall. FRONT of HOUSE caught up with the action at the Fox Theater in Oakland, CA.
In the FOH Position
Dan Crowe has been the house FOH mixer for San Francisco’s Masonic Auditorium since 1995. Over the years, Joe Satriani’s production manager Alistar Watson had come through a number of times, hearing Crowe mix some shows, and he asked if he would be interested in filling in for some Sammy Hagar dates back in 2016. Well, it took a few months, “availability-wise,” Crowe says, but in 2017, he finally did some shows for Watson, first with Joe Satriani in Brazil and at the Sweetwater Music Hall in Mill Valley (across the bridge from San Francisco). Then, in August 2021, Crowe took over the FOH mix position for Sammy Hagar and The Circle’s “Crazy Times Tour.” When that ended, he went directly into rehearsals with Joe Satriani for the “Earth Tour.”
Crowe says he tries to mix very organically and not let technology get in the way of supporting the artist. “I spend a lot of time on research into each artists’ music and try to bring the same level of detail and energy that their recordings have to a live environment. With Joe Satriani and Sammy Hagar, their fans are very knowledgeable, and they want to hear the signature sound and feel from their musical history.”
Crowe is mixing on the Avid VENUE | S6L-32. “The Avid S6L sounds so good that I only use a few plugins. I try to be very conservative in my plugin chains, but very nontraditional in what I use them for. My go-to plug-ins are: C6, SSL E Channel, SSL G Master Bus Compressor, PuigTec EQP-1A, Renaissance AXX, MaxxVox, Waves Q10, Trans X Multi, Maxx Bass, L1 Limiter, H delay, H Reverb and the Abbey Road Chambers.”
On each of Satriani’s guitar cabinets, Crowe combines a Royer Labs R-121 ribbon mic and Shure SM57 dynamic — and says that combo has been fantastic. “We are also using a lot of Earthworks mics on Kenny Aronoff’s drums and a couple of Heil mics on percussion, in addition to SM57’s for snare, AKG D12 and Shure 91A for Kick. Both the drums and guitars really need to be very transparent and extremely dynamic. I use Radial DI’s on keys, bass and guitars.”
tour band that includes bassist Bryan Beller and keyboardist Rai Thistlethwayte. Photo by Steve Jennings
Secrets to a Great Tour
“This tour has been going great,” notes Crowe. “Such a great band, great crew,” adding that it all comes down to the basics. “For this tour, everything starts with the band’s sound. The right mic and the correct placement are the keys to having great sound every night.”
A key addition to the tour crew was monitor engineer Ruben Aguirre, mixing on a DiGiCo SD10, who was in charge of monitor world at the main stage of this year’s Boston Calling mega-festival.
“I met Ruben Aguirre when he filled in on some Sammy Hagar and The Circle dates last year, and we hit it off together,” Crowe recalls. “It’s made all the difference on this tour.”
Next up, after Satriani and crew enjoy some well-earned rest during the “never-fun-to-tour” winter months, the “Earth Tour” will head over to Europe for Covid-rescheduled shows in spring 2023, beginning at the Sentrum Scene in Oslo, Norway on April 1, 2023. The European leg will perform at 48 cities in 17 countries, concluding with a final show on June 4 at Theatre Femina in Bordeaux, France.
Joe Satriani ‘Earth Tour’
AUDIO CREW
- Sound Company: Clair Global
- FOH Engineer: Dan Crowe
- Monitor Engineer: Ruben Aguirre
- Guitar, Backline Techs: Rob Gill, Michael Arms, Jose Baraquio
- Tour/Production Manager: Alistar Watson
P.A. GEAR*
- Mains: (14) Meyer Sound LYON/side
- Subwoofers: (3) Meyer 700HP (flown), (12) Meyer 1100 (ground)
- Front Fill: (3) Meyer Melodie
- System Control: (4) Meyer Galileo
FOH GEAR
- FOH Console: Avid VENUE | S6L-32D
- Outboard: Waves Extreme Server
- Recording: JoeCo MADI recorder, Apogee Ensemble preamps
- Measurement: Earthworks M30 measurement mic, Focusrite Scarlett 2i4 USB preamp, Rational Acoustics SMAART software
- Near Fields: Genelec 8020 Monitors
- Intro PB Trigger: Qlab Go Button for iPad
- Computers: Levon Yoga Series 9 and Apple Laptops
MON GEAR
- Monitor Console: DiGiCo SD10
- Engineer Playback: Albatros Audio PH9B headphone amp; Jerry Harvey Audio Layla in-ears.
- Stage Wedges: (8) Clair Cohesion CM22 wedges
- Front Fills: (4) Clair P2
- Sidefills: (2) Clair R4 Series III; (4) Clair ML-18HP subs
- Amps: Lab.gruppen and Crown, Lake Processing
- IEM Hardware: (4) Shure PSM1000
- Band IEMs: UE 11 Pro (guitar and drums); Jerry Harvey Audio Roxannes (bass)
- Mics: Royer Labs R-121, Shure SM57 (guitar); Earthworks, Heil, Shure, AKG (drums)
- DI Boxes: Radial Engineering
*The P.A. Gear setup varied; this is what was in use at the Fox Theater in Oakland, CA
