I was contacted by a regional electronic music festival to handle their main stage — they needed someone who could mix esoteric/eclectic "bands" with bizarre instrumentation based around DJs. We've done lighting for the gig and I was looking forward to the experience… until the festival called and told me that they had booked racks 'n' stacks already and just needed me to bring "the rest.”
“The Kid” with the racks 'n' stacks arrived half a day late, and we got off to a bad start when he suggested that we determine a 0-dB output level and then tape off the board "so it'll always be the same.” When I explained to him that MIXING actually means that things change throughout the set, he got a horrified expression and blurted out that he'd have to stay at the amplifiers and adjust them for every song if I wasn't feeding him a constant signal!
After I calmed down, I apologized for threatening his life and tried to go through the mixing console with him. He had somehow purchased a fairly large PA system and had only ever run DJs straight into it sans console, using EQ and crossover settings to "mix.” We made some forward progress until he insisted that his processing be used — a BBE Sonic Maximizer (in ¼"!) and a Tapco EQ. I prefer my Ashly Protea and dbx Drive Rack.
We got along OK after I took the signals directly to the amps and then routed them back up into his "processing" so he could see the lights flash and "fix" the sound to his heart’s content. I'd question him about what he wanted to achieve and then dial it in while he verrrrrry carefully nudged the Sonic Maximizer closer to perfection. Our stage manager kept us from physical confrontation, bless his heart, and the kid kept running back to the stage with that puppy-dog look in his eyes like "I did good, hear it now!" I believe that his efforts were vastly appreciated by the Ketamine zombies who shuffled around the field to bad psytrance long past dawn.
Our stage ran the weekend without interruption (and I mean WITHOUT INTERRUPTION) after an upper stage sporting a new KV2 PA was shut down about midway through the first night. I had walked up earlier to check it out and was amazed that the provider had dropped XLR ends onstage for the DJs to plug into and then had apparently just left. His faith in his system's built-in protective architecture was stunning, as was the volume that a small (four bottom/three top per side, I believe) system was capable of. I found that I couldn't stand within about 150' of the PA without finding it painful.
In fact, I think this should be an ad for KV2… The county sheriff who arrived to shut down that stage of the festival (thus relocating all of the acts to my stage for a marathon weekend) reported that he had complaints that the low-end was causing convulsive involuntary bowel movements by nearby farm animals, particularly some prize Pygmy donkeys at a farm just up the hill. While this made for a long weekend on the other stages, the mental image is priceless.
Clint Kaster
SmartTech Audio-Visual
Portland, Ore.
