Equalization / Speaker Management Advice

[jpinewoods]

I run a small sound & light hire business, catering primarily for small house parties and functions which started as an adjunct to my DJing business. However in the last couple of years, due to a good website we have picked up more and more enquiries to supply PA for small events where local bands with little or no experience (and similarly small amounts of gear) have been playing. Accordingly our rental stock has grown steadily in this direction.

 

One of the young bands to whom we supplied a PA system a while ago asked me to set up and engineer for them on one of their gigs - a small wedding - and were very happy with the results,. They are talented and have been getting an increasing number of bookings in pubs and small venues indoors and out for audiences up to about 100 - 150, I have no sound training other than what I have picked up from my background in DJing but so far have managed to get pretty good sound for them through a front of house comprising a pair of EV SXa360s and SBa760 bins, run through a Soundcraft EFX12 mixer. They are 4 pieces - guitar, keys, drums and bass with guitarist handling lead vox and keys and bass doing backing vox. They play traditional wedding covers and a few original compositions in a rock style, but nothing too heavy. Up until now they have struggled by with no monitoring, apart form the odd occasion when I have run lead vox through an active 8" speaker and obviously onstage guitar and bass amps.

 

However as they are now getting more popular they are getting bookings for bigger venues and larger audiences (up to about 400 people) and need to expand their sound to accommodate. I am happy to continue helping them and am about to invest in a bigger active PA system as this is likely to get other dry hires as well - I am looking at something like HK Linear 5 Big Venue Pack, FBT Mitus (pair of 152A tops and 2 or 4 x 118SA bins), or even the new EV ETX system (15p and 18SP) . That, however is a discussion for another thread, possibly. What concerns me most is the need for monitoring and some sort of EQ / speaker management system.

 

I was thinking of adding a graphic Equalizer to cope with the aux out to handle monitor management (monitors will probably be 2 or 3 Alto SXM112A or The Box pro mon A12) and something a bit more sophisticated for FOH , perhaps a Driverack PX.

 

Does anyone have any comments or advice for a novice dipping his toes into this higher level of sound?

[GC1971]

Hi there

Cool. Looks like you're on an adventure.. I hope you have a lot of fun!

Why not get a little digital desk. It would cover all your present issues and allow for your expansion plans.

What's your budget?

[sam.spoons]

Digital desk is a good idea if you have the budget and can cope with the learning curve. I'm slightly reluctant to recommend my desk, Mackie DL1608 at present, it's a great little desk and I love mine but a very few people have had problems, seemingly with recent production ones. Mine is 18 months old and has been faultless. It has the easiest most intuitive (free) control app, is the cheapest available at £750, has 16 inputs and 8 outputs and sounds great. It also has all the outboard you could wish for built in, PEQ, HPF, Gate and Comp on all input channels, PEQ, GEQ, HPF, LPF (which work as a crossover with 24dB/octave slopes available), Delay and Comp on all outputs. It also has stereo Delay and Reverb fx engines (reverbs are serviceable rather than stunning but work just fine in a live context). You would need an iPad (2 or better) but if you live close to your dealer so you can return it easily for exchange should you get one of the few duff ones it may be worth a try.

 

I use Alto TS110s for foldback, they are more versatile than the SXM boxes as they will also work on a stand for FOH on small gigs. I have used mine for acoustic gigs and they sound great.

[Doug Siddons]

I would suggest that a couple of decent graphics are in order at this stage to cover monitors especially. Learn how to use them and train your ears to the offending frequencies this will help. A desk upgrade in the future to digital may help but at this stage keep investment low and quality high! I think at this stage there are two things to consider the first being the band may fold in a couple of months leaving your investment suspect; the second is, I do believe that although digital seems to have all the answers with regards to processing you think you need, without the experience of gradually bringing in the bits to make it sound better, and knowing how they work, the temptation when presented with so much processing is to use it all. Often with "interesting" results.

 

My response is based on the OP's statement that he is picking things up on the way as opposed to knowing it all, it may have been different if he proclaimed to be an expert

[paulears]

Oddly - as digital now offers so much, with built in eq on everything, the money on outboard isn't that useful a spend now. Something like the smaller X32's might be useful, if input requirement isn't too demanding. I also think going straight to digital might save all those horrible work arounds we all developed when analogue desks didn't quite do what we wanted. Why learn the old then maybe have to relearn in a year or two. If you can justify the digital desk, then you have immense capability, but you can dissever it at your leisure, for a modest cost now.

[jpinewoods]

Thanks for the responses. I think that, although the idea of Digital mixer is appealing and a nice and neat one box solution, I think that I am more likely to adopt Doug's suggestions for a couple of reasons.

 

As I said, I am doing this simply as an adjunct to my rental business, and, for my market, a pair of analogue graphics will be something else that I can more easily rent than a higher end digital desk. Secondly , although it seems that there are some pretty good bargains out there in the digital field, I hadn't factored into spend that much on such a solution.

 

Doug, you would normally be right to caution about the band splitting, but I am not doing something with them every week, just once a month, or thereabouts. The active PA that I am intending to buy, I had considered anyway and think that this will be an easy adjunct to our current offering - we have been asked for bigger PA on several occasions and not, until now, been able to help. I do agree that I am far from an expert and a shallower learning curve will help not just my own skills, but enable me to advise better rental customers looking for a cheaper solution.

 

I had thought of using Alto TS110a s for foldback duties as we already have 3 pairs of TS112as in our hire stock which are very popular, but on occasions we have rentals turned away due to not being able to supply wedges, rather small cabs! What to say!!

[sam.spoons]

You'll always get a client who insists on something you ain't got http://www.blue-room.org.uk/public/style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif.

 

dickiefunk of this parish has auditioned the SMX112 alongside the TS112A I think? I seem to remember him saying they were a bit harsh next to the TS112 but I could be wrong.

 

Digital is much cheaper than separate boxes when you start to need a reasonable amount of outboard but I'd agree with you that for smaller dry hire gigs it's a non starter.

[i_hate_fisicks]

I've just bought the baby X32, and it's a bargain at £1000. But if you don't want to go that far, before that I had an old 01V which does most of the stuff. I just sold mine (if the buyer ever pays :|) on eBay for £215. Even in this day of no one wanting analogue I bet you can't get much graphic for that.

[Doug Siddons]

I've just bought the baby X32, and it's a bargain at £1000. But if you don't want to go that far, before that I had an old 01V which does most of the stuff. I just sold mine (if the buyer ever pays :|) on eBay for £215. Even in this day of no one wanting analogue I bet you can't get much graphic for that.

 

I may be wrong but I don't remember the 01 having a graphic on it just parametrics.

[i_hate_fisicks]

That's right. That was ok for me. I'd have thought it'd be ok for the OP too.