The Midas flagship joins Clair Brothers' extensive XL4 and Heritage 3000 rental inventory, which continue to be used daily on major touring productions, both across America and throughout the world.
Midas has worked in partnership and consulted with Clair Brothers Showco throughout the XL8's development, with delegations from Midas paying regular visits to Clair's headquarters in Pennsylvania, USA since the beginning of the project in early 2004. These visits proved invaluable, the company says, helping it fine-tune its digital concepts into the flagship XL8.
"As a leading light of the global touring industry we have always been very proud to have Clair Brothers Showco as a long term Midas customer," says Midas' sales and marketing director David Cooper. "It was therefore very important to keep them up to speed at all stages during our digital development program."
Clair Brothers Showco commented: "With so many of our long term clients in love with the legendary analogue 'Midas' sound we were excited to be involved in the birth of their first digital console, the XL8. The large scale networked design offers the user a massive amount of accessible input/output creative flexibility together with absolute redundancy designed in as standard. It is no easy task to retain that absolute analogue 'sound' in a digital console design, so for us the real surprise is the number of test drivers who walk away from our XL8s saying 'it doesn't sound digital - it sounds like a Midas'. Purchasing our first Midas XL8s is a natural step in our company's ongoing policy of offering the latest cutting edge technology to all of our many worldwide touring clients."
"The Clair Brothers Showco final seal of approval is extremely important to us," continues Cooper. "This purchase sends a very clear signal that the Midas XL8 is fast establishing itself as the digital standard at the highest level of touring production."
(Lee Baldock)
