Alongside Lewis, the tour features a four-piece band and two backing vocalists. Monitor engineer Ant Carr chose the SD8 after a lot of deliberation. "I'd used D5s from when they first came out, back when I worked for Skan PA Hire. I'd gone away from them for a bit as newer consoles hit the market, but when this tour came up I spent a long time evaluating and listening to the SD8 at the tour's rental company Wigwam with Alex Hadjigeorgiou's help," he says.
"The SD8 was the right choice because its preamps are such high quality compared to other consoles capable of the same I/O, which was an important consideration. The dynamic EQ and multiband compressors are a welcomed addition. There was no need or benefit in adding any outboard preamps or compressors to the signal path and the SD8, purely on listening tests, was ideal."
Running two stage racks and Optocore throughout, Carr is using around 72 inputs, virtually all the outputs with a TC Electronic reverb the sole piece of outboard equipment.
"I'm only using the TC reverb because I'm using all of the SD8's eight effects engines," he says. "The effects are one of the major improvements in the SD series and I'm looking forward to the Waves tie-in as well."
(Jim Evans)
