Philadelphia-based Kelo has favoured Midas consoles throughout his long and distinguished career, and this was his first outing with a Midas digital system. "At heart I'm an analogue guy," he states. "I've been using the H3000 for most of my work for years, and I'm all about the warmth of analogue. I've tried other digital consoles, but moving to the XL8 is the only thing so far that makes me feel at home, I love it.
"I was able to get my mix going very simply; the learning curve was incredibly low. I went to Midas Consoles North America in Minneapolis for a couple of days, and it took me about 20 minutes with (national sales manager) Jay Easley to have a good understanding of how to get around. We used recordings from the Klark Teknik DN9696 to really dial in the mix and after that process I was very comfortable. The XL8 is very engineer-friendly and has been by far the easiest digital console I've worked with."
Kelo has been using the XL8's Area B in dual mix mode. "I like being able to mix and have my tech work out any problems without stopping my workflow, and this is genius!" he says. "I can set up the focal channels for each song and have them just a touch away. I break the band down as if it was a studio mixing session, with each VCA group being a different instrument type, and the last two VCAs as master vocal and master band faders. This makes it easy to bring down the overall level of the band if I need the voice to stand out a little more."
Jay-Z, Kelo and the XL8 return to the US for more live dates, including four joint concerts with Eminem in Detroit and New York.
(Jim Evans)
