The 2013 Rebel Soul tour, in support of Kid Rock's latest album of the same name, marks the sixth year that Steve 'Half Pint' Cross has manned FOH for the group. With John 'Haircut' Tompkins once again serving as systems engineer, and Parnelli Award-winning audio system tech Vic 'Beaker' Wagner assisting with PA. setup and optimization, the tour is taking advantage of a full complement of K1, Kudo and Kara loudspeakers, all powered by LA8-equipped LA-RAK.
Similar to Kid Rock's touring system from his Born Free tour with Sheryl Crow two years ago, the main house system is comprised of left and right arrays of 14 K1 flanked by adjacent arrays of six K1-SB subs and out-fill arrays of nine Kudo. New to this tour, however, is the deployment of three Kara per side - replacing dV-DOSC - hung from the bottom edge of the K1 arrays for down-fill coverage.
To create extra punch - particularly during the artist's more hip-hop-flavoured numbers - eight front-firing SB28 subs per side are positioned on the arena floor below the mains in two horizontal stacks of three, plus two on end. A dozen LA-RAK touring racks, each loaded with three LA8 amplified controllers, deliver the loudspeaker processing and power for the entire system.
"Although our arena system is very similar to the one we took out two years ago, the use of Kara on this tour has been a big step up," says Cross. "When walking from the mix position to the front, the transition between our K1 mains and KARA downfills is so smooth that I can't definitively tell when I cross over; the two systems are a fantastic match. KARA's lighter weight, captive rigging, and smoother off-axis response are all great improvements as well."
This year's system also differs in that it's the first time the production crew has kept the audio signal chain entirely in the digital domain. "I'm feeding the digital input cards of the LA8s with the AES output from my Avid Venue Profile console, which has worked very well," Cross notes. "Although it's hard to be sure without a direct A/B comparison, it really feels like the system in general sounds better and more present. I'm very happy with it."
(Jim Evans)
