Capital Sound provided the sound production for the tour and full event production for the Sony show. For the latter, the Martin W8L line array tour rig was supplemented by a Martin Wavefront 2 distributed system for speeches and a corporate presentation, controlled by a pair of XTA DP224s and DP226s using AudioCore software for remote control from a laptop.
Capital’s Paul Timmins comments: "As on the tour, we had five XTA C2 compressors dealing with the band’s five hand-held microphones and headset mics. It was the big new idea that we brought in for the tour, because at the beginning it was a bit of a struggle to get all the levels balanced against the noise of the audience, and when we introduced the C2s Chris was very happy with the result - they really sorted it out."
Pyne explains: "This kind of pop show has some interesting challenges - not least of which are the vocal performance and consistency of levels. Having five channels of constantly swapping lead vocals is a handful; in fact it's two handfuls. Especially difficult is keeping the vocal at a consistent level above the audience noise while also keeping the dynamics under control. I originally tried a well-known high end valve compressor which, after a number of shows, didn't really seem to do the job. I’ve been following the progress of the XTA brand for a few years now especially after using their crossovers and a SiDD on a couple of Kylie tours. The C2 compressor caught my eye while I was considering using a SiDD for Liberty X. I requested through Capital that I give the C2 a try. I’m generally not one for overstating the facts, but the difference the C2 made was astounding - the headroom and the sound quality were immediately obvious. I actually went back through the signal chain to make sure that I hadn't had the original compressors patched up incorrectly.
(Lee Baldock)
