The company's digital specialist Andy Huffer supplied the two D-Show mixing consoles and the Pro Tools HD2 recording system was provided by Andy 'Baggy' Robinson. This allowed FOH sound engineer Marc Carolan to record 48 tracks for the show's three and a half hour duration flawlessly - as well as locally tracking six ambient mics for future 5.1 mixing of the show. In addition to the recording from the FOH desk, Keith Uddin, The Cure's studio engineer, took a firewire feed to the Pro Tools LE from the monitor desk of Matt West.
Carolan added that since The Cure had used Venues on their European festivals last summer it seemed logical to treat this as a one-off extension of that, as the band's studio commitments meant that there were no opportunities for pre-production.
With a vast 80-plus tracks stored in the board, for both Carolan and West it was simply a case of dialing up the show they had saved eight months ago, and picking up from there. In this respect, the desk's recall facility, says the front-of-house man, proved a real Godsend. "What I love about the D-Show is the ease with which I could re-order a set from this list."
In fact he described the show as a case study in recall. "It was flawless - much more quick and precise than on previous digital boards I have used, in that it worked without any adaptation or reconfiguring. I felt guilty in that I just had to push it up and it was all there!"
Marc Carolan was also full of praise for the support offered by Andy Huffer. "He was involved from the get go. His support up to, and on show day was magnificent. I arrived to a fully setup system which was a mirror of what I'd been using and it worked perfectly throughout."
His praise was echoed by Matt West, who was armed with a similar set-up to that provided by Andy Huffer for the Ga*Ga*s show at the Hard Rock Cafe. "As with Marc it was simply a case of loading up our show files, and continuing from where we left off eight months ago - with no time needing to be wasted during the day on dialing in or programming new desks."
West had visited the Marquee Audio warehouse the week before the gig for a refresher and to check his files - but admits he probably needn't have bothered "as Andy was at the Albert Hall from first thing, to help hook everything up and answer any questions we had".
And that was literally all he needed. "When using the Venue as a monitor desk I have no need for any external equipment. I don't use any plug-ins but have the desk graphics on all my mixes. It makes life easier and gives me the smallest of footprints. It's a great sounding EQ as well."
As a result the day went without a hitch and the audience were treated to top quality, transparent audio, delivered from an Entec-supplied d&b line array, which had been rigged for the duration of the week-long series of events.
(Chris Henry)
