These went straight into rehearsals with some of the best known rock 'n' roll stars on the planet - including Pink Floyd, The Who, Madonna, Elton John and Robbie Williams in the run up to Live 8. "So as you can deduce from that, we were pretty confident we had a superlative product" states Brit Row's Roly Oliver. The company provided discreet monitor systems for all these maverick performers in the run up to their appearances at Live 8 London.
The amplifiers were then used to power the monitor system for the historic Live 8 gig in Hyde Park. It's the first time Britannia Row has ever bought Crown explains Oliver, "We did a listening test against several other amplifiers and nothing even came near the Xs in terms of build quality and value for money." He reiterates that they were exceptional value and also that Harman Pro UK was able to turn the order around in a very short timescale. "The service from both Crown and HPUK was fantastic," he says, highlighting that the 'no quibbles' returns policy underlines its belief in the product's reliability, and that this is exactly what a rental company needs.
The purchase consisted of 16 Crown Xs 700s and 16 Xs 1200s. Andy Duffield handled the deal for HPUK. The Xs is a new generation of affordable, quality power amplification. The line offers four models - Xs 500, 700, 1200 and 900 in a rugged 2U chassis. All are identical apart from the output power.
Features include a forced air fan for efficient cooling, precision level controls, power switch and five LEDs that indicate the clip for each channel, power, AC mains temperature and fault conditions and microprocessor controlled protection system.
The new amplifiers are currently still out in rehearsals with Robbie Williams (monitor engineer John James) and were used for REM's show in Hyde Park at the weekend (monitor engineer Sarne Thorogood). They'll also be going out on the Foo Fighters (Ian Beveridge), Marilyn Manson, Robert Plant (Dee Miller) and Toto (Simon Hardiman) ... to name but a few upcoming Brit Row tours.
(Sarah Rushton-Read)
