"All UK summer festivals are busy, but Wireless is one of the busiest, with over 190 acts taking to the stages over three days this year," explains SDUK's Tuomo Tolonen. "Different acts are on different stages simultaneously all weekend; it's the very definition of a crowded RF environment, and this against the background of generalised spectrum scarcity thanks to the recent Digital Switchover. Fortunately, Axient is designed precisely for events like these, offering high channel counts even where the available RF spectrum is restricted, and with extremely effective resistance to interference, plus the ability to find interference-free frequencies and switch seamlessly to those in the event of a problem. The PSM1000 systems have also been popular at busy events like Wireless, as they're the only true-diversity in-ear systems, with two identical antennas - and the RF noise floor stays really low. At events where the scope for interference is high, such as venues with lots of LEDs, PSM1000 is the perfect choice."
Axient was used on the main stage all weekend with a selection of Shure capsules, including KSM9 and Beta heads, while the PSM1000s in-ear monitoring systems supplied by SDUK became the 'in-house' in-ear monitoring systems on the festival's Pepsi Max stage. Justin Timberlake also used 12 channels of PSM1000, as part of the personal equipment carried by his engineers.
Lez Dwight of Britannia Row Productions adds, "This was Wireless Festival's first year at the 2012 Olympic site, and after having heavy audio restrictions for many years in Hyde Park, all involved on the new site, from the engineers to the paying public, were treated to a truly great sounding outdoor event. Tuomo really helped us out with the Axient and PSMs; we had planned to use them on the Pepsi Max stage, but so many of the American artists on the main stage requested Shure mics, we switched the Axient handhelds to the main stage."
(Claire Beeson)
