ProAudio Review - August 2008 - (Page 40)

LIVE | Tour Profile: AVRIL Continued From Page 39 “Like most VENUE users do after working on VENUE for a while, both Matt and I use a fair number of plug-ins. I have the Smack! Compressor on vocals, a lot of the Bomb Factory compressor/limiters on acoustic guitars, Purple Comps on bass and Drawmer TourBuss Gates on drums. But the cream of the crop is the CraneSong Phoenix variety of tape-saturation emulators; these things are fantastic. As many of my mixer colleagues like to say: ‘It’s like getting free gain on your input!’ I love using CraneSong on guitars, Avril’s vocal and snare top - it just makes it sound fuller, louder, and more analog. And the meter doesn’t move any higher on the meter bridge. It should be illegal! “We were not asked to mimic any studio session FX or CD sounds with the plug-ins. I do try to match things up in texture to the CD sound for each album but, depending on the environment of the venue each night, you may or may not notice much of that. We do not regularly record the performances to Pro Tools, although that option is available and I have a system at FOH that is just a patch away from being ready at any time. When we did our DVD shoot in Toronto, I used Pro Tools to back up the audio files in the truck - that came in very handy. “So far, the VENUE consoles have been very reliable. We don’t have any backup consoles on tour; only a spare parts kit and USB keys to back up the shows. We do have UPS battery back-up systems on the consoles in case we lose AC power.” To set up for live mixing, Yakabuski utilizes the VENUE’s Channel Safe feature to “bank safe” all four of Avril’s RF vocal mic channels that are rotated throughout the show. “Also locked are the short and long vocal delays on Avril’s vocal,” the FOH engineer continues. “This means that when I switch banks on the console those inputs will always stay available on the top layer, no matter what layer I’ve switched to. By doing this, I had to be aware that channels underneath these channels would be hidden so, in laying out my console patch, I had to leave ‘holes’ in my patch so that I wouldn’t be missing channels. I am not using any subgroups this time around; auxiliary sends are only used for FX sends.” The tour is using mainly Sennheiser microphones, “Avril has been using these since the very beginning,” confides Yakabuski. “Some of my favorites are the new [Evolution Series] e901 kick-drum mic, the e908 tom mics and, of course, the e935 cardioid dynamic vocal mic. The 935 is a very natural, true-sounding vocal mic with a nice top-end that isn’t over-accentuated in today’s world of cranked-up, high-end presets in PA systems. We also use the eW935 microphone for Avril’s vocals, and our dancer/BG vocalists, which is the RF version. I also like the AT 2500 mic on guitar, for the flexibility of having a condenser and dynamic capsule in one mic body.” The tour also uses Sennheiser SKM 935G2s with EM 550G2 receivers, plus Neumann KM 184s and TLM 103 models. Regarding outboards, neither Yakabuski nor Peskie use any external processing. “Matt [Peskie] started out using some Millennia compressors,” the engineer says, “but one started to give him some trouble. When we went to four RF mics on this tour, he decided to also go with console plug-ins - and he’s never looked back.” AVRIL continues on page 54 ® 40 | ProAudio Review | August 2008 www.proaudioreview.com http://www.cranesong.com http://www.proaudioreview.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of ProAudio Review - August 2008

ProAudio Review - August 2008 Contents Publisher's Page Broadcast News and New Products Yamaha Pocketrak 2G Olympus LS-10 Linear PCM Recorder Bench Test Marantz PMD620 Flash Recorder TASCAM DR-1 Portable Digital Recorder Tips From The Pros: Location/Production Audio Prosumer Portables in a Pro World Studio News and New Products Apogee Ensemble Solid State Logic Duende Mini FireWire DSP Live News and New Products Avril Lavigne's The Best Damn Thing World Tour Behringer Eurolive B412DSP and B415DSP Active Loudspeakers Gear for FOH Engineers — A PAR Contributors’ Wish List Contracting News and New Products Buyer's Guide Single Slice

ProAudio Review - August 2008

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