The original Cockney Rebel, Steve Harley still enjoys an enviable reputations as one of the UK’s most revered musical talents. Always a live attraction, the Performing Rights Society reports his ‘Make Me Smile (Come Up and See Me)’ to be one of the most played records in British broadcasting.
On the road, Harley’s FOH engineer Andy Linklater has high expectations of any sound system demands for a system, and was keen to put Tannoy’s VQ Live system through its paces recently.
‘I’d heard about the loudness of the system, but I was really looking forward to hearing how it performed at a lower level. My big praise for it, really, is the vocal definition.’ he says. ‘Obviously, there is the volume side of it – it is a very powerful system – but the main reason for bringing on the Steve Harley Acoustic Tour is that I wanted to hear it with an acoustic band. This band has got quite a range of instruments, dulcimer, violin, full range piano for instance, and I wanted to see if it was musical as well as being loud, which it is, I’m pleased to say.’
With long experience in FOH engineering that has saw him work with countless artists in thousands of venues across the world, Linklater has used pretty much every system available, from festival line arrays to house systems.
‘The Steve Harley set is very dynamic,’ he warns. ‘It goes from a whisper to very loud with seconds. ‘Without doubt, VQ Live has outperformed any systems I have used before. It is probably the best point source box I have ever used in my career, I don’t know if I can say any more than that. Because it is self-powered, the speed that you can set up is another big plus. It is very user-friendly, and although I did bring my laptop and the software to tweak around with the system, I set it up for the very first gig, and haven’t touched it since. Occasionally I would adjust the frequencies for the room, but I just didn’t feel the need to play around with the system settings. It’s running pretty much flat on the EQ on the box, the crossover point is set at about 100Hz with the 2×18 (VNet 218DR Live) subs, so it’s ideal.’
The tour has taken in Victorian theatres, places where traditional architecture often results in challenging acoustics when it comes to introducing a live PA. The flexibility of the system has meant he could negotiate the different venues with the minimum of fuss, using a VQNet 60 Live top per side and coupling these with a VNet 218DR Live each side. This set up gives comparable SPL performance as a large format four-box flown line array system, but with far greater coherence and consistent broadband coverage; and given that VQ Live is fully integrated with onboard amplification, DSP and network control (via Tannoy’s proprietary VNet system), there’s no need for additional outboard power and processing, hence setting the system up and tuning to each venue is quick and easy.
‘A lot of the theatres have been fairly small, say 1200 capacity, and this system has coped with everything. I’d say pretty much every night the audience commented on the quality of the sound. I’ll take some of the credit for that myself. But in all honesty, this system has made my job a whole lot easier.’
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