Joining forces with guitarist and Nashville producer Buddy Miller, ex-Led Zeppelin front man Robert Plant’s Band of Joy took to the road in America recently.
Covering classic rock to folk and gospel music, the gigs called on a Midas Heritage 3000 desk and Meyer Sound Mica line array loudspeaker system provided by Thunder Audio. For FOH engineer Roy Williams, the system was a good fit for the band’s dense, yet occasionally delicate, sound. ‘There are softer numbers – particularly duets with Patty Griffin like ‘Monkey’ and ‘Silver Rider’’– with a breathy quality that demands absolute transparency,’ he says. ‘But on others, we push it up to send a message to the Zep fraternity that, when we want to, we can still do it. The Mica system handles the dynamics with no problems at all.’
The tour system comprised 12 Mica cabinets per side, each with dual 700-HP subwoofers, and further supported by side hangs of five-each M’elodie line array loudspeakers and five M1D line array loudspeakers for front fill.
Stage monitoring used side fill stacks of two 600-HP subwoofers topped by dual Mica cabinets, along with eight MJF-212A high-power stage monitors.
Thunder Audio systems technician Keith Jex used the Meyer Sound Mapp Online Pro acoustical prediction program and SIM 3 audio analyser to tailor the system to the room, then monitored showtime performance on the RMS remote monitoring system. ‘Because we’re playing a lot of theatres, and compared to the Milos we had on the Raising Sand tour, we can put more cabinets on the same hang points, which allows more angle selections for better coverage,’ he says.
The system front-end was hard-wired and analogue, with Shure SM58 vocal mics (except a Neumann KMS 105 for Griffin), feeding the Heritage 3000 console. According to Williams, ‘There’s a warmth generated in this music that we want to come through, and the system seems to be accomplishing that quite well.’
‘We always feel that we have an extended family at Meyer we can call on whenever necessary,’ Williams adds. ‘I know that if I have to call, I’ll get an immediate response, and not just “Oh, hang on a bit and somebody will call you back”. That’s important to me, to Keith, and ultimately to the band. Meyer Sound is the master of that kind of support.’
Thunder Audio was also the system supplier for Plant’s earlier Raising Sand tour with Alison Krauss, and received the 2009 TEC Award for Tour Sound Production.
More: www.thunderaudioinc.com
More: www.meyersound.com
