Kid Kapichi played their local venue, The Printworks just before lockdown (photo: Sara-Louise Bowrey)
UK - Hastings-based rock heavyweights, Kid Kapichi, stamped their name firmly onto the hide of the UK rock scene last year, and just before lockdown they played their local venue, The Printworks.
The band is fronted by Jack Wilson and Ben Beetham and for this gig sound engineer Alfie Rolph made sure that they performed to 200 ecstatic fans upstairs through a Martin Audio Blackline XP12 / XP118 PA rig, supplied by partners Old Barn Audio (OBA).
“The Martin Audio speakers represented a huge upgrade,” said Wilson, “and we’ll now be looking to use them for all future events of that level.”
Alfie Rolph, an employee of OBA, and one of the Printworks’ sound techs, reviewed the existing sound system and decided it was time for an upgrade. “Although it was a tried and trusted system, I knew that for Kid Kapichi’s last gig here, these local legends needed a truly special send off.”
And so he turned to Old Barn Audio for their recommendations. “I had heard great things about Martin Audio products and especially the BlacklineX Powered range so I was intrigued to hear them in action. Speaking with Chris from Old Barn, we agreed on four XP12s and a pair of XP118s. On arrival I was surprised by how light the speakers were; speakers with built-in DSP are usually a two-man job to carry but these were easy to handle by myself. We got the speakers configured incredibly quickly, and I was surprised by how easy the BlacklineX Powered system was to set up.
“The sound from these speakers absolutely blew me away,” he exclaimed. “Straight out of the box they were pretty much perfect. I only had to do slight EQ to match the room.”
Summing up, he describes the BlacklineX Powered series as a “game changer”, particularly the XP118s ”They were the speakers that really stood out for me. The response from these was absolutely incredible.”

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