Tools from Waves Audio were employed by live-sound engineers for a variety of performers throughout Coachella 2018
USA - Tools from Waves Audio were employed by sound engineers for a variety of performers in diverse set-ups and consoles throughout Coachella 2018 – from Avid Venue S6L (Kygo) and Avid Venue Profile (The Weeknd), to DiGiCo SD10’s (Vince Staples), to SSL Live (Portugal. The Man) and Waves’ own eMotion LV1 Live Mixer (MØ). Prominent FOH engineers provided a peek under the hood of their productions, relaying which tools help them create a tight, spectacular-sounding show under demanding festival conditions.
Vince Staples’ FOH engineer Robbie Barr has been touring with DiGiCo SD-series consoles nonstop for five years, mixing such acts as M83, Foster the People and Banks. His setup for Staples at Coachella consisted of a DiGiCo SD10 console, two Waves SoundGrid Extreme Servers (one for redundancy) and the Waves MultiRack plugin host.
“Running Waves plugins on MultiRack couldn’t be easier,” Barr says. “It helps me recreate my favourite dynamic and FX chains from the studio and tailor them to a live environment.”
Having toured with Bruno Mars for half a decade, Derek Brener has now been mixing tours for R&B/pop singer and producer The Weeknd for over three years. At Coachella, he’s been using an Avid Venue Profile console to mix The Weeknd’s show. “I still like using the Profile,” he says, “Waves integration is effortless. It speeds up my process and enables me to just mix and be creative.”
Front-of-house engineer Jon Schumann (Mew, The Ravonettes, Lykke Li) has been mixing Danish electropop artist/producer MØ’s live shows on Waves’ eMotion LV1 live mixer for well over a year now. “It’s a very simple system,” he says, “in which both myself and monitor engineer Jeppe Andersson are relying extensively on the eMotion LV1 software mixer and Waves SoundGrid technology.
Eds John, whose credits include Orbital, Richard Ashcroft and Dave Clarke, was helming the boards for popular Norwegian DJ/producer Kygo, using an Avid Venue S6L-32D console, a Waves WSG HD card, two Waves SoundGrid Extreme Servers, and a d&b GSL speaker system. “Quite a few plugins are must-haves for me for a show like this,” John says. “The Waves dbx 160 compressor and H-Delay plugin are favourites.”
(Jim Evans)

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