Headliner Magazine Issue 47

SWEET SIXTEEN

MILKY CHANCE

GERMAN ROCK DUO ON FOURTH STUDIO ALBUM

THE ZOMBIES ON SURVIVING 60 YEARS IN MUSIC

LEMAR WHERE HE’S BEEN AND WHERE HE’S GOING

SUPPORTING THECREA T I EV YTINUMMOC

At the moment, anyone that keeps up with music or pop culture can’t glance at social media without being bombarded with news and grainy phone footage of the biggest stars’ world tours, which, after a turbulent few years for the live events sector, are very much underway. Fred Again and the Blessed Madonna’s 2021 hit song addressed the obvious impact the pandemic had on the music industry: we’d lost dancing, however they spied hope on the post-Covid horizon: what comes next, will be marvellous…

And marvellous it is. This month, the World Health Organisation declared that Covid-19 no longer represents a global health emergency, and promoters, organisers and ticket organisations are making up for those lost, uncertain years. Coachella officially kicked off festival season, with the whole summer (Glastonbury! Tomorrowland! Lollapalooza! Creamfields!) to look forward to.

Meanwhile, the biggest stars on the planet are hauling themselves around the world on tour: Beyoncé, Taylor Swift, Harry Styles, Coldplay, The Weeknd, Ed Sheeran, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Lizzo – you name them, they’re probably touring. For the full year of 2022, Live Nation reported more than 121 million music fans attended around 43,600 events, and total full year revenues rose 44 percent to $16.7 billion. Live events are in demand to such an extent that even the UK’s dire cost of living crisis can’t keep patrons away: Glastonbury announced a more than 26% increase in ticket price for this year’s festival, yet the last batch sold out in April in six minutes. Live events are very much back.

This issue sees us check in with those at the heart of the action: Former

Alice Gustafson Editor, Headliner

FOH engineer Daniel Reed reveals how JBL Professional line arrays were essential to the smooth running of Coachella this year, while he shares his worst ever live tech mishap.

Meanwhile our cover star this month is British singer, songwriter and record producer MNEK, who reflects on his teenage years working with Sugababes and The Saturdays, explains the complexities of song interpolation and why he’s backing the UK’s next big girlgroup, FLO.

We also catch up with legendary UK rock band The Zombies to talk new music, new fans, and why theirs is a story quite unlike any other, meanwhile Fame Academy star Lemar reveals where he’s been and why the time is right for new music.

On the studio front, Headliner took a trip to Kalevala Studios in Helsinki – the first Finnish studio to become Dolby Atmos certified – to talk immersive audio, while Grammy-winning producer and mixer Andrew Scheps shares the lessons he learned working on Michael Jackson’s HIStory album.

Marvellous!

8 / TRAGIC SASHA

28/ MICHAL PAJDIAK

22/ STUDIO

50 / CHRXSTAL SARAH

42 / NOCUI

32 / MILKY CHANCE

38 / THEATRE SOUND

82 / LEMAR

62 / LIVE SOUND

78 / INSTALLATION

88 / IMMERSIVE AUDIO

56 / THE ZOMBIES

66 / DANIEL REED

94 / AUDIO PRODUCTION

100/ LIGHTING

72 / ANDREW SCHEPS

104 / GLEN MATLOCK

MUSIC FOR MILLENNIAL ANGST

TRAGIC SASHA

Whether it be trading Instagram time for playing solitaire or feeling like a character from the Sims in real life, Tragic Sasha’s brilliantly unique songs tell of millennial angst and attempting to live in the modern world with her mental health intact. A rising star in the UK’s left-field pop music scene, Sasha chats to Headliner about her new single Head Over Heels and her upcoming debut EP – about trying to feel adequate in a society that often tells us we aren’t.

Sasha Gurney chose the tonguein-cheek artist alias Tragic Sasha – many Brits will relate to the fact that they’d sooner opt for a selfdeprecating name over some of the ‘soon to be a millionaire’ styled names you typically see in the US hip-hop scene. There’s little to deprecate when it comes to her music trajectory, however. She’s consistently been dropping singles since 2016, which have accumulated hundreds of thousands of streams — although she very understandably bemoans the millennial musician

issue of being played thousands of times on streaming platforms, with eye-watering low payments accompanying them.

Sasha is giving her time to Headliner very generously as it’s her 27th birthday on the day of interview. She’s at home with her parents in Surrey, where she’s staying while also splitting her time at her boyfriend’s in London, where her studio is. She has lived all around London, on and off.

“I went to L.A. in January for a little holiday. I was doing a bit of work out there as well, because I write and produce for other artists. I love it there. London can be quite a sharp place, especially if you don’t have the money to enjoy it. But as most people know, no artists really have the money to enjoy London,” she laughs. “We’re all just trying to get by really.”

While Tragic Sasha’s music undoubtedly does go underneath the umbrella of pop music, to merely refer to it as pop would be doing it a disservice. “You probably wouldn’t hear me on Capital FM,” she says. “Maybe late-night Radio One, or BBC 6 Music, if you will! Although I have been writing some more upbeat stuff recently, especially when writing with other artists. I get to dip my toe in a few different genres.”

While there are plenty of artists from the Millennial generation who’ve built a fanbase and made music their career, there are few who make the actual experience of growing up in the nineties and noughties such a big part of their songwriting as Sasha.

Following on from the Baby Boomers and Gen Z, many of whom typically own cars and property, Millennials are the generation who have entered the job market during recessions and faced with the fact that many jobs have been replaced by automation — meaning unemployment and struggling to afford rising rents and house prices has become a huge issue for young people.

“It really does inform my music, the notion of just trying to get by in these times we’re living in with all the chaos around us,” she says. “I’m 27 now, so heading into my late twenties, and I know a lot of young people have the same struggles — trying to find a job, especially in this cost of living crisis when everything is so expensive. Not knowing what to do, where to live, this combination of having so much choice, but everything is so chaotic at the same time. And then you have all these people on TikTok saying I should move to Barbados and become a digital nomad!”

One thing Tragic Sasha definitely has a firm grip on is the visual component of her music — her singles always have pleasingly uniform cover art, her Instagram is a delight, and her two latest singles have fantastic music videos. As we build up to her upcoming EP, Bottle It Up was selected as the lead single, with an anthemic chorus and Sasha’s signature and tasteful use of autotune. And for the aesthetics out there, the video is an absolute delight.

“Each of the songs have their own little visual stories,” she says. “And Bottle It

Up is the first of five. The videos aren’t related, I’m not that clever! I wrote the song four years ago, I’ve been sitting on it for a long time. The song is about bottling up your emotions rather than talking about things. That feeling of guilt a lot of Millennials have and not knowing what to do.”

She followed that up with Head

Over Heels, a deft slice of lo-fi pop, displaying Sasha’s unique strength of marrying singalong choruses with her production style of keys that are ever so slightly off-key, a drum-machine style beat and a general edge that ensures the track has no hint of a bubblegum sheen. It couldn’t marry more perfectly with the video, in which Sasha is a Sims-style, house-bound avatar, as things slowly unravel…

“My little Sim is just going through the motions, trying to go about her life,” she explains. “But her emotional state is feeding into the world around her. She’s trying to iron a shirt, but it’s riding off the ironing board and glitches into the floor, and the whole world around her starts crumbling into chaos. I actually wrote the song before the pandemic, and it prophesied the loneliness of the next two years.”

The third single is The End of the World, is another tongue-in-cheek existential crisis song that expertly weaves Sasha’s trademark humour and darkness.

“I think this EP is probably some of the darkest stuff I’ve released to date,” she nods. “I wanted the whole EP to have a dark undertone running throughout the tracks, as they’ve come out of a tumultuous time, written mostly in the UK during the pandemic, Brexit and now being released in a cost-of-living crisis and environmental chaos. I think most people have been feeling really anxious the last few years and I felt it was important to capture that.”

It’s another song that’s been slowly simmering with Sasha since 2019. “I started the idea with my good pal Scott Colcombe (aka Scott Is Okay),” she says. “And then finished it early 2020 on the day we left the EU with my other talented writer-producer friend Kaity Rae. We were both feeling quite depressed at Brexit and the general state of things. Little did we know a mass pandemic was about to befall us.”

Sasha had a vision for the song’s production from the outset: to create the dark heart of the song. “I envisioned the production in my head to be quite glitchy and dark. I wanted lots of SFX, white noise, I wanted the piano to feel like you’d find it in a haunted house, reverberating through the walls. The synth that carries throughout the song feels very cinematic and wide and feels like it could be from a trailer in a sci-fi film. Everything in the production feels like it feeds into the story and this The Last Of Us-style cinematic universe. I even got my friend Pete Daynes to do his newsreader voice as a sound effect

for the bridge of the song, making it sound like one of those glitchy radio headlines you see in zombie apocalypse movies.

Fittingly, the song’s music video is downright creepy, almost feeling like a psychological horror film. “I have to give most of the credit for the video to my good friend Dottie Kay who is an amazing director,” she says. “I’ve always been a massive fan of horror films. I love the tropes and the jump scares, the spooky locations and the thrill of being scared. At the time of filming, my family had been trying to empty my late Grandmother’s house in the countryside in order to sell it and I had always felt a connection to it.

“It was such a beautiful house, built in the Tudor period, but it was falling apart. I knew it would be the perfect location for the video so I got Dottie and her wonderful team to come out and film the video mostly in the backyard and my mother’s old bedroom. We had creepy dolls, old flickering lights and those old wooden beams structuring the shots. All I knew

was I wanted it to be scary. Dottie came up with the rest!”

If the strength of these three songs is anything to go by, then it’s time to get very excited about Tragic Sasha’s fivetrack debut EP, her first full collection of songs after diligently releasing so many singles for several years, as is the norm in the Spotify-age.

“The EP is called The End Of The World,” she notes. “Expect more themes of millennial angst, I’m very on brand!”

SPONSORED BY

QSC.COM

INSTA: @TRAGICSASHA

“THE EP IS CALLED THE END OF THE WORLD. EXPECT MORE THEMES OF MILLENNIAL ANGST, I’M VERY ON BRAND!”

When London’s legendary RAK Studios responded to demand and went immersive, they wanted the most truthful monitors available. So they chose The Ones Smart Active Monitors, finding them unbeatable for neutrality, imaging, fatigue-free listening and consistent mix translation.

RAK now enjoys a flawlessly cohesive and scalable immersive system that’s also pinpoint accurate in level, distance and frequency response alignment, thanks to our GLM calibration software.

So, if you’re serious about going immersive – whatever your room size – explore our industry-leading solutions online. Visit www.genelec.com/immersive-hub

“Genelec have set the bar for immersive monitoring.”

Emma Townsend, RAK Studios

Words by

ALICEGUST A F NOS

If you can be sure about anything about MNEK, it’s that he’s gonna write and produce the hell out of a girl group song. While the rest of us were over-tweezing our eyebrows and working Saturday jobs to top up our phones, MNEK was already collaborating with Sugababes and The Saturdays when he was a teenager.

It’s significant then, that his new single, 16 Again – a collaboration with dance titans Paul Woolford and Lewis Thompson – sees the British singer, songwriter and record producer reflect on his own teenage years, which were so very different from those of his peers.

Used to seeing MNEK dressed mostly fabulously on Instagram (a flammable-looking blonde wig sometimes making a guest appearance), today he’s dressed down in a grey long-sleeved top and is sporting his natural short (although

soon-to-be-swishable, braided) hair – no fluorescent dye in sight. If there are any flashes of him being extra today, it’s all in his words.

The 28 year old is in full promo mode – “Allegedly,” he teases – his phone pinging away intermittently throughout. “Honestly…the WhatsApp is going off, the fucking Zoom interview marathon, talking about 16 Again …”

Ever the pro, he brings back into focus what he’s here to promote today, despite the inevitability of

being asked about his work with certain global icons as well (more on that later). He’s immediately game though – naturally shifting into an easy, conversational style with someone he’s just met. Despite the constant pings, for 20 minutes he’s all yours, and Headliner senses he wouldn’t shy away from answering more controversial or weighty topics than today’s allotted time slot allows.

Real name Uzoechi Osisioma ‘Uzo’ Emenike, his Instagram bio includes the pronouns ‘he/him/she/they,’ but MNEK isn’t here for making people stress over saying the wrong thing, telling an enquiring fan, “Issa he/him boo,” when asked what’s correct.

At age seven MNEK was writing poems and songs, and it wouldn’t be much longer before he started experimenting with production software. By his early teens, he was learning how to make beats and was uploading them to MySpace. Before he knew what was happening, numerous publishers were vying for the teen’s attention. “I was a bit of a late bloomer in a lot of ways because my life was my career at that point,” he reflects. “I was just finishing school and I was gasping to be a part of the industry and write songs and for that to be my life. My 16 was writing and

being in the studio with Charli XCX on half term, working with Xenomania and getting my first cut with The Saturdays – a different time,” he grins. “But 16 was a cool year.

“I’ve always been very clear about what I wanted to do,” he adds, acknowledging the difference between his and his school friends’ lives at the time. “My school life was interesting because I was very focused about what I wanted to do. I’m thankful I get to do it now as an adult.

“Thankfully everyone around me knew that as well and were very much like, ‘Okay, cool. Let him do his thing.’ I don’t recall any backlash or negative vibes,” he thinks back.

“I had friends who were very supportive, but then of course, things change. I mean, life just changes.

I’m not really friends with a lot of

people I went to school with at this point, I think as a result of me being quite clear about what I wanted to do…there was a disparity or a disconnect. But you know, another one bites the dust,” he shrugs.

Another group who started out when they were teenagers crossed MNEK’s path when he was 17. Sugababes formed when they were just 13, and also experienced a very different adolescence to that of their peers. With the original lineup back together in 2012, Mutya, Keisha and Siobhan set about creating new music, bringing in MNEK to work on tracks for what would go on to become The Lost Tapes album, including co-writing and producing standout album track, Today

“I was a bit of a late bloomer in a lot of ways because my 16 was being in the studio with Charli XCX and The Saturdays.”

“I’ve always loved Today in particular,” he nods. “I always thought it should have been the first single from the project…” he pauses, changing tact. “We did it literally 10 years ago. I was 17 when we wrote Today and Drum, and I worked on Boys as well. I was a kid, so it’s funny to hear the music back now and hear where my brain was at back then. It’s a time capsule. It’s nice that that’s just there – there’s no changing that and there’s no tweaking it. We just mastered the demos, because we were like, ‘Why not?’ Of course, I would have loved to have had the stems, but I can’t worry about that now because it is what it is and that magic was captured. I’m pretty proud of it. And I looooved working with them,” he stresses. “I think they’re so great.”

A new UK girl group making waves for their tight harmonies are BRIT Award Rising Star recipients, FLO – who MNEK has been working

closely with from day one. A self confessed Destiny’s Child stan, his musical preferences are unmistakably baked into each track – FLO sound like they’re lifted straight out of the ‘90s R&B charts – while their look is straight up Y2K – artwork font, lowriders and all. Rather than shy away from any comparisons, FLO make a point of tipping their (probably bucket) hats to the ‘90s and early 2000s girl groups that came before them, whether that be referencing Sugababes’ debut in their Cardboard Box music video, to the ‘no scrubs’ and independent women message that forms the cornerstone of their music. MNEK’s role has been crucial to their ascent, including co-writing and producing their breakthrough track, Cardboard Box, taken from their debut EP, The Lead

“I think that one may have started with the verse and the pre, ironically [MNEK usually starts with the chorus]. It was a piece by piece thing. When

it came to the chorus I was like, ‘I’ma put your shit in a cardboard box,’” he sings. “It just kind of came out, and I was like, ‘Okay, that makes sense.’ It’s kind of a weird title! When we finished it we all knew that there was something really special about that song. I’m really proud of what it’s been able to do for them as a group and the pathway it opened up for them. We’re now on the album and are getting those things together. There’s so much music, I’m buzzing. I can’t wait for people to hear what they’re coming out with because it really is just the beginning.”

The day after this interview, FLO release their new single Fly Girl, which interpolates Missy Elliott’s 2002 single, Work It. Fly Girl doesn’t just interpolate Work It (it even begins with iconic backwards lyrics, ‘Ti esrever dna ti pilf nwod gnaht ym tup i’), it features a new verse by Elliot – who confirms that 21 years later, she still looks like a Halle Berry poster. Given the

legal complexities surrounding song interpolation today, Headliner is curious if MNEK is cautious about this particular songwriting process, given that artists are not often consulted prior. He smiles knowingly: Missy featuring on the track rules that out, as will become clear tomorrow…

“I made a funny joke on Instagram yesterday. I say it was a joke, but it was pretty pretty real,” he says.. “I said that I’d come up with the chorus of Fly Girl kind of knowing that we were going to be robbed of publishing from it because it is from Work It. But at the same time, sometimes it’s really fun to be able to reference stuff that you love and to be able to get the approval from the people who’ve made it. I’ve sampled music in my career and I’ve had some really generous people who’ve been able to let go of their ego and say, ‘Okay, you’ve done this, but we love what you’re doing. We’re gonna let you do your thing with it. We’ll take what we take, but we won’t try to cheat you.’ And then there’s people who just are about their business and they say, ‘We’re gonna be taking this chunk from it, and then you’ll be left with that chunk.’ It is what it is. I don’t think I’m wary of it. I’m definitely acutely aware of what comes with it. I try not to have too much of an ego about it because the song is king at the end of the day.”

To mark the release of nostalgic dance bop, 16 Again, MNEK shared a throwback pic of a 16 year old him on Instagram “letting the gworls know” that the single is out. The lyrics hark back to a simpler, more carefree time: ‘You make me feel sixteen again / Not a care, summer air, you take me there.’

“My experience as a 16 year old isn’t necessarily what’s being narrated in this song,” he acknowledges. “We’d written a song at Lewis’ writing camp for his project and we all loved it. The chorus of this came first – I really like the chorus. It’s catchy. Paul heard it and wanted to be a part of it. They both brought their production identities towards it to make it what we hear right now. I’m grateful for them for helping take it to the next level and hopefully also bring some more ears on it. I like working with other producers because I’m able to do a lot of things at the same time,” he adds. “I like being able to release one of the roles and let someone else handle it. If I’m singing it, writing it and vocal producing it, which I did on this one, I’ve already got that on my plate. I want to know that I’m working with someone who I trust, and that I’m able to voice any feelings I have about the production still.”

MNEK says that the track was recorded a year ago. “I’m excited for it to belong to the people and for them to enjoy it and interpret it how they will. It came from a place of wanting to write a song about nostalgia, being reflective, and what’s the word I’m thinking of…” he searches for the word – “pensive!” he lands on. “I went into the thesaurus in my mind. We were feeling pensive about the past and that resulted in 16 Again.”

There’s an elephant – or rather, a silver holographic-shaped horse – in the room. MNEK has worked with

Beyoncé. Headliner knows it. He knows he’s going to be asked. We make it quick. The song in question is 2016’s Hold Up, taken from the singer’s critically acclaimed sixth studio album, Lemonade. MNEK was flown to Beyoncé’s house, ushered past a wall of security guards and a sleeping Jay-Z to wait in a room. Not entirely convinced she was actually going to materialise, Mrs KnowlesCarter entered the room in jeans and a T-shirt and introduced herself – “like I don’t know who you are!” – and explained her idea for the song.

Scattered around the room were A4 pieces of paper with key words on them with themes she was trying to touch upon for each Lemonade track. MNEK was played the chorus, and then went back to London to see what he could come up with. He wrote a full song over the demo, from which Beyoncé cherry picked three lines: (‘Hey, this such a shame / You let this good love go to waste…), which was used in the bridge.

“I TRY NOT TO HAVE TOO MUCH OF AN EGO ABOUT SONG INTERPOLATION BECAUSE THE AT THE END OF THE DAY.”

“Yeah,” he begins, suddenly high pitched. “It happened. It was cool. Hold Up is a song that’s now in her discography and the fact I was able to meet her and she thinks anything that’s come out of my brain is cool, is amazing. Forgive me, I’ve answered this question about a million times,” he laughs good naturedly. “Not a very enthusiastic moment from that! I grew up listening to Beyoncé as a kid and I love every project she’s ever put out. Seeing my name on the credits for anything that she’s a part of is an honour. To be able to call her a colleague in any fashion is amazing.”

MNEK reveals that he secured Renaissance tour tickets, although Headliner assumes he wasn’t fighting for his life in the Ticketmaster queue with the rest of us. Sensibly, he declines to disclose which date he’ll be attending. “I can’t tell you!” he laughs. “I mean, for real I’m just about hearing America Has A Problem live because I will lose – my – shit. That’s my fucking tune. I love Energy – I love the album! I’m such a fan.”

MNEK released his debut solo album, Language in 2018, and shares that he’s not just focussing on writing and producing for others at the moment: “There is another album in the works,” he smiles, not giving anything away. “I just want to talk about it when I’ve got a sense of the visual side of it, you know? I have a lot of confidence in the music and getting that to a place I’m happy about. I want to make sure that I’m presenting myself in a way that I’m excited to show my face and champion this project, and all the projects I’m a part of, because it isn’t just about the album. It’s about

artists and developing them, like FLO and other artists that I’m working with in the pipeline. It’s about being able to embody everything. I look up to people like Pharrell, Diddy and Timbaland who are more than just a monolith. They are seen as just music, period. I want to do that and be able to present myself in the best fashion.”

With that, our 20 minutes are up. Headliner will see MNEK at the Renaissance tour; or will we?

“Take care of yourself,” he says, not taking the bait. “Take care. Mwah!”

GUMBLE

KALEVALA STUDIOS

Located in the Finnish capital of Helsinki, Kalevala Studios is one of the country’s leading mix rooms for feature film and TV projects. It was also the first Finnish studio to become Dolby Atmos certified, readying itself for what chief engineer Sami Sarhamaa expects to be a gradual increase in demand for immersive services. Headliner boarded a flight to Finland to pay him and sound designer Pietu Korhonen a visit to discuss the trends shaping the market, their studio setup, and where they believe the industry is headed…

It may not be apparent from the outside, given its humble location on a quiet street on the fringes of central Helsinki, but Kalevala Studios is one of Finland’s premier facilities. For more than three decades it has resided at the heart of the nation’s film and TV industry, and once inside, its prestige soon crystallises. The main playback room boasts a vast screen,

an Avid ICON D-Control console, and a vast Genelec monitoring system. Upon arrival we are treated to an immersive screening of some of Finland’s most beautiful and brutal nature, from raging storms and wild bears to icy rivers and lush wildlife. The audio-visual experience is genuinely spine tingling.

‘SOUND IS MORE IMMERSIVE THAN PICTURE’

We are soon joined by Sarhamaa and Korhonen for a chat about their respective careers and their work at Kalevala.

“My personal history with Kalevala is as long as the studio has been around,” says Sarhamaa. “My main thing is to be a dubbing mixer for feature films and TV shows. I have been at it for 30 years, so I have managed to make almost everything that goes into making sound for film. The main owner (Jyrki Rahkonen) is a renowned Finnish sound designer and an old friend of mine. We used to play in a band together and he started doing film work in the ‘90s. As he knew I was into gear he asked me to help him out with some technical issues. And he knew I was interested in sound as well, so he would have me around and it grew until I was ready to mix movies. It’s been over 20 years now.”

“I’m a sound designer mostly and I did a lot of location sound previously, and after that I started working as a sound tutor and doing a lot of sound design and dubbing mixing,” adds Korhonen. “My history here is shorter than Sammi’s. I’ve been doing things here over the last couple of years and I hope to do more here in the future.”

With such a variety of projects passing through the studio’s doors, from dialogue driven drama to action-packed thrillers, Sarhamaa explains that he likes to know as little about each job as possible before beginning work.

“My main concern when mixing a movie is to be able to get the feeling of the movie across to the viewer,” he says. “I try to not know anything more than I need to know about the movie when I start mixing. I don’t like

to see the movie beforehand; I want to be the first viewer and then react so that I can translate the intentions of the filmmakers to the viewer. If the movie is dialogue driven I need to make sure that the dialogue is as clear as possible without losing the drama or the ebb and flow of the movie. The clarity of the dialogue is vital, but the music and the sound effect work are as important for the whole of the movie and the feeling of the movie.”

Notably, Kalevala was the first studio in Finland to become Dolby Atmos certified. At present, Sarhamaa suggests that the studio’s immersive capabilities were primarily installed as a pre-emptive measure for an expected uptick in demand for such services over the coming months and years, with Atmos projects across the country currently few and far between.

“IT’S BETTER TO HAVE A NORMAL MOVIE WITH AN ATMOS SOUNDTRACK THAN A 3D VISUAL MOVIE.”

“The main sound work we do for film and TV is still stereo,” he elaborates. “Atmos mixing is a rarity in Finland. We have about 10 theatres that can show Atmos movies. Around 20 titles have been made for Atmos in Finland, so it is quite niche. From a sound perspective, immersive is a definite step upwards. It is much more than 3D in picture. It’s better to have a normal movie with an Atmos soundtrack than a 3D visual movie. You get more immersed with audio than picture.”

“I have only done one Atmos film but what I really liked about it was not using the immersive nature for big effects, but for the immersive details you can really pull out of the soundtrack,” adds Korhonen. It’s amazing.”

According to the pair, there is a misunderstanding in the market as to what immersive audio actually is and what it does.

“It’s pretty tough to tell a normal viewer that they should pay attention to something,” says Sarhamaa. “We are always serving the story and the picture, so the sound can’t be separate to the picture. Home Atmos, which is smaller scale, has a lot of potential, but since you don’t have any control of how people watch their movies at home it is very hard to predict how things will develop sound-wise. Even if you have an Atmos home set up, your subwoofer could be in the wrong position.

“There are lots of variables and if we could have a standardised version of a speaker and amplifier set up for home that you could just put in easily then there might be things we could do, but it is different to Atmos in a theatre. You don’t have the objects so you can’t place small audio objects in certain places in the sound field like you can in the theatre. It will just take time like it did with 5.1.”

“It will take time for people to realise immersive audio isn’t just the sound of flying saucers above you and stuff like that – you can use it in different artistic ways,” adds Korhonen.

Our focus shifts to the technical spec of the space.

“The basic setup is Avid Pro Tools software plus a Mac and some interfaces,” says Sarhamaa. “In this room we have 27 loudspeakers, so we have to have an interface that has at least 27 outputs. The main speakers are Genelec 1037s behind the screen. Then we have 1032s as surround and ceiling speakers - we have 20 in total I think. Then we have the wide speakers which are 1038s. They are all analogue so it’s a totally analogue setup. And since Genelec speakers are active they are all selfpowered, which is excellent.

“Pro Tools has an Atmos panner which is the basic tool for panning stuff around the Atmos sound field. Then we have some upmixers which can upmix a stereo or mono 5.1 source to Atmos. And, of course, reverbs, delays, your basic EQs and compressors, which are the same tools if you do stereo, 5.1, or Atmos.

“The console is an Avid ICON D-Control 32-fader controller, and then we have two separate Dolby processors for sound. We have one for Atmos called the RMU and the CP750 for 5.1 and 7.1 processing.”

For Sarhamaa, the Genelec monitoring system brings multiple benefits.

“Since we are Finnish, it was quite an easy decision,” he laughs. “But that’s only the very basic thing. My first Genelecs were 1019As in the ‘80s so I have a long history with Genelec. And when we came to this studio in the year 2005 the previous owners already had Genelecs behind the screen. The room has a very nice sound by itself and when we came here and heard the screen speakers, we decided Genelec was the way to go forward. I don’t think I’ve used any other speakers than Genelec in 20 years.

“When spec’ing a room of this size you have to have powerful enough speakers, so you have to have DSPL required, which is quite loud. We were lucky to find out that the 1032s we have were just powerful enough to use as surround speakers and

ceiling speakers. The Atmos spec has a requirement for sub frequencies in the surround as well, unlike 5.1 which only needs to produce the lower end from the ceiling speakers, but the Atmos spec requires that you go to 30Hz across the room, and these go to about 32. Spec’ing wise you need to have enough power, enough frequency range, and after that it’s more a question of the acoustics of the room, but I really like the sound of Genelecs as well. These still sound excellent, and I don’t know what else to ask for.”

“When you are film mixing the most important thing is sound translation to cinema and I have found this is really good,” concludes Korhonen. “You have no worries wherever you go. It’s excellent. You could take a mix done here in a seven-seater room and play it in a 700-seater room and it still sounds the same.”

BOHEMIAN

Words by COLBY RAM S YE

LIKE YOU

MICHAL PAJDIAK

Multi-talented sound engineer and music producer Michal Pajdiak has upgraded his private studio with a Neve 8424 console, as Headliner recently discovered…

Pajdiak’s unique studio is based in the heart of the beautiful old city of Bohemia, with two separate studios in a two-story house, a recording room and dedicated vocal booth, and an attractive garden in the centre of the city.

The engineer and producer, who has been in the industry since the late ‘90s, provides a range of services including

composing music for TV ads and films, sound post-production, music mixing and mastering, and complete music production. He caters to both online and offline clients and his expertise in the field has earned him Apple certification as a mastering engineer.

One of the key pieces of equipment in his studio is the Neve 8424 console which has replaced an

Avid S3 Controller and Shadow Hills Equinox unit.

Neve’s 8424 is a small format console with a large format sound, based on the iconic 80-series console range. It is designed to fit the needs of the modern hybrid studio, where the speed of in-the-box workflow is enhanced with the sound quality of analogue outboard gear.

“I love my 8424 console. It’s just made for me. It has everything I need,” says Pajdiak. “It is very flexible and I use it for everything - from recording, composing, producing and mixing to final mastering.”

The 8424 features a built-in master bus EQ and stereo width enhancement, processors that provide Pajdiak with powerful tools for mixing or mastering:

“I love the master section because I can set up each channel strip the way I need it, using analogue outboards, parallel compression,

cues… it’s just great,” he adds.

Pajdiak has been working on several projects, both short-term and longterm, using the Active Faders feature on the 8424 console.

He comments: “Sound-wise, this console is a beast. All the mixes and masters I’ve done on it rock so well. It’s a combination of this desk, Trinnov room control unit and my loving BareFoot Sound speakers.”

When working on mixes for film and TV ads, Pajdiak does all of this in the box as most of his clients are online

and require changes that must be applied quickly and precisely.

“This console makes my life much easier,” he says. “Especially when clients ask for a quick change – it means I can easily do what they need.”

AMS-NEVE.COM

“I LOVE THE MASTER SECTION BECAUSE I CAN SET UP EACH CHANNEL STRIP THE WAY I NEED IT.”

Photographer: Anthony Molina

Words

LIVING IN A HAZE

bY COLBY RAM S YE

MILKY CHANCE

Clemens Rehbein of Berlin-based music duo Milky Chance talks candidly to Headliner about the band’s upcoming fourth studio album, the huge North American tour they’ve got planned for later this year, and why the chemistry between them is as strong as it’s ever been…

Originating in Kassel, Germany, Rehbein (guitar, vocals) and Phillipp Dausch (bass, percussion, production) were in fact school friends way before their musical partnership blossomed into what it is today. The duo released their debut album Sadnecessary in 2013 - much to the delight of millennial indie fans who were treated to an irresistible pastiche of electronic and folk-tinged rock through viral singles Stolen Dance and Down By The River

Ten years, countless live shows and three albums later, Milky Chance are now poised to release their fourth studio album, Living In A Haze, set for

release on June 9. Having clocked up a decade of musical success, Headliner was curious to find out if the band still operates like a well-oiled machine.

“It definitely has changed, in a very good way,” begins Rehbein when questioned on the matter. “I feel like we’re even more of a band now than we were during that time, because in our first two or three years we just kept looking back at it like a big happy accident.

“We weren’t prepared for anything; we’d just finished high school in 2012 and during that time we uploaded

a few songs on YouTube,” he reflects fondly. “We got together that summer and recorded another bunch of songs in my childhood bedroom at my parent’s house, which is when we started thinking about turning that into an album. The stuff on YouTube started getting more attention and we could feel something happening, so we played our first show in our hometown to a crowd of about 150 people and were just blown away by the audience’s reaction.”

It wasn’t long before Rehbein and Dausch embarked on their first domestic tour in May 2013. Admitting that they “didn’t even really rehearse back then”, Rehbein says it was out of necessity that two more band members, Antonio Greger and

Sebastian Schmidt, were brought on board to support their fast-growing live shows.

“2016 was the first time where we felt like properly talking about live shows, and knew exactly what we

wanted to do for them. We were a four-piece by then, and that was the first time where we thought, ‘Oh, this feels good.’ You know?”

“IT’S JUST US TRYING OUT NEW THINGS, TRYING TO FIND NEW SOUNDS, AND TRYING TO SURPRISE OURSELVES.”

Photographer: Anthony Molina

Milky Chance’s upcoming record, Living In A Haze, has been described as an expansion of the band’s sonic vision, and includes some impressive guest features. That being said, Rehbein says that they have never been the type of band to have a concept in mind before entering the studio, and this is also the first time they have released an album during the summer.

“It’s the same this time round,” he reveals. “We always work very intuitively, and things usually come to us naturally. For this album we’ve been trying out a lot of things. During the

pandemic we had so much time and space to be creative, so we actually really enjoyed that time. We just went to the studio on a daily basis in Berlin and really dived into the creative process. We also started working with lots of other producers, songwriters and creatives from Berlin or overseas, which was very inspiring.

“All in all, it’s just us trying out new things, trying to find new sounds, and trying to surprise ourselves - but also, it’s us. It is our taste in music, which also develops of course, but it has the same DNA and that certain vibe.”

New song, Frequency Of Love, falls into this experimental category, offering a glimpse of the slightly different musical direction in which the band is now moving. Released as the B-Side to the titular track Living In A Haze, which is laden with beat-driven dance energy, Frequency Of Love instead goes down a deeper, more ethereal route.

Photographer: Anthony Molina

“I feel like these two songs show the diverse musical range of the album,” offers Rehbein. “There’s lots of songs on there, which are very different in a way, but which are also happening in the same universe.”

Last year, the band released an acoustic version of their debut album Sadnecessary, which went down a storm with fans.

“There were always people in the comment sections asking for it, because it suits the acoustic vibe very well,” explains Rehbein. “We love doing those stripped back versions; we just wanted to celebrate the first album and also give the fans a little surprise to enjoy. It was a lot of fun recording it - guitar is our first instrument which we use to write a lot of songs anyway, so it really felt and sounded natural getting right down to the source. I really enjoyed it, and who knows, maybe we’ll do the same with our other albums - we’ll see.”

Rehbein goes on to explain with excitement how they are about to embark on their biggest tour yet - 67 shows all over the US: “We’ll be on the road all summer long; it’s always beautiful to see people singing our songs back at us,” he says. “For my live setup I use Kemper. I get a good basic sound - sometimes I just use some reverb and delay when I play rhythm guitar on stage.

“One of our favourite pedals, that we also used a lot when producing this latest album, is the Chase Bliss blooper. It

loops guitar or piano riffs and makes them sound really cool. It’s also weird and confusing sometimes in terms of what it does, but it immediately brings a really cool vibe.”

The band’s second studio album, Blossom, was recorded with entirely organic instrumentation, rather than with a digital setup. Rehbein insists that they usually operate a hybrid setup these days:

“It’s always a mixture for us between digital, using Splice or creating our own samples, and lots of real instruments. It really depends on the song and the sound that you want to create. Whatever it needs to get there, we use!

“We also love to experiment, and recently started using a lot of synthesisers in the studio,” he adds. “It’s great when you play around turning knobs until some magic happens. You can play something on a piano, but then when you play the same chord on a Prophet, a different world opens up. It can be very inspiring, and can take you to someplace else, which I love. Once we’re back home from the tour in September, we’ll take some time out to relax and then go straight back to the studio to get creative again.”

Milky Chance’s fourth studio album, Living In A Haze, is out June 9.

“WE’LL BE ON THE ROAD ALL SUMMER LONG; IT’S ALWAYS BEAUTIFUL TO SEE PEOPLE SINGING OUR SONGS BACK AT US.”

Genesys Black

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BY NEVE ENGINEERS

Words

THE FULL SPECTRUM

by

COLBY

RA M YES

STIFELTHEATRE

Image Credit: Spectrum Sound and Scott Rovak for Stifel Theatre

Stifel Theatre – a historic, 3,100 seat theatre in the heart of downtown St. Louis, Missouri – has recently made significant improvements to its guest experience by installing a d&b audiotechnik KSL loudspeaker system, as Headliner recently discovered…

Originally opened in 1934, the theatre has played host to a variety of events including opera, Broadway, the symphony, comedy acts and some of the greatest musical performers in history.

KSL, which in this case was installed by Spectrum Sound of Nashville, was introduced as the ‘younger sibling’ to the flagship GSL system. The family shares broadband directivity and extended low frequency response throughout the lineup, as well as technologies like d&b ArrayProcessing – providing an option for sonic consistency, delivering tonal balance and even level distribution over the entire coverage area front to back.

“All venues have their own set of unique challenges when it comes to designing and implementing house PA. Stifel Theatre, while beautiful aesthetically, had some typical acoustical challenges with some significant hard reflections that could be exacerbated by amplified PA,” explains Ken DeBelius, system integration sales manager for Spectrum. “This was one of the reasons why we chose the d&b audiotechnik KSL-Series for this space; the very controlled polar directivity of KSL minimised the amount of wasted energy that typically excites the room in bad ways with ordinary loudspeaker systems. During the initial deployment of the rig, everyone was instantly amazed at how well it sounded right out of the gate without even doing much system tuning. It simply sounded great from the start.”

DeBelius says that the Stifel Theatre staff were familiar with other d&b systems, mostly V-Series, as they regularly come through the space

with various touring productions, making them well-acquainted with the d&b sonic footprint: “They had not actually heard KSL but based on Spectrum’s recommendation, they went with this premium solution that will serve their needs for decades.”

“Our number one priority as a company is to provide the best experience possible for both performers and guests who visit our theatre,” adds Adrian Silverstein, assistant general manager of Stifel Theatre. “Spectrum, along with Tim Kostal, the head of our audio department, understood those needs and through both of their expertise, made it easy to invest in a state-of-the-art d&b PA that addresses our need to adapt to the varied productions we host. Spectrum’s willingness to provide their touring amp rack during a chip shortage due to supply issues is just an example of how they will go above and beyond for their clients.”

“EVERYONE WAS INSTANTLY AMAZED AT HOW WELL IT SOUNDED RIGHT OUT OF THE GATE.”

The staff at Stifel Theatre expressed the desire to have an auxiliary centre full-range cluster that could be used both with the main Left/Right KSL arrays, or alone for simpler talking heads shows.

“For this, we elected to use the d&b A-Series Augmented Array product,” says DeBelius. “These are suspended directly below the centre-flown subwoofer array using a custom designed/fabricated adapter from the d&b custom shop. Despite their small footprint, they keep up with the main KSL arrays remarkably well.”

d&b’s A-Series is designed to combine the ease of point source clusters with the level and frequency distribution of line arrays, delivering d&b sonic quality in an augmented format. It can be deployed vertically or horizontally, and its coverage is adjustable to meet its requirements.

d&b ArrayProcessing was also implemented in this project, and DeBelius reveals that he rarely installs any d&b systems without ArrayProcessing:

“The benefits in smoothing the tonal response across the seating planes are totally worth the extra amplifier

channels needed,” he says. “It also greatly assisted providing good coverage into the balcony without excessive level loss, right up to the very top of the high balcony seating without having to resort to separate upper balcony delay fills.”

The full KSL configuration consists of eight KSL8, 16 KSL12, four KSL-SUBs (centre, flown SUB array), four SL-GSUBs (portable floor SUBs for the deck), 18 40D amplifiers, two D80 amplifiers, eight 44S loudspeakers for front fills, three DS10 Dante network bridges, four Yi7P point source loudspeakers for under balcony delay fills, one AL60 and three AL90 A-Series loudspeakers, and two M6 wedge monitors.

Image Credit: Spectrum Sound and Scott Rovak for Stifel Theatre Anna Azarov

LANCE POWELL ON USING ANUBIS MISSIONS

“I’m constantly moving between my personal mix room and various studios and spaces, which means the need to have absolutely pristine quality on-hand all the time is really important. With the Merging Technologies Anubis I have a pair of really powerful mic preamps, brilliant A/D and D/A converters and a perfect monitor controller all in one box. I finally have a centerpiece that I trust completely for both recording and mixing.”

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Lance Powell- Engineer / Mixer Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, Miguel, Snoop Dogg, Jess Glynne, Blxst.

WORDS

NOCUI ARTICULATE ELECTRONIC

BY ADAM PRO T Z

NOCUI is a Rome-born, Berlinbased electronic music composer and producer on a rapid rise since relocating to Germany in 2020. He’s just released his incredible single Pasión, which features guitar and Middle Eastern elements. NOCUI chats to Headliner about why he doesn’t make his dance music with nightclubs in mind, why he loves using analogue instruments, and his newly released EP Anomie

NOCUI is home in Italy visiting friends and family, but regarding his relocation to Berlin almost two years ago, he says: “Berlin is educating my ear to electronic music a lot. The scene is just overwhelming over there. There are so many amazing artists and great opportunities for new ideas. It’s very stimulating to be in that city.”

It’s not surprising to hear an electronic artist like NOCUI speak so glowingly

of the German capital – it being one of the world’s premier destinations for the electronic music scene. Since the fall of the Berlin wall in 1989, abandoned bunkers, power plants and factories in the east of the city were filled with the sounds of techno, as both East and West Germans revelled in their new freedom. His early music-making days in Rome, however, were very different.

“I started out playing classical piano and later jazz,” he says. “But we had a family friend who was a DJ, and we went to his place a few times and I would ask him so many questions about his record collection, his CDJs. I was so curious. A little later, I bought an MPC as my first piece of equipment, and started having fun with Ableton.”

NOCUI is a fascinating character in the world of dance music — while he’s deeply passionate about the genre and is making such a valuable and

unique contribution to it, he isn’t a fan of some of its hallmark characteristics, albeit stereotyped. To put it simply, don’t expect to see him drunk in a nightclub at 2am. Clubbing and its associated hedonism is not his bag.

“I will be honest with you,” he says. “I sometimes feel a bit guilty making dance music, because I feel like I’m contributing to something I’m not necessarily fond of. I love dance music, but the hedonistic aspect doesn’t appeal to me. Often people don’t go to clubs to listen to music, but for other reasons, and the music is overseen. For me, it should be a place where creativity and exploration are taken more seriously. But I do think the electronic music scene is moving into a more articulate space.”

Something that was very formative of NOCUI’s view of nightclubs was formed when he began DJing at the clubs of Rome at the tender age of 17. He was keen to put his personal stamp on this endeavour, to put it mildly.

“I have a terrible personality because if someone tells me to do something, I do the exact opposite. I would arrive at these clubs and the promoters would tell me what a great opportunity I was getting because I was basically a child playing for much older people, 26-30 years old. They would tell me which genres to play and that it had to be 130 BPM music because that was what worked. So I would categorically go to the club and play 60 BPM music, and the people in the club would enjoy it! But the promoters were so pissed off that any kind of professional relationship totally disappeared.”

Next up was studying neuroscience in Boston, Massachusetts. “I wasn’t ready to treat music as a job or business yet — my family had always pressured me to do business, and I wanted to do music, and I was also scared of not having other options.”

His dedication remained though –he spent virtually all of his free time jamming and performing with the (many) jazz music students in one of the USA’s most famous music cities. Upon graduating, he spent most of the pandemic in Italy before he made his pivotal move to Berlin.

NOCUI has just dropped his new EP Anomie. This new music was initially announced with its blistering lead

single, Pasión. As its four-to-thefloor kick pounds the song forward, it evolves and shape shifts in a way very few dance tracks do. Sultry piano chords gradually begin to team up with Latin and Middle Eastern elements, as the synth parts carefully reach a brilliant crescendo. Pair this with interspersed spoken word from the man himself, and the result is a piece that easily achieves its aim of merely encouraging people to put their hands in the air in a nightclub setting.

NOCUI has been listening to a lot of Latin, Middle Eastern and acoustic music recently. “It all leaked into my production. I started the track on my drum machine, and eventually found the rhythmic element that drives it forward. But there are a lot of uncommon instruments in it; the Middle Eastern sounding instrument is me playing my Continuum Fingerboard, which is a very expressive synthesiser with a sound engine of its own and a complex synthesis software that comes with it. It’s my favourite synthesiser. It closes the gap between acoustic music and electronic music because it’s so expressive, and there is no latency between the ideas and the movement.”

But don’t stop at Pasión, the entirety of the Anomie EP demands a listen. Opener As Long As It Takes

announces the EP’s arrival with pounding bass and chords filtering in and out.

The deep house stylings of Paradiso make it seem the most club-worthy on a first fleeting listen, but delving deeper are neoclassical-esque strings and hints of choir. The penultimate You’re My Strength combines a deep and soul-shaking bass with delicate piano and pads, further Middle Eastern influences and spoken word.

It all amounts to ensuring NOCUI is a name to remember in 2023 in the electronic music scene and beyond. “This year will be packed with shows, as well as with my label imprint, Shapeless Culture. We’ll be organising exhibitions and events. I have four EPs and an album coming up; it’s going to be a crazy year! It’s a mixture of dance, house, ambient and pop, which I’ll be singing on. This is just the beginning.”

INSTA: @NOCUI_

“I HAVE A TERRIBLE PERSONALITY BECAUSE IF SOMEONE TELLS ME TO DO SOMETHING, I DO THE EXACT OPPOSITE.”

byDAN GUMBLE

ROCK SOLID SOUND

GEORGE EZRA

After award-winning artist George Ezra completed his third album Gold Rush Kid in 2022, he set off on a UK arena tour at the end of the year. This was soon followed by a European run of shows, which started in early February and finished in April at The O2 arena in London. Adlib, one of Europe’s leading event technology partners, designed and supplied the PA system for the tour, which featured the L-Acoustics K Series, including the industry K1 and the ‘lightweight heavyweight’ K2.

James Coghlan, Adlib’s systems engineer, worked in close collaboration with Ezra’s FOH engineer, Mike Timm, on the system’s initial design, and throughout the tour. Together, the pair played a vital role in making sure the system delivered the best possible audio experience for Ezra’s fans throughout.

“L-Acoustics has always been the go for touring solution for George

Ezra,” says Coghlan. “As Mike has had great experiences with their sound systems, he likes to work with them whenever possible therefore he specified L-Acoustics for the current tour.”

Coghlan noted that the tour played mainly in arena-style venues, which inevitably influenced their design choices.

“Using Soundvision, L-Acoustics’ 3D modelling software, we decided on the positioning of the arrays at the beginning of the UK run,” he explains. “We’ve used a combination of K1 and K2 for the main and side arrays. A combination of A and X Series enclosures are used as front-fill to draw the image of George’s vocal down from the main arrays for the first rows closest to the barrier line.”

The general setup comprises main arrays of 12 K1 over six K2 down, with eight K1-SB flown behind them. For side hangs, 12 K2 are deployed both left and right, along with 12 KS28 positioned on the floor in a broadside configuration. The fill system comprises four centrally placed A10 three ARCS II per side as in-fills, two X15 for out-fill, and four lip-fill X8, evenly spaced across the front of the stage. The entire system is powered by 46 LA12X amplified controllers. Supplementing the system for the O2 shows in London were additional K1 delays and extra K2 side hangs.

“Four L-Acoustics P1 processors on the front-end, utilising an AVB based returns system, provide us with better sound quality and greater flexibility of routing,” Coghlan adds. “The system is easy to set up and has proven to be rock solid.”

Coghlan also highlighted the use of custom cable bridges with a centre hinge to allow navigation of the PA cabling around the various lighting and design elements on the stage. The team collaborated closely with production and designers to ensure the bridges were the perfect fit for each venue. “Despite some challenges, we were able to create a setup that worked seamlessly, even in tight spaces with minimal tolerance, particularly over stage right,” he says.

With the audio experience complementing Ezra’s unique sound and style, fans have been treated to unforgettable shows and consistent

audio, regardless of where they were in the venue. “The tour has received overwhelmingly positive feedback, with some audience members going so far as to approach FOH to say it’s the best live show they have ever heard,” Coghlan confirms.

“I’ve been a big fan of L-Acoustics since first mixing on ARCS in the late 1990s. I just feel that ‘the brown boxes’ translate what I want my mixes to sound like better than

any other system on the market,” concludes Timm. “I’ve been working with James since 2018, and he quickly learned what I wanted from a system. Since then, I’ve trusted him to consistently deliver the sound I want to hear for the whole audience, with minimal variation. Adlib’s gear is always well-maintained and upto-date, and that contributes to the quality of the final result!”

L-ACOUSTICS.COM

“THE SYSTEM IS EASY TO SET UP AND HAS PROVEN TO BE ROCK SOLID.”

START WITH A STRONG FOUNDATION

Then add the perfect mics to build your mix

TOMS

PERFORMANCE IS EVERYTHING

Words by ALICEGUST A F NOS GAIA’S

CHILDREN

CHRXSTAL SARAH

In this Emerging Headliner interview powered by JBL, L.A-based singer, songwriter and producer Chrxstal Sarah shares how with her new single, Gaia’s Children, and something called a sound bath, she hopes to heal mother earth – she’s got a certificate and everything. Allow Headliner to explain…

Chrxstal Sarah’s blissed-out new single, Gaia’s Children, ponders what kind of world her future children may grow up in, and sees her grappling with the unrelenting uncertainty at the current state of the planet. It’s timely then, that when Headliner catches up with the burgeoning talent at her home in L.A, it’s pouring with rain. “It’s been raining so much,” she says – her tone warm and pleasing (Headliner can tell she can sing just by speaking to her). “Everyone’s kind of losing it because I feel like we’ve never had this much rain, so everyone doesn’t know how to drive and doesn’t know how to function,” she laughs.

Growing up in a religious household in L.A, Sarah was raised on gospel music and motown, then later latched onto Radio Disney, then made her way through rock, indie, and in college when she wanted to learn how to DJ, EDM. Sarah always gravitated towards music growing up; she joined the school choir, signing up for talent shows, and was writing poetry from a young age:

“I just knew that I loved to sing,” she remembers. “But I also was a very shy kid, so I didn’t really know how to go about it. As soon as my mum figured out I could sing, she

was like, ‘Church choir, school choir, conservatories, talent shows!’ – I kind of got thrown into it where I had to learn how to develop a stage presence and learn about music theory, and it flowed naturally.”

Graduating from SoundCloud to Spotify, Sarah has only been releasing music since 2018, but has already been featured on Spotify’s Fresh Finds. Introspective new track, Gaia’s Children voices the anxiety surrounding climate change, and includes the lyrics, “Our mama, she’s upset / Can’t understand why we’ve forsaken her / I pray she gets

revenge,” and the repeated line, “I know you don’t wanna hear it…”

The message is serious, yet the delivery, calm and undemanding. A quick Google tells Headliner that Gaia means the goddess of the earth. “I’ve always had a love for the planet and the environment; when I was a kid I was kind of a tree hugger and very in love with the earth,” she smiles. “So now, to see what’s happening, it was inevitable to bring that into my

music. No one can really ignore what’s happening to our planet and the damage that has been done.”

L.A.’s recent heavy rainfall creeps into the interview again, as it brought the issue of climate change home for Sarah, quite literally. “All the rain I was talking about in L.A. got me thinking, plus I was – not even sad – but just staring out my window all the time looking at the rain. That’s where the song idea came from. And even

just outside of the environmental changes, things we’ve experienced on a political and social level and everything we’ve been through within the last three years…I wake up every day like, ‘Okay, what’s next? When are the aliens coming?’ That’s where I started to get the idea for the song – out of feeling a little helpless right now and knowing that other people are probably feeling the same way. I got it all out on the page.”

Credit: AC Photography

Gaia’s Children is Sarah’s first release of 2023, and she plans to use the song as a catalyst for change, a call-toaction for her fans, and a reminder of the type of artist she’d like to be. And she’s not all talk; on April 1st she hosted ‘Gaia’s Children: An Immersive Sound Healing Experience & Climate Talk’ in L.A – coinciding with Earth Month. She tells Headliner that this included something called a sound bath.

“A sound bath is a sound healing event or activity you can hold for a group of people, one person or even just yourself, and it consists of different sound healing instruments,” she explains patiently – she must get asked this a lot. “So you’ll see crystal sound bowls, chimes or ocean drums – things that help you relax, relieve stress and anxiety that put you in a really deep mode of relaxation to heal you on an emotional and spiritual level. I got a sound healing certification in 2022,” she points out. “I’d already been practising sound healing for a while after attending a sound bath myself. I was pretty drawn to it because of music, and it’s cool that people are introduced to this healing modality through music.”

Take a listen through Sarah’s Spotify releases and you’ll discover an artist that has crafted a unique collection of songs filled with soulful vocals, alluring harmonies and expansive instrumentation. When it comes to music production, she is self taught, having soaked up as much as she can from producer friends. She shares that initially thinking she needed to do it all drove her to learn a new skill set.

“When I first started, for some reason it didn’t occur to me that I could go to someone for a beat,” she admits. “So I started to get familiar with music production, thinking that even if my focus is singing and songwriting, I at least want to know as much as I can about production – so if I wanted to drop a song today, I could do that. I started to learn and I got pretty familiar with things. It helped develop

my sound as well just by being involved in the whole process.”

In her home studio space Sarah shares that she’s recently started using JBL 305P MkII powered studio monitors, which have made her realise a surprising detail that she was missing in her music before: “One thing that I’m really happy with is the bass,” she enthuses. “It’s funny because the type of music I make is not crazy-heavy and bass-y, or even a huge sound all the time, but definitely as a listener, that’s always what I’m drawn to, especially when I’m

producing – in terms of what sounds with more depth can hold. Sometimes with studio monitors, it can sound a bit muddled, but these are just really clean – the sound is really powerful,” she stresses.

“Another thing I really like is that the vocals are very much in the foreground. Obviously as a singer, my vocals are what I focus on the most as far as how everything sounds, so now I’m like, ‘Okay, they’re right here in my face and I can hear everything and I know how everything’s sounding.’”

Going forward, Sarah sees the monitors playing a key part in the production process when it comes to improving her demo recordings and working on her vocal arrangements. “Before I was using them, I would mostly use my headphones, but now I can definitely see myself starting with the monitors and sticking with those for the most part – especially for the vocals. I’m really excited to keep using them for that, because you can get everything super clean. And especially for indie artists, they’re such a great find,” she points out, “particularly the setup, which was super simple. For the most part, I’m recording in my bedroom studio space, and the way these studio monitors are set up and in terms of the features, they’re perfect for small spaces. However, if you’re a larger, more established artist, the sound is amazing – and you have a full blown studio, so, you’re good! Anyone and everyone can use these; they’re pretty perfect for anyone looking to produce and having it be a seamless process.”

An independent artist overseeing (not to mention financing) every aspect of her music releases, from her socials, to PR, live shows, to

production, Sarah sees her monitors playing a particularly important role when factoring in how her tracks will translate over different playback systems and streaming platforms – allowing her to feel confident that her music is perfected prior to release. “As far as releasing goes, you want to hear how they sound on the studio monitors, the headphones, you gotta do the car test and the phone test, and make sure the sound across every medium is perfect. The car test is honestly my favourite,” she grins. “When I’m driving and listening to music, that’s one of the best experiences – just driving and blasting music, so I have to make sure the song sounds good in the car, and these monitors are perfect for that.”

In terms of standing out as an independent artist in a changing industry, Sarah admits it can be difficult, but she remains focussed on continuing to make her mark, and on her own terms. A self-proclaimed “chameleon,” she refuses to be put in a box, releasing everything from R&B, to indie, to chill, downtempo tracks. With more music planned, some live shows and more events as part of the Gaia’s Children world she’s building,

it’s safe to say this won’t be the last you’ll hear of Chrxstal Sarah.

“It’s all about consistency and never giving up,” she reaffirms. “That’s the only thing you can fuel yourself off of because with the industry right now, there’s so many pros and cons to the way things are going. On one hand, if you decided today that you want to drop songs and you’ve never done it before, you totally can, and there’s no one to stop you – and you could be on all the streaming services. But at the same time, the industry is kind of oversaturated and it’s so hard to cut through the noise, so really believing in the art you’re making and being consistent is the only way to keep going. I’m just excited and interested to see how things go,” she smiles.

POWERED BY

“THE INDUSTRY IS KIND OF OVERSATURATED AND IT’S SO HARD TO CUT THROUGH THE NOISE.”

Photograph

Credit: Alex Lake

PLAYING A DIFFERENT GAME

THE ZOMBIES

In recent years, legendary UK rock band The Zombies have been enjoying something of a renaissance, culminating in the release of their acclaimed new album Different Game. Headliner caught up with singer Colin Blunstone and songwriter Rod Argent to talk new music, new fans, and why theirs is a story quite unlike any other…

Very little about The Zombies makes sense. At virtually every juncture in their career they’ve flown in opposition to their contemporaries, be it by accident or design. They’re the British Invasion band that was welcomed into the US without breaking stride yet is still trying to crack its domestic market over five decades later; the singer and songwriter duo at the heart of the band still actually like each other;

perhaps most bizarrely of all, their biggest hit isn’t even a hit – arguably their most famous song, 1967’s Time Of The Season, has been released five times in the UK and has never even charted; and perhaps most pertinently, they are still making music with the same vigour and verve as when they first started out in the early 1960s.

Their latest album Different Game has been released to glowing reviews and marks the culmination of what has been a period of renewed interest in the band. Just prior to the pandemic, The Zombies were inducted into the legendary Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame in 2019 and had been playing to some of the biggest crowds they’d ever seen. And then everything came to a juddering halt.

“Leading up to the Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame induction, we all felt that the band had never sounded so

good,” Rod Argent, The Zombies chief songwriter, tells Headliner. We’re sat round a table with him and singer Colin Blunstone in a plush terrace of a luxury London hotel on a sunny and balmy spring morning. The pair are as bright and warm as the surroundings. Argent, with a mane of silver hair and wearing a black leather biker jacket, looks every inch the veteran rocker. He’s affable and talkative, with an almost palpable enthusiasm for his band. Blunstone, meanwhile, speaks slowly and thoughtfully, with the same dreamy, hypnotic tones that define so much of The Zombies’ work.

“We’d done a lot of touring in the US and were so on fire live, and we couldn’t wait to get back and start recording a new album,” Argent continues. “We wanted to capture some of the spirit we had onstage, and we wanted to record with all of us in the room playing together. And we did capture a bit of that magic. We got back and recorded two tracks immediately – Merry-Go-Round and Runaway – and we loved what we had. And then Covid hit, and we had to stop doing things that way. We didn’t want to do things remotely, so everything ground to a halt and we had to pick it up again two years later.”

“When we did pick it up the actual recording of the album was quite

quick,” adds Blunstone. “Although it did give Rod this unlooked for advantage where he could spend some time writing songs, and he came up with some cracking songs during that period. But it was strange for things to come to a halt like that, because we are a band that tours a lot and it’s so important to us to be active. And our very first gig after the pandemic was a live broadcast from Abbey Road, which I have to admit I found quite overwhelming. One thing that sometimes slightly worries me is that because the band lives all over the place, before we go out on tour, we aren’t always able to rehearse. So sometimes we get to the venue early so we can have a really good run through!”

The reception with which Different Game has been met is testament to the passion Argent brings to the songwriting process to this day. While it could be suggested that some artists of a similar vintage hurry new material together as a means simply to get back out on tour, Argent remains possessed of an ambition befitting a new artist readying their debut. His methods, however, are tried and tested.

“We always have the same process,” he states. “I’ll try to get something that strikes me as being interesting and I’ll work by myself, embarrass myself

Photograph

Credit: Alex Lake

Photograph Credit: Alex Lake

[laughs], and then I’ll do some almost automatic writing, which eventually turns into something that resonates and then I’ll flesh it out into something more focused. There is a range of human emotions that are pretty common to most of us, and if it can hit one of those emotions and people can react in their own way, then that’s wonderful. That universality of feeling is something I always want to hit.”

“Once Rod has an initial idea for a song, because we live quite close to each other, he’ll then call me and we’ll sit around the keyboard, just the two of us, and we’ll just keep going over the song,” says Blunstone. “It’s a phase the song has to go through. Then we play it to the band, and they add their musicality to the idea and it develops a new layer. That’s always been the most exciting thing for me, seeing the spark of an idea. Who knows where it comes from. And then seeing it developed and worked on until you play it live to an audience. It’s great.”

There’s a certain sweetness in the image of these two old friends, nearly 60 years on, sitting side-by-side at a keyboard singing and exchanging ideas. It’s one that is inconceivable for virtually any other rock ‘n’ roll pairing: Mick and Keith, Liam and Noel, Ray and Dave, Roger and Pete.

“It’s disappointing isn’t it,” laughs Argent. “It’s extraordinary, but it’s been the same on the road, travelling vast distances together for many years. We know how to give each other space and be respectful. I spoke to a very famous artist who I won’t name, who said to me, ‘how do you stay friends after all these years? We can’t stay in the same hotel, let alone the same floor!’ Somehow that hasn’t happened with us. I don’t know why.”

“We are very careful about each other’s space, and everyone in the band is fairly laid back. It’s just our natures, really.”

The harmonious relationship that exists between Argent and Blunstone very much underpins The Zombies resurgence in recent decades, and indeed the quality of their new music. It’s hard to imagine that they’d have been able to make a record like Different Game without that shared love of making music together. Had they been content with trotting out mediocre material as an excuse to tour every few years, it’s highly unlikely they’d still be finding new fans, particularly on home soil, in the way that they have been of late.

While heralded as a psychedelic pop masterpiece today and hailed by the likes of Dave Grohl and Paul Weller as one of the all-time great rock records, the band’s 1968 album Odessey and Oracle sank largely without trace in the UK upon release. Though it did spawn the single Time Of The Season, which would fare well across the pond but failed to trouble the charts in the UK. Over time, however, extensive use in a variety of films, TV shows, and commercials has seen its, and in turn, the band’s, popularity soar during the ensuing years.

As for why it took so long for The Zombies to forge a domestic following, the band have their theories.

“It was a lot to do with how a band is first perceived, and that sticks with them for their whole career,” Blunstone notes. “And we were introduced to the public in a very strange way. We were very young, and Decca Records just wanted to create an image for us, and it was honestly about a 10-mintue conversation – what image are we going to give you? And we had a desperately poor image forced on us and some appalling photos. You’d think that’s all forgotten in six months, but it’s not, and it still comes up now. But in America, we didn’t get there until six months later, so we could take more control of that side of things. That helped us no end, and in every other country.

“In the ‘60s we only really had one moderately successful hit, which was She’s Not There,” adds Argent. “But even much later on, after Time Of The Season had been a hit in many other countries, it was released five times in the UK and has never ever charted! And yet, all the kids, when we played Glastonbury a few years ago, went crazy when we played that song.”

“It’s films and commercials,” Blunstone asserts. “The Zombies repertoire is used a lot in film and commercials, so a lot of people started to think it was a hit, when it wasn’t. Not here at least. As Rod just touched on, the cross section of ages in our audience is quite vast. There are so many young people at the shows. And I think there is a bit of mystique about the Zombies because we don’t seem to follow any normal trend that a lot of other bands’ careers follow. So suddenly we are re-emerging in what we call the autumn of our careers and our audience is a real mixture of ages.

“There’s a lot of things about this resurgence of The Zombies that I don’t think we fully understand. All we’ve ever done is write the best songs we can, record them to the best of our ability, and tour them to the best of our ability. It’s very simple, and this is the result.”

Argent shrugs with a smile, “we’ve never been good at trying to analyse trends and get in on anything like that.”

And all the while they are content sitting side-by-side at the piano, singing, and pouring their collective heart and soul into the music, they really don’t need to be.

THEZOMBIESMUSIC.COM

The “Yes” amp.

It’s not just that the 5D has integrated audio networking. Or flexible output power sharing. Or that you can easily hide it. You’re saying “yes” to more. A d&b system that provides the scalability, flexibility, and reliability needed for installations. Still, the 5D is a very impressive amplifier.

Discover more: dbaudio.com/5d

The art of creative engineering.

Photos: Thomas Peham (background), Alexander Popov, Benjamin Ch ild, Donny Jiang, Hulki Okan Tabak, Marcos Luiz, Pablo MerchanMontes, Rodan Can, William White (all unsplash)

CODA AIRAY IN THE HAGUE

VOICE OF THE PEOPLE

Hoedemakers PRO recently supplied CODA Audio systems for an important day of demonstrations in The Hague, Netherlands, as Headliner recently discovered…

Organised, peaceful demonstrations are a part of democratic life across the world. A recent example which took place in the Netherlands epitomised the spirit of such events when more than 25,000 people gathered at the Zuiderpark in The Hague to air shared grievances about aspects of government policy in advance of provincial elections. Although principally providing a platform for speeches for politicians and representatives of a wide range of organisations, the day-long event also featured DJ sets including one from the Hague’s own Outsider.

Events of this kind often suffer from inferior audio - something that on this important occasion, the organisers were not prepared to accept. Very careful consideration was therefore given to the audio and visual requirements for the day, with experienced providers Hoedemakers PRO and ABC Scherm respectively engaged to ensure that communication from the stage was clear and effective for the large crowd.

Hoedemakers PRO has worked with CODA Audio products for more than a decade, beginning its investment in the brand with ViRAY, SCV, G18 and LINUS amplification before more recently adding APS, LINUS 14D, AiRAY and SCP subs to its inventory.

For the 190m x 120m Zuiderpark site, Hoedemakers system tech Julian Lacroix, supported by Hans Engelen of Viladco (CODA’s distributor in the Netherlands) designed a system based on CODA’s flagship AiRAY line array. As well as a comprehensive sound system, Hoedemakers PRO also supplied power and staging for the event.

“Since investing in AiRAY to take care of a number of large festivals in 2022, we know exactly what it can do,” Lacroix comments. “Few if any systems in this class compare with AiRAY’s sound quality and dynamics - its compact size

and ease of rigging are also a major factor in its success.”

The site to be covered at the Zuiderpark was 120m x 190m for which the Hoedemakers PRO team deployed 16 AiRAY and four ViRAY per side as mains, eight ViRAY as outfill, and 12 AiRAY per side as delays. An arc comprising 12 clusters of two SCP sensor controlled subs completed the front of house. Two HOPS12T and two U4 subs were used for DJ monitoring, with four CUE TWO stage monitors for presenters.

Julian Lacroix was pleased with the system’s performance: “Even at 120m away, the main PA was clearly audible across the entire site and the organisers were very happy with the quality and intelligibility,” he says.

“We even received compliments from various speakers about how good the

sound was - something that they told us isn’t always the case!”

“It’s great to see our systems being put to good use at an open air rally like this,” adds CODA Audio director of global sales and marketing, David Webster. “It underlines the flexibility and adaptability that CODA gives to rental companies like Hoedemakers PRO who are catering for a wide range of applications. In the case of an event that predominantly concentrated on spoken word presentations, crystalclear intelligibility couldn’t be sacrificed for power alone. AiRAY can deliver that clarity, whilst effortlessly ensuring that everyone present doesn’t miss a word.”

drow s by ALICE GUSTAFSON

THE ART OF LIVE SOUND

DANIEL REED

Daniel Reed is the production application support specialist, production audio at Harman Professional Solutions, but in a past life, was a FOH engineer for artists including The Kid Laroi, Avril Lavigne, Fifth Harmony and 5 Seconds Of Summer. He has just wrapped up working at Coachella 2023, which was headlined by Bad Bunny, Blackpink, Frank Ocean and Blink 182. Here, he reveals how JBL line arrays were used on the Gobi tent at Coachella 2023, how he adapts to engineering for different artists and genres, his worst ever live tech mishap, and his personal favourite Coachella headliner of all time.

This year at Coachella you were representing JBL at the Gobi stage both weekends (JBL Professional’s VTX A12 line array loudspeaker system was used on this stage at the festival.) How was the festival this year for you?

Coachella has been amazing. We’ve had the ability to come out there and support RAT Sound with our VTX A12 and VTX A8 systems with B28 subs on the Gobi stage. All the feedback from the front of house engineers has been super positive. It’s been a really great experience in terms of getting to connect with other engineers, getting to hear other people mix and get the variety of music genres that come through each stage every single day

– it’s so vastly different from show to show. Coachella has been a really great opportunity to support one of the biggest festivals in the world at the highest level. It has been nothing but a success.

Before we dig more into your FOH and live sound work, can you explain how you wound up at Harman as the production application support specialist, production audio?

I was a full time touring FOH engineer, monitor engineer and production manager. On my most recent tours, I was working with an artist that did a few JBL events. I’ve always loved using their systems. As a touring FOH

engineer and production manager, we really need to ensure the best quality, so having contacts within a company like Harman was important for me so that I knew that if I’m going into a show that’s going to have VTX, I can reach out to someone and say, ‘Let’s talk about the system, what we’re actually using and what I can expect’. I couldn’t imagine a better opportunity for me to learn a different side of the industry in terms of manufacturing and being more of a systems engineer. For me, it’s always about expanding my horizons, growing, finding new opportunities to keep learning, expanding my network and staying involved in the industry. I’ve dedicated most of my life to the industry at this point!

What does your role as production application support specialist, production audio at Harman Professional Solutions entail, and what does your unique perspective as a FOH engineer bring to the role?

My role at JBL entails a variety of things – I’m a wearer of many hats! One thing that I do at JBL is pre and post-sales support, meaning that when we have existing or prospective buyers for VTX systems and VRack systems – which are the amplifier systems that are made specifically to be used with VTX speaker products – we are providing the sales team with technical support, certification courses and will train the

new buyers and their staff. On the other end of it, I will actually go onsite, similar to Coachella, where I will be there to physically optimise the system and actually deploy it – boots on the ground – flying it up, taking measurements, using the control software and then handing the keys over to whatever company it is. It’s also a little bit of business development, where I can use my network that I’ve developed over the years from my touring experience as a front of house engineer to be able to give other engineers a perspective as someone who’s actually used these systems and to have real world experience. I talk to them about how our product varies versus other products out there and how they all stack up. At the end of the day, we can’t just be talking about things from reading things like ‘this has this amount of output,’ – these are all specs that everyone has access to. The real world experience is where the applications team really comes into play, because we’re the ones that actually use it and have the most experience on it. We’re an all-inclusive, one stop shop for every bit of guidance on the VTX and Crown amplifier systems.

You can prepare for every live sound eventuality, but sometimes things can still go awry. Have you had a moment during a live show where things have gone wrong?

Absolutely. Unfortunately, that happens to the best of us. There’s always situations where gear just fails – there’s so many components to concerts that can hinder the ability for it to be exactly what was envisioned. There’s been opportunities for me to really earn my paycheck on certain days! One thing that comes to mind would be when I was doing a tour with a lot of amphitheatres. I had my outboard rack at the time – I was using a digital audio workstation to host a lot of plugins – and unfortunately, I didn’t have a redundant backup unit in case one goes down. That was a hard lesson to learn. My digital audio workstation was hosting all these plugins, and it failed.

All of a sudden, the entire show went completely silent. When you’re doing a headlining show in front of 10,000 people and all of a sudden while the artist is still performing it just goes mute after being around 100dB – to zero – is extremely jarring. It’s unnerving. You get this rush of adrenaline and you have to immediately assess what it could possibly be, as fast as humanly possible in order to get things back up and running. In this case, I realised that my hardware unit that was hosting plugins, had failed. That five seconds of muted audio at that concert made me feel like I was gonna die for a minute [laughs]. But at the end of the day, that didn’t make anybody have a bad night; people seem to be pretty understanding that, ‘Hey, this is the real world; things happen.’ Technology is technology, it doesn’t always work. It just doesn’t. All we can do as touring engineers and systems engineers is find ways to have redundancy and find failsafes to combat the potential bugs that can get into any system.

The system that we deployed is a traditional system: it is 14 boxes of VTX A12 and 15 B28, subwoofers and a cardioid deployment with six A8s as front fills / out fills for the front stage. Then there was another deployment of six A8s for our delays because the stage extends pretty far back – the crowds get pretty large! What we’ve found is that these artists are coming in from being on tour or they’re coming from rehearsals – there’s a whole wide variety of engineers in terms of experience levels: there’s guys that are coming in having never mixed on VTX, there’s people that have a tonne of experience on it and really know the nuances of the system. As a touring FOH engineer, especially going into festivals, sometimes you don’t get the opportunities to soundcheck and you don’t have the knowledge base of what to look for in that particular system. We try to make it as easy as possible from the systems engineering standpoint

How did the VTX A12 line array loudspeaker system perform at Coachella 2023?

of giving them a frequency response curve to make this as agnostic as possible in the sense that it’s open for you to be able to make what you want out of it.

How does this JBL line array excel in terms of rigging in particular?

JBL’s VTX system prides itself on being one of the most easily deployable systems on the market due to our rigging systems.Rigging used to be heavier with older systems all across the board. Various manufacturers have dealt with refining how to make things go up and down

as quickly and seamlessly as possible. If you’re spending all day long floating a PA or rigging system, just to be able to hopefully pin it in properly and have a bunch of guys wrestling with the system and banging it to get in and out, that’s wasted time, especially when you’re dealing with local hands and stage people that don’t have experience with that system. You have to make things as easily optimisable as possible. That’s what JBL has done with the VTX system. It is as simple, smart and intuitive as you could possibly be when it comes to rigging and deploying their system. If you’ve ever flown any VTX system, once

“ALL OF A SUDDEN, THE ENTIRE SHOW WENT COMPLETELY SILENT IN FRONT OF 10,000 PEOPLE.”

you’ve done it once, you know how to do it. For us, that’s a huge win. We don’t want to be spending time dealing with the manual labour of flying; it goes up and down so easily and they’ve designed the product to come in on carts that are already in a position where you can set your angles before it even goes up in the air. It’s all done in the control software or line array calculator. Then you’re able to scan a QR code which gives you all the actual points on your cell phone.

What’s been your personal favourite Coachella headliner so far?

favourite band and I did see them headline. However, seeing Beyoncé do her massive performance was the pinnacle of production in terms of the time and the preparation that went into that. Stephen Curtin was the front of house engineer on that and I was blown away by how great it sounded. You don’t have to love a specific genre to go and see someone at the pinnacle of entertainment in production. When you’re dealing with things like two guest vocalists, an entire orchestra and choir – it looked like there were 200 people on stage! – from that standpoint I was in awe of the technical acumen of everybody involved to be able to bring all those things together.

Touring and concert production is all about the illusion that everything is perfect, and it’s meant to be this way all the time. You want to trick the crowd into thinking that this is just normal. When an artist and a production is so dialled in and so buttoned up to where it takes even the production folk out of all those technical aspects and we’re just in awe of the performance, you can’t ask for anything better. It was a big tip of the hat to the Beyoncé crew for Beychella.

MAKING WAVES

ANDREW SCHEPS

Grammy-winning producer and mixer Andrew Scheps has spoken to Headliner about his incredible career to date, from the lessons he learned working on Michael Jackson’s HIStory album as a budding studio talent, his work on new Fellow Robot album Misanthropoid, and his ongoing relationship with plugin specialist Waves.

For almost three decades, Scheps has been working with some of the biggest and most iconic names in music. To date he has received three Grammy Awards for his work with Adele, Red Hot Chilli Peppers, and Ziggy Marley, notched up over 20 further nominations, and worked with the likes of Green Day, Metallica, Hozier, Johnny Cash, Michael Jackson, and many others.

Among his most recent projects was a collaboration with California’s Fellow Robot, co-producing and mixing the band’s latest record Misanthropoid. Completed over a two-year period, the album is a concept record of sorts. Indeed, the band itself could be described as

a concept project, having formed as an extension of singer Anthony Pedroza’s The Robot’s Guide To Music sci-fi novel, with that source material providing the basis for much of the band’s lyrics. As such, Misanthropoid is a record that seeks to explore what it means to be a human being.

To find out more about the record, Headliner sat down with Scheps to discuss his working process with the band, as well as some of the most pivotal moments in his career and how he arrived at where he is today…

How did you first get to know Fellow Robot? Were you aware of the origins of the band before you started working with them?

It’s a pretty typical story. They sent a song to my manager in L.A. who then forwarded it to me. They sent him a song from their previous release, and I really liked it. We exchanged emails, I mixed the song, we finished it up and it was all great. I think it was all done by email at that point, and I wasn’t aware of the history of the band. So when they started working on the next record they got in touch and said they’d like to work with me more. This was pre-Covid, so we were talking about possibly recording in Monnow Valley in Wales. That’s where I would record and produce most of the time. But of course that all went south and they just kept working on their record. They would send me demos and rough mixes. We went back and forth on the songs six or seven times and then it was time for me to mix. But it was a very organic process.

How much focus was there on creating a consistent sonic identity throughout the record, given the conceptual nature of the band?

There wasn’t really on this record. With this album there wasn’t anything in particular we went looking for with regards to themes. We wanted the guitars and drum sounds to be consistent, but they are the kind of band that understands how to make that work anyway. The band is the band, so there is going to be consistency. A lot of

people ask about how when you’re mixing a record that has had different producers that you make it all come together, and my answer is you don’t. If it’s a body of work, it will gel together. And if you ever are wondering about whether or not everything matches, just go check out the Beatles’ Revolver. You have four lead singers, and every song is completely different to every other song. I really don’t worry about that. If you get it right, then it just fits together.

Did you immerse yourself in Anthony’s writing or of the defining concepts of the band to gain a greater understanding of them as artists?

I didn’t. I feel strongly that with music it’s only about what you hear when you hit play. Nobody is going to go over to the houses of people playing the record to say, ‘hey, did you know this was about this novel?’ That’s for fans to discover and is an added bonus, but the record can’t be influenced by that. I tend to stay out of that stuff. I‘m fascinated by that stuff as a fan, but when you’re making a record if you let it influence your decision making that’s a dangerous thing to do.

“IF YOU EVER ARE WONDERING ABOUT WHETHER OR NOT EVERYTHING MATCHES, JUST GO CHECK OUT THE BEATLES’ REVOLVER.”

Have you worked on many immersive projects to date?

Yeah, it comes and goes. Everybody has a different take on it. I’ve done catalogue stuff for other producers; I’ve gone back and done Atmos versions of records I mixed for labels a while ago. It’s starting to become more and more a case of doing stereo and Atmos versions of the stuff I’m mixing from scratch now.

Do you approach the two formats differently?

It’s very different. One reason is the process right now. Everybody finishes their stereo mix first then does an Atmos version, so the Atmos version is very much based on the stereo version. So, you’re taking all of the sonic decisions you made for the stereo version and making it fill up the room. Sometimes it’s not terribly involved,

but if you separate things too much it starts to fall apart. And sometimes you go nuts. I did three out of the four 1975 records, and there are some songs on those records where I didn’t do a whole lot and others where it’s going crazy. In the future people will start to have it in mind when they are making records in the first place, and eventually we’ll get to the point where it’s just two versions of the same mix rather than one being a version of the other. But at the moment it’s very much based on stereo. I don’t mind that because the stereo is all about the sonic decisions and arrangements, and the Atmos is about making that a 3D world that is really compelling in a way that stereo can’t be.

Tell us about your relationship with Waves?

I’ve been using their stuff pretty much since it came out. I had the Q1 and Q10 and some of their first plugins. I beta test a lot of stuff, and so I met people at the company that way and the relationship grew. They were starting to do their Artist Series and I don’t think I was really at a point where anyone was going to buy something just because it had my name on it, but I’ve always had ideas for things. I’m constantly thinking about how to do things better and what kind of tool you might need to do that. The first couple of plugins I did with them were more collaborations. The first one was a model of a 1073, the Neve mic pre and EQ.

Then, after doing more mixing and doing more interviews, my parallel

compression techniques were things people talked about, so it was a matter of how can we do parallel stuff in a plugin? That’s what Parallel Particles ended up being. The next thing I really wanted was a channel strip. As you mix more and more you end up with a small tool set that is your go-to, and a gigantic tool set for experimenting. But if you just want to get the snare drum to sound the way you want it, there will typically be three or four things you’ll use, and they are pretty much the same but set differently each time. And I was just sick of having lots of plugin windows open, so I sent Waves a big PDF flow chart of what I wanted my channel strip to be. The timing was really good, they wanted to do a channel strip, and it took about two years to finish it but that’s what became the Omni Channel. I use it constantly. It’s got everything I want, right in front of me, exactly how I want it. And they are fantastic to work with.

How collaborative are they?

They’re really open. They are never just trying to get me to put my name on something. The Omni Channel took two years because I spent about six or eight weeks each on four or five of those parameters, going back and forth. They are absolutely fine with that. And we got it just right with the Omni Channel. Hopefully there are more in the works.

What have been some of the most pivotal moments in your career so far?

One of the first records I got to do was Michael Jackson’s HIStory. It’s 18 months, you’re working with some of the best engineers on the planet, with one of the best artists on the planet, who is bringing in some of the best musicians on the planet, and that encompasses everything. I did a bit of everything on that record. I worked with just about every person who worked on it. I would be overdubbing keyboards on songs; I would set up rooms. It was a pretty great place to learn. There is a lot going on at a very high level. But I was good enough to deserve to be there and as soon as people know that you deserve to be there then they become really open and really generous. So that solidified a lot of stuff right away about how to make records, how to keep track of stuff, how to deal with a project that big and how to deal with personalities.

L- ISA STUDIO

YOUR PORTAL TO SPATIAL AUDIO CREATION

Words by COLBY RAM S YE

BACK IN BUSINESS

MUMU

Maidstone’s MuMu nightclub, known for its vibrant and energetic atmosphere, recently underwent a major refurbishment after a significant fire in 2021. The nightclub, which has been a popular destination for party-goers in Kent, had to shut down for several months to carry out repairs and refurbishment. However, with the recent installation of a state-of-theart Martin Audio stereo monitoring solution by Middlesex Sound and Lighting, the chic lounge and bar is now back and ready to deliver the ultimate night out.

The unique venue, which includes a traditional Irish pub, a speakeasy,

a hidden laundromat room, an eatery and dining restaurant, a newly refurbished cabaret bar, and a basement club area, presented a challenging but exciting opportunity for the team at Middlesex Sound and Lighting who were tasked with bringing back the ‘wow factor.’

“The whole space is like a labyrinth!” recalls Darrel Olivier, director of Middlesex Sound and Lighting.

“The main room is accessed via a small corridor which leads upstairs and along the way, there are these washing machines with quirky content displayed in the centre of them, spinning around. On the upper level, there’s an eatery and

dining restaurant with a newly refurbished cabaret bar, and then downstairs in the basement is a new club area, which we were involved in creating.”

The AV crew had to pay attention to the aesthetics, such as using more compact enclosures in the booth seating areas, concealed subwoofers, and a clean finish from both the lighting and audio perspectives. For audio, the crew went with Martin Audio boxes throughout the venue, with an emphasis on coverage and quality of sound to ensure a vibrant customer experience.

Maidstone’s MuMu nightclub has installed a bespoke AV set up with a Martin Audio stereo monitoring solution as part of a major refurbishment, as Headliner recently discovered…

It is the ADORN family that greets guests, with ACS-55TS ceiling speakers covering the entrance lobby, customer routes and toilets. In the club itself, the main dance floor is covered by Blackline X12s with low end support from a pair of Blackline X118 single 18” subs. The Blackline family is also in the DJ booth with Blackline X10s serving as stereo monitors. Supplementing the dance floor system in the booths and peripheral areas are

The amplification is driven by Powersoft and controlled by a Symetrix Prism DSP and controller in the DJ booth. They also have full zoning control and have included presets for the venue’s staff, as they plan to use the space for brunch and lunch events in addition to operating as a nightclub.

“It was a solid team effort and I think the final result speaks for itself – it looks and sounds fantastic!” Olivier adds. “They are thrilled to have the new Martin Audio system installed at the club. It’s really made a difference to the sound quality and their staff guests have already noticed the difference.”

MARTIN-AUDIO.COM

“THE FINAL RESULT SPEAKS FOR ITSELF –IT LOOKS AND SOUNDS FANTASTIC!”

CDD6 cabinets with SX110 10” slimline subs, concealed within the banquette seating.

Words

bY alicegus t

In an alternative life, Lemar would be working in a pharmacy. Instead, in the 21 years since appearing on BBC’s Fame Academy, the Tottenham singer has won three MOBOs, two Brits and has released seven studio albums. On his new album, Page In My Heart, Lemar explains where he’s been and why it’s important to remind yourself who you are.

“I’d probably be working in a bank, or a pharmacy actually!” says Lemar on what he might have done had he not featured on the hit reality TV show in 2002. “I was gonna be a pharmacist. I had a place at Cardiff University, but then fate had its own decisions, or its own intentions…”

Fate took on the form of a set of forgotten keys when Lemar was working at NatWest:

“I was working at a bank and at the time I was also touring with

Trevor Nelson,” he recalls. “There was another show on – I think it was Pop Idol – and his voice was the one they used for their advert. I was on my lunch break and I went back to my desk. I forgot my keys in the canteen so I went back to pick them up, and as I was leaving I heard his voice. That’s what made me turn around – his voiceover for the show. I thought, ‘If Trevor’s doing it, maybe it’s a bit of karma or an omen in there,’ so I’ll throw my hat in for this one before I go back to uni and call it quits on music.”

Lemar came third in the reality TV talent show, and the following year his double-platinum debut album Dedicated was released, which contained the singles Dance (With U), 50/50 and Another Day, all of which charted in the top 10. His second album, Time to Grow, saw similar success, also achieving double platinum certification, and contains his most successful single, If There’s Any Justice, which peaked at number three and spent four months in the UK Singles Chart.

“20 years,” he says, shaking his head slightly. “I was very new to it. I was rolling the dice, taking a chance on life and taking a chance on an opportunity – not really knowing what it would lead to. Much like Big Brother, we weren’t really in contact with anyone that was outside the building or outside the show for a good three months. While I was in, I didn’t really know the magnitude of how well or how bad things were going until it was finished. Then I realised, ‘Okay, life might be a little bit different.’

“In life, you’re presented with whatever opportunities are in front of you; you’re dealt some cards and you’ve got to make the most of the cards you are dealt,” he muses. “Everyone needs a bit of luck to start.”

Seven albums later, his new album, Page In My Heart chronicles his emotional journey over the last few years, including the ups and the downs that go hand in hand with being in a constantly evolving music industry.

“I’m older now, so I understand the music business much more; you understand what an audience is

and how to get through to people. Evolution is evolution. Back in the day, it was a cool thing for the artists to be mysterious and for you only to see them on the stage, but nowadays it’s a much more connected world. They want to see you everyday and they want to be really connected with you, which develops a stronger relationship, or a closer one. But it’s definitely more demanding. It’s just a different way of working to achieve the same thing.”

To mark it being 20 years since the release of Dedicated, Lemar recently played two special shows in London and Manchester to celebrate two decades of music. For Lemar, those years have gone by in a flash.

“It’s crazy! You start off with an album, and as one’s finishing, the next one is starting, and then as the next one’s finishing, the next one’s starting, so it does become a bit of a blur. Back then you were extremely busy when you were busy; it was a lot of drama. About a year and a half ago, someone reminded me that it was going to be 20 years in 2023. I had to count a few times on my fingers like, ‘No, you’re right. It’s 20 years!’ But it does not feel like it at all.”

Part of his post Fame Academy promo cycle saw Lemar appear on the Miquita Oliver and Simon Amstell-fronted Sunday morning show, Popworld, known for its pisstaking segments and distinct lack of pandering to the guests brave enough to feature. It soon amassed a cult following for its non-sycophantic approach, and featured bizarre segments including There’s a Rat in McCutcheon, but what are the Sugababes going to do?, The Big Ones (Amstell asks a baffled Britney Spears if she’s ever licked a battery), and Lemar from Afar, in which Amstell shouted questions into a megaphone from one end of a car park while Lemar stood at the other end.

“Do you know what…” says Lemar, a hint of recognition in his eyes. “I do remember Simon and Miquita, but I don’t fully remember what the piece exactly was. I do remember the saying ‘Lamar from Afar,’ but not the details,” he laughs. “Whatever it was, it was always tongue in cheek. Simon was always a joker, Miquita too. As I’ve just demonstrated, you do forget a lot of the things that you do along the way!”

“YOU’VE GOT TO MAKE THE MOST OF THE CARDS YOU ARE DEALT.”

Fast forward back to present day, and Lemar’s new album is his first release in eight years, and is made for fans that enjoyed Dedicated, evidenced by the funky Dance (With U)-esque single, Future Love

“That was very intentional,” he says of the upbeat tune. “I didn’t want to come back on a downer like, ‘I’m brokenhearted’ and for everyone to be like, ‘Oh here he is, the grim reaper.’ I wanted to come back a bit happy. Topically, the album is quite relationship-based,” he says. “I think that’s where my strength is – my voice lends itself well to the emotional stuff, so there’s a few songs on there that I hope that people will relate to. [My songwriting] has definitely matured along with my life experiences.”

Album track, I Been was written at a particularly low point and sees Lemar reflecting about his journey in the music industry after repeatedly being asked, ‘Where have you been?’ over the years.

“This was one of those 2am songs,” he shares. “I have had quite a few of those early morning ones. I Been is me talking about the highs and the lows. The highs are when everything’s going good and everything’s positive and everything’s great – you’re winning awards, you’re performing, you’re going all over the place. Then you have low moments when you don’t really want to do music that much, you don’t really want to play another tune, you may have moved on from labels or managers, etc. Unless you’re a very resilient person, it does…” he trails off. “Like I mentioned before, social media – as great as it can be – it’s good to step back a couple of times, analyse things and take your moment to regroup. I Been is me regrouping and saying, ‘Alright, cool. This is where things are, this is where things could be, these are the cards in front of me.’

“I’ve been doing this a while, so I’ve had the highest highs, and there have been some lows as well – you have to remind yourself who you are. It’s good to surround

yourself with people that see you in a certain light and appreciate you, so whenever you have a doubt in your ability or a doubt about who you are – which you will have over 20 plus years – it’s good to surround yourself with positivity so that you can take that next step. Ultimately, everything does work out. So yeah, that’s what I’ve been doing!”

Working again with longtime writing partners Craig Hardy (who co-wrote Dance (With U)) and Mathias Andermo, this album sees Lemar write music that is true to himself. Releasing the album on his own label also allowed him to take the reins fully as an independent artist. The self confessed “super private dude” has allowed himself to be vulnerable through his songwriting: “It has turned out extremely personal,” he nods. “It doesn’t get more ‘me’ than this, musically. The way this album was written and the way it came to fruition, I don’t think it could have been a purer process than this one.”

Lemar’s fans have been patient in between album releases, flocking to see him belt out his hits at his recent shows, including a packed Indigo at The O2. When it comes to fan favourites, he says it’s a tough call: “Justice always smashes it. 50/50 always smashes it as well. But then people love It’s Not That Easy, Someone Should Tell You, What About Love? and Dance (With U) live is good as well, because we do an extended version. I mean… I’m not saying I’ve got loads of hits, but I’m just sayin’, you know,” he laughs.

Lemar is performing at The Cambridge Club Festival this summer, and after the success of his recent shows, warm reception to Page In My Heart, and cameo in the new season of Bridgerton, hopefully it won’t be another eight years before he releases a project again.

“Yeah! It’s gonna be Lemar from up close,” he laughs.

LEMAR-ONLINE.COM

BYDAN GUMBLE

WHAT NEXT FOR IMMERSIVE SOUND?

MEDLEY STUDIOS

Frank Grønbæk, studio and live sound engineer, and product specialist for distributor Nordic Pro Audio, talks to Headliner about his recent move into the world of immersive mixing, his predictions for the format, and why Merging Technologies products are the “most precious gem” in his setup at Denmark’s Medley Studios…

Frank Grønbæk is a man who wears many hats. For over seven years he has served as FOH engineer for pop sensation Lukas Graham; worked as a product specialist with distribution company Nordic Pro Audio, specialising in Merging Technologies, Meyer Sound, Dolby, and SSL; and has his own Atmos

mixing space at Denmark’s legendary Medley Studios. More often than not, he can be found juggling any number of roles at once. His foray into the world of immersive mixing, however, is the most recent of his sonic adventures.

“I’m the live FOH engineer for Lukas Graham, but during Covid there was obviously nothing happening in the live world, so I thought I should figure out something else,” he tells Headliner from his room at Medley Studios via Zoom. “I’m also engaged with selling audio equipment as part of my job at Nordic Pro Audio, so I help people get the right kit and advise people on gear, and that’s mainly in the broadcast and film industry. But my entrance into the studio work was through Atmos music. I built this little cave in Medley with a 7.1.4 system built around a Meyer Sound speaker setup and Merging Technologies kit, and set about figuring out if anyone was interested in this format. I was actually the first person to release anything in Atmos in Denmark – a record by Danish DJ and artist Rune Rask - and when Medley heard about the work I was doing they said come along and this will add to the facility.”

According to Grønbæk, the uptake for Atmos and immersive mixes is growing slowly but surely.

“The format is slowly rising in Denmark,” he says. “It’s getting there but it is slow. I just handed in the master for Aqua’s first album Aquarium, which is being released in Atmos. There is a DJ and artist called Rune Rask who I’m working with right now. Then there are some Lukas Graham live things and some home recorded music with him as well. There have been a few other projects happening too. It’s super fun to work in this format. That’s what I do here. I don’t do any recordings, just Atmos mixing.”

While slow and steady growth is something he predicts for the format, there is one factor that could prompt a speedy and significant spike.

“I can see there are more and more albums coming out in Atmos, so there is a tendency towards releasing more in the format,” he notes. “What we are all waiting for is Spotify to launch its Atmos service. I’m pretty sure it’ll happen. Spotify needs to do it because of the demand, especially

when the cars start arriving with Atmos included and you can’t access the format via Spotify. Otherwise people will start to look for something different.”

One of Grønbæk’s studio essentials is his Merging Technologies setup, featuring both the company’s Anubis and Hapi products.

“I first came across Merging via Nordic Pro Audio, as it came in through a colleague of mine,” he says, explaining how he first got to know the brand and its products. “Immediately it spoke to me in terms of audio quality. Their products are exceptional. And when I was introduced to the Anubis I couldn’t resist it. I use it every day and it is probably my most precious gem in here. It does everything, it’s really a remarkable piece of equipment.

“There are so many great things in that box, and it’s super easy to use,” he continues. “In the multi-channel formats there is a display onboard, and you can swap things around easily. You can have 128 inputs, you can have eight different speaker setups/headphone setups, and you can choose to build them up exactly how you want. All eight could be Atmos setups if you want, or you can have a combination. I only have one set of speakers, but I have multiple setups to choose from, so I can use the same speakers for 2.0, 2.1, 5.1, 7.1, and 7.1.4. And it’s all different in the way that it can fold down the mixes internally, and it does it really well. That’s really cool. It has good converters in it. It’s the best monitor controller out there.”

Such is the extensive range and nature of the Anubis’s capabilities that some users find there is a learning curve of sorts to be navigated in order to fully comprehend and harness its full functionality. Was this something that Grønbæk encountered?

“WHAT WE ARE ALL WAITING FOR IS SPOTIFY TO LAUNCH ITS ATMOS SERVICE. I’M PRETTY SURE IT’LL HAPPEN.”

“I got to know the whole Merging Technologies platform before it was released,” he recalls. “I knew the infrastructure, the AES67, Ravenna and the network setup, so I had a feel for how it all worked, and so it was somewhat easy to get started. And the more you get into the workflow the easier it gets. In the beginning it took a little while before I grasped just how much it can actually do. And everything in the box just works so seamlessly. Over time I discovered more and more things that it can do. I also have two Hapis as well, just to get enough I/O for the system, and it’s all running on their VAD.”

Also crucial to his setup is a speaker system from US loudspeaker

manufacturer Meyer Sound. Despite being synonymous with the live music market, the company is also active in the broadcast and studio sectors. Indeed, it was through his work on the road as Graham’s FOH engineer that he became familiar with Meyer Sound products, and as such, opted to bring them into his mix room.

“My work with Meyer Sound products on the road is where this connection came from,” he concludes. “I’ve been to Meyer Sound a few times in the US and was so impressed. These Amie speakers are great, I really like them. They show me what I need to see, and I don’t feel like I need other speakers to AB. They translate super well to other systems. It’s a great

reference speaker, and I even use them as a reference in my PA setup. It translates to PA very well. That’s why I went in this direction.”

MERGING.COM

droW s by ALICE GUSTAFSON

EIGHT SEASONS LATER

FEARTHE WALKING DEAD

American post-apocalyptic horror drama television series Fear the Walking Dead is a spin-off to The Walking Dead, and its eighth season, for which filming took place in L.A, Texas, Vancouver, Canada and Mexico, is its last. Production sound mixer Marlowe Taylor reveals how the show has been one of the most challenging, yet rewarding gigs of his career.

In his Cleveland Studio, Taylor has recorded the likes of Chuck D and Snoop Dogg, while as a film and TV mixer, he has worked on projects as varied as Judas and the Black Messiah, Queen & Slim and The Marksman. One constant in his life since 2015, however, has been his role on Fear the Walking Dead

To be prepared for everything a zombie apocalypse could throw at

him, he made sure he was prepared for every audio scenario, using Lectrosonics’ D Squared system, DCR822 and DSQD receivers and Digital Hybrid wireless, along with multiple SMQV, watertight WM, microcompact SSM, plug-on HMa, plus his trusty UCR411a units for vehicle work.

“One of the biggest challenges so far this season was our James Bond-style boat chase scene,” Taylor reflects. “We had six actors on one boat, and they let the actor drive the speedboat. They’re speeding down a river and the bad guys are chasing them and shooting at them. There’s all this yelling in the dialogue. For this, we had six 411s in a bag in our follow boat, and we’re trying to keep up. Video kept losing their image even though it was compressed to 1080 for transmission. But the Lectro just held on, and that was just using SMQV packs on the actors set to 100mW output,” he enthuses.

Another scene in season eight, which looked simple on paper, proved to be one of the most challenging to capture audio for: “There were several times this season when I just couldn’t believe how the Lectrosonics wireless worked flawlessly, and was able to pull me out of a tough scenario,” he nods. “We were going into a night scene, and it was five pages of dialogue with the lead characters, Morgan and Madison. This was supposed to be an easy scene at night with two actors, but then the curveball came. The director wanted the scene shot in a torrential heavy downpour of rain – this was not light rain or small sprinkles – but rain so loud actors could barely hear one another.

“In addition, there was the sound of it hitting the train tracks and gravel on the ground,” he adds. “The water tower from special effects was coming, so I knew we needed our Lectrosonics WM water transmitters with VT500 water mic lavaliers with backups at the ready in case any of the mics got waterlogged. We also had a boom rig using a Schoeps Cmit 5U with a HMA plug on as well.”

They persevered through the elements, shooting the scene for hours at night – the packs soaking wet – but they performed with no issues. “The transmitters were set at 50mw with my cart being 150ft away to avoid the rain. The scene turned out wonderfully according to post production and Michael Satrazemis, our director. No ADR was needed – it was a proud night for the sound team!”

Taylor also praises the SMQV’s contribution to his lack of range worries. “We did another show called The Walking Dead: World Beyond, which had a helicopter scene with some dialogue,” he recalls. “It’s way up in the air, the blades are throbbing, and I’m getting clear dialogue all the way through with just an SMQV on 100mW. I thought I had it on 250. When we got the pack back and I checked, I was like, ‘Holy smokes!’”

“THERE WERE SEVERAL TIMES THIS SEASON WHEN LECTROSONICS WAS ABLE TO PULL ME OUT OF A TOUGH SCENARIO.”

Other types of scenes that have been tough to capture pristine audio for during his time on the show often involve using SWAT assault vehicles: “We had four actors wired inside the assault vehicle being held as hostages, which was fine, because I was staged right outside the truck,” he explains. “Then the director decides to shoot the entire scene with the truck driving down the dirt road, passing us, with no time for us to even drop a mobile bag rig setup inside the vehicle, because the truck had just pulled away!

“So my utility just raised the antenna mass up high and ran to the actors as they were getting inside the vehicle.

He used the RM remote app to turn the transmitters to 250mw and we hoped for the best. All I remember is my utility saying, ‘Wow, that’s digital!’ – which is our word for awesomeness – because we got every bit of dialogue plus the plant mics inside the vehicle just as clean as the stationary dialogue earlier. If I hadn’t had the ability to increase the watts that would’ve been an entire ADR looped scene, because the director wanted to have the option of having the truck move and seeing that while the dialogue was happening in frame, which wasn’t scripted that way at all!”

In Taylor’s opinion, the ability of his D Squared series transmitters to find and retain frequencies is also second to none. “Shooting in Savannah, it’s basically the Hollywood of the east coast,” he says. “On set, we had the lighting dimmer guy who’s on Wi-Fi, so that’s in the air. We had the Teradek systems for transmitting lossless video. We had the followfocus camera guys and their wireless stuff. So, we have so much RF. When I do a scan, it looks like a bomb went off! On the transmitter end, the Digital Hybrid stuff punches right through, but I’m really looking forward to seeing what the new digital transmitters can do when paired with the receivers I already have.”

When it comes to the frenzied action sequences required for this post-apocalyptic show, Lectrosonics’ ruggedness has saved the day on numerous occasions, even surviving

being trampled by a horse: “If there’s one thing anybody can say about Lectrosonics, it’s that the gear is built tough!” he laughs. “The transmitters in their metal style housing and the IFB R1As have been dropped more times than I can count. We had a SMQV transmitter slip off an actor’s ankle and then a horse stepped on it. When the PA brought it to me and told me what happened I laughed because the transmitter looked fine, it was still on and just muddy with a small scratch on the back. I cleaned it up and we put it right back on the actor with a bit more Velcro so it would not slip out again! They’re the best solid-build transmitters I know in the field and I couldn’t imagine doing a show without them.”

Asked if he employs Wireless Designer software to coordinate as many as the 24 channels sometimes used on Fear the Walking Dead , he replies, “Oh, I love the software. But all the locations you see on the show? They’re as rugged and rough in real life as they look onscreen. And there’s a lot of humidity, which my laptop won’t stand up to nearly as well as my Lectrosonics gear. So, I tend to scan within all the units themselves, and I find this works excellently.”

Taylor reveals that people may be surprised to learn that the sets they see on TV are often difficult to navigate, and that what he captures on set is also used in the Foley process: “Many people don’t realise that the dialogue they hear and the Foley sounds of doors opening, big, loud gates slamming, walkers’ footsteps and the truck engines running are also recorded by us as well during the scenes and placed on Foley tracks for post production,” he discloses.

“I do this because the nature of these special noises and things that happen aren’t easily accessible

later for a Foley recordist to come back and record. Often on this show we could be blowing up a tanker or truck and there’s no other double for the vehicle so it’s imperative we capture all the natural surroundings and sounds of these specialty vehicles during the actual scene because there may be no second chance later.”

The final season of Fear the Walking Dead premieres on May 14, 2023, and after eight seasons, Taylor will miss it. “The best thing about having the opportunity to work on Fear the Walking Dead is the daily challenges it brings,” he smiles. “The sets we build and the crew all work like family; the entire crew looks out for one another and helps when you need anything related to their department.

“Once you have reliable gear that you can count on, it allows me as PSM (production sound mixer) to focus on the task at hand, capturing every piece of the actor’s performance in that moment,” he adds. “That’s what I strive for. To hear Coleman Domingo, who plays Victor Strand, give me a big hug and thank me because he hasn’t had to do ADR or looping for one scene for the entirety of season eight was the best news to share with my team! That’s what I love about Fear the Walking Dead: the actors talk to you and appreciate your work and valiant efforts to capture their performance in all weather conditions. That’s an honour I owe to Lectrosonics,” he concludes.

ROLLSOUND76.COM

LECTROSONICS.COM

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Words by COLBY RA M YES

LIGHTING THE SLOPES

BIGAIR

GLP JDC1 hybrids were used to track skiing and snowboarding tricks on the slopes of Canada’s Big Air Show, as Headliner recently discovered…

Crowds congregate annually at the base of the ‘Smart Alec’ ski trail in Ontario to watch the province’s finest freestyle skiers and snowboarders perform choreographed flips and tricks off the 50ft Big Air Jump, accompanied by music, lights, fireworks and all manner of show sizzle.

The Big Air Show, as the event is known, required the building of a technical infrastructure, with towers rigged with 24 of GLP’s versatile JDC1 hybrid strobes so that spectators could track the action coming down the 200ft slope and onto the landing ramp. The FOH position itself was set 50ft back, behind the video screen.

To make matters more difficult, the Air Jump takes place in the grip of

the Canadian winter, which this year saw three days of snow and rain. Yet the JDC1s, despite not being IP rated, performed flawlessly.

They had been recommended by the lighting designer Andrew Dawson, who also worked on the event last year. He teamed up with old friend and long-term associate Matt Chambers from PSI (Production Service Industries, of St Catharines, Ontario), who served as account manager and show services manager, working through main contractor Cass Audio Productions. The GLP inventory was provided by Toronto-based Christie Lites, while another key figure in the event’s success was dimmer tech Antony Kahil.

After his work on the event last year, Dawson had again been contacted by Cass Audio, and this year he had no doubt that the JDC1 would be the fixture of choice: “I’m the biggest fan of

JDC1 – it’s an absolute workhorse and features in all my designs,” he admits.

It was this versatility that also appealed to Chambers, who had tight control of the purse strings.

“It’s funny – most LDs like to ask for as much as they can in the initial design phase; instead, this time when I asked Andrew what fixtures he wanted, he said 24 JDC1,” says Chambers. “I was quick to agree, as I was aware of its brightness and versatility, which would be key features outdoors.”

This simple requirement also made it extremely budget friendly, and Chambers was well aware of the fixture’s capabilities:

“With the JDC1 I have a wash, a strobe and effect light all in one fixture,” he continues. “It was just so bright, and with so much ambient light to deal with that was essential, they certainly did their job.”

“WITH THE JDC1 I HAVE A WASH, A STROBE AND EFFECT LIGHT ALL IN ONE FIXTURE.”

The prep was arduous, with a two-day build followed by a rehearsal day, five nights of shows and then teardown. This was preceded by four days in pre-viz, which paid dividends, as Chambers explains: “I was able to free draw something prior and scale the landing; comparing the 3D model, it was very close in reality to the pre-viz.”

Four towers were placed on either side of the landing with two free-standing JDC1 in each. The remainder were rigged around the perimeter. The run itself was set at around 42° before flattening out at the landing.

Dawson programmed the fixtures in 68ch Mode 3 to get full creativity, running the show off a grandMA3. “My approach was to keep it clean and simple and high impact,” he says. “I wanted to use them as blinders, wash lights and strobes – and they held up to everything I threw at them. For pixels and general eye candy they were great, and as for side lighting, they produced an impressive wash, with excellent colour rendering which was consistent right across the colour palette. It delivered all the punch and intensity I needed.”

This brought out the carefully choreographed theatricality, manifested by each performer in a series of 40-minute shows. The intro and outro were played to time code but, with each skier having a soundtrack, Dawson would then go into freestyle mode, mixing on the fly as they went through their repertoire of tricks and comedy routines.

Both creatives admit they are generally more at home working in a concert arena. “But when I was asked last year if I wanted to do a show on the side of a ski hill, I realised it wasn’t something we would do every

day,” notes Dawson. “It was fun and we certainly learnt a lot from last year that we could apply to this year. Although this made it much easier, there was still a lot of calculated risk.

“The event was a great success overall and I was extremely happy with the result,” he sums up. “Thanks to its intensity, the JDC1 added so much coverage –following the skiers from the take-off right down the slope to the landing.”

GLP.DE

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DANGUM B EL

GLEN MATLOCK GUN FOR HIRE

Glen Matlock, artist, original Sex Pistol and in-demand musician for hire, released his politically charged new album Consequences Coming on April 28. Headliner caught up with him for a chat about the state of the world, being one of the busiest people in the business, and dreams about Donald Trump and Sly Stone…

“The other day I was in New York doing press for the new album at Sirius Radio and guess what was happening the same day,” a smiling Glen Matlock teases as he joins us from Los Angeles via Zoom. “Donald Trump was going downtown to be arraigned,” he fills us in, “and there were all these helicopters flying around… I thought, Consequences Coming? Not half, mate!”

Currently on the road as a member of Blondie’s touring band, Matlock is in high spirits when Headliner catches up with him during a rare spot of down time. On April 28 he released his new solo album, aptly titled Consequences Coming. It’s a record of which he is rightly proud; a taut, marauding collection of predominantly protest songs that take clear aim at their targets and leave little room for ambiguity, as exemplified by its title track and lead single Head On A Stick.

While its lyrics may deal with Matlock’s ire at Brexit and political turmoil the world over, Consequences Coming is not an album that feels weighed down by its subject matter. It zips along at pace with the same swagger and purpose that makes the man himself such an engaging presence.

Though perhaps best known as the original bassist and songwriter in the Sex Pistols, he has spent the past 40-plus years as something of a troubadour. When not writing and releasing his own material, he is often onstage or in the studio lending his talents to a variety of friends and collaborators. Among them, Iggy Pop, Primal Scream, Faces, and, of course, Blondie.

Photographer: Chris Musto

“It’s been good, I’ve been doing it about a year now,” he says of being on tour with the iconic New York band. “They have a great body of work; Debbie still sings like a bird. They’re interesting. When the punk thing happened, I thought of them more as an artsy pop band in the same way Talking Heads were - pop music with an interesting twist. They’re cool. And in the meantime, for my sins, I’ve made a record that I’m pretty happy with. I’ve been a busy boy.”

In conversation he’s good company – entertaining, charming, and occasionally intense, with a distinct directness in that familiar voice. These qualities often combine, particularly when talking about the motivation behind his new album.

“It’s a small bit of seething resentment on top of another small bit of seething resentment, and soon you get this mountain building up,” he says. “And what can you do about it? You can go on a march, you can sound off on Twitter, which I do, but I have an outlet as a songwriter, and I’m fortunate enough to be able to put songs out. It’s almost like a psychiatrist’s couch I’m sitting on.

“Hopefully a song coming out and people liking it is a bit like being a standard bearer in an army, something for people to rally around. And a lot of people seem to be picking up on what I’m saying. All you can do is keep sniping away at them like gnats or mosquitos until they run off screaming that they can’t take it anymore!”

As we begin to pose the question of whether or not he’d expect more artists to be tackling these issues in such a head-on fashion, he quickly interjects: “I haven’t heard it yet, but a couple of people told me Shakin’ Stevens, of all people, has released a song called All You Need Is Greed!

That shows you how peeved people are getting. I’m sure there’s loads of people doing it.

“The whole Brexit thing is terrible for musicians and everyone. It’s stupid and unsustainable. It won’t last. It’s just a waste of time, money, and effort. Think of all the things that could’ve been done if the energy that has gone into Brexit had been put to something more important. But not all the songs on the album are about politics. It’s a pop rock record; there are some boy girl songs and things like that.”

There are indeed a few romantic numbers thrown into the mix on Consequences Coming, as well as an unlikely reworking of the K.D. Lang classic Constant Craving

“I’ve always liked that song, and I always like to throw in a curveball,”

explains Matlock. “On my last album I did a pretty cracking cover of Montague Terrace (In Blue) by Scott Walker. He did it as a massive, big ballad with a huge orchestra and I did it with Slim Jim Phantom from the Stray Cats. Sometimes, if you’re a limited musician… I like a simple thing done well. And you sometimes try to play a song and there’s all these chord changes and you go ‘bugger that,’ and you find a way of simplifying it. So, I was just in the studio, one of the guys broke the snare skin or something, and I was just strumming away and one of them goes, ‘what’s that?’ I go ‘Constant Craving,’ and they go, ‘that sounds good, let’s have a go at it.’ Also, as well as it being a romantic song, it fits in with the theme of the album. It’s a song about yearning and craving for something better.”

“THE WHOLE BREXIT THING IS TERRIBLE FOR MUSICIANS AND EVERYONE. IT’S STUPID AND UNSUSTAINABLE.”

Photographer: Tina K

With that theme in mind, does he believe that something better could be on the horizon?

“I think things are beginning to come to a head,” he suggests. “As for what’s going to happen next, I don’t know. But what I’d like to see is this horrible pernicious brand of Tories be decimated at the next election. But I should also say I’m not Keir Starmer’s biggest supporter. I think his biggest mistake was not spelling out to everyone what nonsense Brexit is. The most fantastic thing in my life was freedom of movement and that’s been wrenched away.”

As we prepare to finish up and inquire as to what Matlock has lined up for his next project, he throws us a curveball of our own.

“You know what, I had the weirdest dream last night,” he says out of nowhere. “I watched a snip online of Sly and the Family Stone doing that song Thank You. It’s just one groove, one chord all the way through. This was just before I went to bed, and I probably had a bit of cheese as well. And I had this dream where I was in the middle of Trump’s arraignment in a big courthouse and there were all these people coming out of the woodwork to see what was going on, but they had this music playing. And I thought, ‘where’s that coming from?’ And you know where the sound desk is in the middle of a venue? Well, there was a little tent like that in the courthouse, so I stuck my head in and who was the bloke doing the sound? It was Sly Stone. I said, ‘hello, I’m Glen.’ And he goes, ‘I know who you are. I’m just here playing the music,’ and he was playing that song,” he laughs. “There’s something in the water over here!”

Almost out of time and with a hectic schedule ahead of him, we do find a moment to reflect on the career that Matlock has carved out over the past four decades. For an artist still so

affiliated with a very particular era, the scope of what he has achieved is truly something to behold. From his own material to the countless artists he’s collaborated with, he’s amassed a towering body of work.

“When I think about my career, I see my art as being a songwriter and presenting those songs, and my

craft is being a bass player,” he says. “And I’m not bad on the bass, so the phone rings. And it gets you in to all kinds of scrapes. Mostly good ones!”

GLENMATLOCK.CO.UK

Photographer: Tina K

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