The timing of a key equipment investment can be as important a factor as the purchase itself. Patience has served Subfrantic well, with the arrival of DiGiCo Quantum 225 and Quantum Pulse 338 consoles with 32 Bit SD Racks proving as timely as they are welcome additions to the busy company.
Founded in 1993, Subfrantic is a South London-based production house supplying high-end solutions to a long client list that includes houses of worship, live events, festivals, touring, conferences and even floats for the Notting Hill Carnival.
Subfrantic Studios, developed post-pandemic in 2021, is the company’s rehearsal and recording facility which shares a warehouse and rental inventory with the production side of the business. The studios are a set of unique spaces for touring musicians and technicians, but also support upcoming artists and engineers. The building has been designed around the needs of the whole team, providing facilities for work and wellbeing which are a real bonus for touring engineers and artists.
‘We’ve been waiting for a good opportunity to get back into DiGiCo since selling our SD8 a few years ago, and the Quantum series felt like the right moment for us,’ says Managing Director, Steve Davies. ‘DiGiCo is a market-leading console for live acts, and where we’ve previously lost out on touring artists coming to our studios because we weren’t able to offer them one, now that hole is plugged.’
The mixing desk of choice for many live engineers, their attraction for Subfrantic was also the ability to use the consoles across a range of different performance settings.
The Macro and Set Spill features allow engineers to quickly reset for any situation and compatibility across the range means that converting older show files to the newer Quantum 225 and 338 is hassle free for visiting engineers. ‘DiGiCo is a professional standard that people want and expect to see,’ Davies says. ‘Engineers like the familiarity across the range and the unique features they offer, especially the new Nodal Processing found in Quantum. I’m looking forward to getting to know these better from behind the consoles, including Klang integration and the Pulse update which we are rolling out over the next few weeks.’
The consoles are already demonstrating how useful they can be, with Davies confirming that both the Quantum 225 and 338 will be heading out on tour with The WAEVE, Graham Coxon from Blur’s other band, in May. ‘The band will be supporting Elbow in arenas around the country for a couple of weeks,’ he says. ‘I’ll be on monitors, with regular
Engineers know that DiGiCo consoles are stable and reliable, but if anything happens on tour Davies knows he has a great support network to fall back on. Core Audio, who supplied the consoles, are authorised DiGiCo Dealers and Davies is keen to expand on the relationship so far.
‘We’ve always had fantastic service from Core,’ he concludes. ‘We have a great relationship; they provided us with our Quantum 225, and they’ve now supplied us with the larger format console, too, so we’ve got both options covered. And as they’re so popular, we’re expecting to make duplicate orders later in the year.’
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