With their All In Good Time released and several large festival and one-off arena gigs under their collective belt in 2015, Dutch band Racoon began 2016 with an extensive tour of intimate theatres around The Netherlands. Engineers Marty Brugmans and Jelmer Dijkstra accompanied them, both using SSL Live consoles – Brugmans taking an L500 for FOH and Dijkstra using an L300 for monitors. Both consoles have been supplied by Dutch hire and events production company, Stagelight, and are use Dante AoIP network technology for audio transport.
Brugmans was an early adopter of SSL Live technology, having used the L500 on several large-scale events. His move to the SSL platform was triggered by dissatisfaction with the quality of summing and processing on other live consoles: ‘The first time I used it, everything became clear – everything you do comes out of the PA,’ he says. ‘SSL brings a transparent, uncompromised audio quality.’
With a wide variety of acoustic instruments on stage for Racoon – including guitars, a grand piano and two drum kits – Brugmans has to be certain of his signal path. Underlining his confidence in the SSL Live, he has left many of his boutique mic preamps and outboard processing at home, opting for the console’s SuperAnalogueT inputs, full-featured channel processing, and internal FX Rack instead. ‘I’m using a lot of the SSL processing – I especially like the channel dynamics, with the Tube emulation,’ he explains. ‘With other consoles, I just use the faders.’
The SSL L500 console offers 256 channel paths (208 fully processed, 48 dry) at 96kHz, with Channel, Stem Group, Aux, and Master channel and bus types. Processed channels have hi- and lo-pass filters, four-band parametric EQ (switchable between Legacy or constant Q), compressor with tube ‘warmth’ effect), expander/gate, delay, panning, and an all pass filter. The FX Rack can host up to 96 individual effects instances with comprehensive routing options in six racks that feature independent solo bus selection.
Brugmans uses snapshots throughout the shows, a strategy that he says could cause him problems with other consoles. ‘Every day we’re in a new venue and everything about the environment changes, but this console sounds so great,’ he says. ‘It’s so close every time that we can trust the snapshots. It’s really wonderful.’
More: www.solidstatelogic.com
