English musician Steven Wilson is currently circling the globe with The Overview tour, an ambitious live multimedia and concert production featuring an immersive L-Acoustics sound system – the first half of the show centres on the two pieces that comprise his latest album and the second features songs from his prolific solo career, performed with band of deft prog musicians.
Having recently wrapped up two months on the road in Europe, Wilson has now set his sights on shows in North, Central and South America, with India and Australia to follow through the remainder of the year.
Wilson’s latest album, The Overview, explores the relationship between humans and the universe. On its European leg, the tour visited a mix of theatres, amphitheatres, and arenas carrying an L-Acoustics rig provided by Britannia Row Productions. The standard set-up comprised up to three L2 over one L2D flown per side with KS28 subwoofers on the floor and an assortment of A15 and A10 enclosures for various out-fill and front-fill.
A celebrated songwriter, producer and Grammy-nominated audio remixer, Wilson is recognised for his 5.1 and Dolby Atmos mixing prowess on both his own music and catalogue releases from other artists. This tor presents his live music in surround via eight L-Acoustics Syva speakers, connected wirelessly.
‘I find that L-Acoustics loudspeakers are extremely musical, the most musical boxes out there, and sound right for the way I mix,’ says FOH engineer Alessandro Melchior, who is also a consultant for the manufacturer’s L-ISA technology. He has been mixing on the immersive platform since 2017 and met Wilson during an L-ISA demo.
‘I wanted something that was easy to rig and offered consistency. Steven’s fans are audio fanatics and very demanding, and Steven also knows exactly what he wants,’ he continues.
Melchior modelled some of the tour’s venues for L2/L2D using L-Acoustics Soundvision software. ‘I discovered it was not only going to work, it was going to make our life a lot easier in terms of tour logistics and deployment,’ he reports.
But, while Melchior was familiar with the L Series system, he hadn’t yet worked with it much. ‘I needed a System Engineer that really got the idea of the L2 and what it’s all about, and how you should deploy it,’ he says. Dan Fathers, who toured with Rag’n’Bone Man with an L Series rig similar in size to Wilson’s, was the ideal choice. He had also worked with the system at the Eurovision Song Contest and on multiple Brit Awards, including the world’s first L Series deployment with Brit Row when it was an L-Acoustics pilot partner for the new product.
‘L2 goes up super quick,’ notes Fathers, who has also worked with You and Me at Six, The Killers, Pearl Jam, Royal Blood and Foo Fighters in the past few years. ‘I’m quite used to flying PAs on my own, and hanging L Series is pretty much a one-man job, especially if you’re flying from two points. On a single point, depending on how much up-tilt you’ve got, it can be more of a challenge,’ but monitor engineer Luca Romani would help in those situations, he says.
With the tour visiting venues of all shapes and sizes, it was decided that the most efficient method for feeding signals to the amplifiers powering the Syva surrounds, typically stand-mounted or flown, would be over a Milan-AVB signal path and via RF. ‘It was Brit Row’s idea to do it over RF, just in case we couldn’t run the cable, and it became the norm quite quickly,’ Fathers says. ‘It was a lot easier than running 150m of cable all the way upstairs.’
Wireless signal distribution, using Shure transmitters and receivers, was not only more efficient but also offered flexibility when Fathers and Melchior were faced with having to modify their planned surround layout on the fly at any given venue.
Once the band had finished their soundcheck, Melchior and Fathers would spend a few minutes optimising the system for the surround content. After tuning the main hangs using the L-Acoustics P1 AVB processor: ‘We’d do a virtual playback to ensure that the surrounds aren’t too loud, adding a bit more delay to make it match up with the video content, and generally making sure that they’re bringing depth, nuance, and immersive engagement to Steven’s complex compositions.’
‘The system sounds absolutely incredible in the middle, but I also want to provide a positive experience for people that are right next to it,’ Melchior says. ‘We want to make the sweet spot as big as we possibly can. We do some of the tricks that we use when we have a full L-ISA configuration as well, like virtually pushing it back an extra 15ms or 20ms, to make it coherent for a lot more people. You’re not aligning to anything; it just needs to be musical, and it is.’
Of working with Wilson, Melchior says: ‘It was never just about the sound, it was about re-envisioning the whole stage layout, the whole audio department. I completely restructured everything, even the playback system. This is the first tour in his career where everybody is on in-ears, because we wanted the stage as clean as possible.’
‘Alessandro wanted it quiet on stage, so we were doing cardioid subs pretty much everywhere. On stage, out of the L2 dispersion pattern, there would be nothing. It was quiet unless you got slapback from the room,’ Fathers says. ‘In certain venues, like Manchester, we won’t have room to do cardioid, so choose end-fire configuration instead – two, two, and two, so six a side – which works quite well.’
‘We wanted pristine sources from the stage,’ he adds, ‘because I was adamant about having a very clear and stable gain structure. If something isn’t right, we’ll sort it at the source.’
‘Steven is a musical genius. He’s got an incredible ear and is one of today’s top mixing engineers. His shows have to sound fantastic. He knows what he needs to deliver to make that happen, and L2 and Syva are both a huge part of achieving that level of excellence for Steven and for his audience each night.’