Having used various lightweight, portable mixing consoles with Danish pop band Lukas Graham without finding quite what he wanted, FOH engineer Frank Grønbæk was treated to a demonstration of Solid State Logic’s System T Tempest Control App, TE1 processing engine and 16-channel Fader Tile – and witnessed the power and agility he required. A

Available in pre-configured packages that include Fader Tile(s), Tempest Control App, and Tempest DSP Engine, TCA Packs’are designed for flypack and backup systems, or studio production where space is a consideration.

Grønbæk has worked with Lukas Graham since 2012, and is also a live and studio product specialist at Nordic Pro Audio, one of SSL’s partners in Denmark. The band’s monitor engineer, Rasmus Valentin, also works for Alfa Audio, SSL’s live sound products distribution partner for Denmark. ‘We’re both involved with the same band, but we’re also involved with the same brand,’ Grønbæk says.

In Grønbæk’s custom-configured FOH package, a System T 16-channel Furniture Fader Tile and a dedicated touchscreen are housed in a custom case. A single-rack-space SSL TE1 Tempest Engine, which supports up to 256 paths, is paired with a custom-configured Windows-based computer running the Tempest Control App.

The TCA Flypack is interfaced to an outboard hardware interface managing routing and matrixing in and out of the set-up, as well as a hardware processor providing multi-zone PA management. A Mac Mini computer acts as a server, hosting plug-ins and presets that Grønbæk has developed during more than a decade with Lukas Graham, and additionally runs sound level measurement and metering apps.

‘We travel a lot and do as many as 90 gigs a year, all over the world,’ Grønbæk says. ‘We need to be able to travel light when we fly, so the weight can never exceed 32kg for the whole rack. But we also want to maintain a high level of audio quality and consistency. It doesn’t matter if we’re playing a festival for 30,000 people, a showcase for 500 people or a morning TV show, it has to sound exactly the same all the time.’

Despite the high channel count supported by the TE1 Tempest Engine, Lukas Graham’s stage set-up demands relatively few inputs. ‘We have a drum kit and a bunch of microphones for vocals, so about 16 of the 40 or 45 channels coming from the stage are mic level,’ Grønbæk explains.

The wireless bass passes via Dante to the console while the wireless guitar is fed over AES/EBU. The outputs from the computers driving the Midi keyboards are routed to FOH via Madi. The support tracks playback rig is also networked over Dante to FOH. ‘Being able to route everything from the TCA touchscreen is brilliant, and a workflow which is unique to SSL,’ says Grønbæk.

When mixing, Grønbæk typically has the system configured with VCAs on the top fader layer. The link between the physical faders and the touchscreen can be disengaged, allowing him to focus on the faders yet still adjust other channels on the touchscreen. It’s also a simple matter to take control of an onscreen channel from an encoder on the Fader Tile, he notes.

Lukas Graham is a two-piece comprising lead vocalist Lukas Forchhammer and drummer Mark Falgren that is supplemented on stage with additional musicians and backing tracks. Because the show is time code-based, Grønbæk uses snapshot automation. When playing festivals or fly-dates where there is insufficient time to optimise the PA before the band take the stage, Grønbæk has the time code triggering a variety of snapshots so that he can make fader moves with one hand while trimming the speaker system with his other on a separate touchscreen during the first few songs.

System T has two faders per channel, ‘so whenever there’s a new song, there’s a new level on fader two, but fader one stays at unity gain – all my faders are flat at 0dB, but the other fader is doing all the automation underneath’.

Grønbæk first took his TCA console out on a US tour with Lukas Graham in January 2024, followed by dates in the UK in March, then eight nights at the same venue in Denmark around Easter. ‘When I started touring, I had beta software, but it has always been super stable,’ he reports. The band is playing festivals across Europe this summer.

More: www.solidstatelogic.com