The AudioArt Blogs

For the first time in many years I do not have a production gig for bikeweek. I am mixing the evening bands at the Full Moon Saloon on Main Street in Daytona. This is also the first time that I have worked the rally on Main Street. Main Street is the heart of the rally. People tend to go to Main Street first and then spread out to the outlying areas.

There is one band per evening at the Full Moon. There are two acts that are performing during the week. The Saloonatix (YouTube Channel) did the first three  nights and will return Wednesday and Saturday. Hayfire plays Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday nights.

I am using the SAC rig to mix the shows. I have been using my NetBook for a wireless remote. The stage was moved over the winter from the corner, where it has been for several years, back to the short wall on the East end of the building. The mix booth was set up for the corner stage and is now at the side of the stage. I have been mixing from the floor amongst the crowd when I can. The Saturday night crowd was too big to do that, so I mixed from beside the booth.

The battery life on the NetBook is not quite good enough. It has a conventional hard drive, if it had the solid state drive it would probably make it. I can make it most of the way through three hours of music by charging during the breaks, but at some point I become tied to the charger/power supply. At least I can get out to where I can hear the PA some of the time to get a decent mix. I have been getting a lot of looks and comments out in the crowd.

If you get the chance during the rally stop in to the Full Moon Saloon and say hello. The band starts at 8:30 PM and plays until at least 12:30 AM. On the weekend they will play until 2 AM.

Over the weekend I had two gigs. I used the remote functions of my SAC system for the first time. I have a netbook on which I installed the remote software. This was a fun way to work.

Neither of the gigs lent themselves to a conventional set-up. The first was a band gig playing for a fund raiser. At fundraisers the producers never leave space for a mix location. I set the computer up at the side of stage and then went out front with the netbook. It is a great situation. I can mix from anywhere in the room and take up virtually no space. The second was a hip-hop show in a dance club. I could set up a mix location there without a problem, but the crowd would be all over it. I set up the computer on stage, and when it came time for the show I stepped out front with the netbook and mixed the show. At the end of the show I left the venue without worrying about my equipment. It is a beautiful thing to have full control of the mix without being tied to a board.

It would be very nice to have a bit more screen real estate for this, but the netbook is a perfectly viable option. The battery was up to the task as long as I plugged it in during the breaks, although I think that I might get a bit nervous about it if I was doing a 90 minute show. I hope to be able to manage a real laptop at some point.

I have recently returned from a trip to the great Northeast. I made my usual June excursion to the Laconia Motorcycle Rally. The event was an eight day event this year. In years past there was a problem with the first Friday and Saturday of the event in that these were not officially rally days. The noise ordinance kicked in at 10:00 PM. At some point this seems to have changed. For several years there was no outside music scheduled at the ‘Spoke because of the ordinance problem. I did not go up last year because of a date conflict, but Rush told me that the music went on in the tent on Saturday without problem. That was also the case this year.

There were two concerts scheduled this year. The first was Bang Camero on the first Saturday night. The other concert was Edgar Winter on the last Saturday. Between we had the current ‘Spoke schedule of events. There was one other major promotion for this Rally. Jay Allen had set up an East-West build-off between Paul Cox from the East and Chica from the West. The finals were held the last Saturday of the event. Between the Build-off and the Concert I don’t know if I have ever seen more people on property.

I picked up the gig at the Harley Rendezvous this year. This allowed me to spend a couple of leisurely days with my brother, who lives between the events. We had a good visit. My brother always has an interesting outing planned. We went to see a cemetery at Barre, VT. Barre is the home of a granite monument company. The company provides the stone workers a suitable stone and many have carved their own monuments over the years. I took some pictures and will be posting a gallery on Number One Pictures soon. For a change I suggested another outing. There was an impressive local artist with whom I worked a few years ago at the Laconia Rally, Mama Kicks – Lisa Guyer. She has a more or less regular gig in Manchester, NH. I had wanted to catch the show since the time that I worked with her, so we drove down and listened for a while. This was a bar gig on home turf with other featured musicians, so I did not get a full dose of Lisa, but I could certainly see the talent that I remembered.

The Harley Rendezvous is an old biker party. It has been run for the last 38 years. This is a big party on private property near Albany, NY. There were two stages and a Biker Rodeo. Since there was not room in my trailer for a full concert rig and the second rig for the Day Stage, I found a local contractor to cover the events on the day stage. I carried the Concert PA for the Main Stage and the announce system for the Rodeo.

There were two concerts scheduled for the event. The first night was Gator Country, mostly former members of Molly Hatchet. They were not carrying an engineer so I was able to mix the show on my SAC computer. The SAC computer is a full virtual digital mixing environment and is my preferred mixing environment at this time. I did all of the shows in Laconia in the box and all that I mixed at the Rendezvous as well.

The other show was the Kentucky Headhunters. Steve Wilson, KH foh engineer, was tempted to use the SAC system but was not really prepared, so declined. I had attempted to advance the date but had not made contact with them. I have worked with them many times over the years, so advancing the date was not a big deal, but I would have alerted Steve to the digital option and suggested that he check out the demo.

There was one bit of excitement on this trip. Of course, it is always hard to get out of Daytona. I got on the road in the late evening instead of the morning of my departure date. I drove until it was ill-advised to carry on and then pulled into the first rest area in North Carolina. When I woke up I pressed on toward my goal. This dumped me into New York City at around 5:30 PM. That is not the time that you would want to drive through the city and southern Connecticut.  It took over an hour and a half to go probably around 30 miles before the traffic began to thin and move a little better. I made the first rest area in Rhode Island and pulled in for some more sleep.

I proceeded toward my goal in the rain when I awoke in the morning. I made it past Boston and finally got to New Hampshire. I got on I-93 and proceed deeper into the North country. About 30 miles south of Laconia there was a clunk and a jerk. I looked into the mirror to see my 8 and a half by 20 foot trailer growing smaller. I applied some brake to the truck and the trailer began to get bigger again, too fast. The hitch had broken and the trailer was loose. I have around $150,000 invested in the concert rig and had a significant chunk of work scheduled on the trip. This could have been a major personal disaster.

This is the truly amazing part of the story. As chance would have it the trailer broke loose as I was approaching an exit on the Interstate. The trailer rolled straight but followed the crowning of the road. The trailer took the exit, narrowly missing the exit sign. There is a lot of granite in the North-East and they use granite blocks for curb stones along the exits. The trailer straddled the curb on the Interstate side of the exit and rode to a stop. I got off the Interstate and looked the situation over. I then drove into town and was directed to the local Advanced Auto Parts store where I picked up a new hitch, a new ball, and a hitch wrench. I also picked up a replacement safety chain to replace the one that had broken (the second chain had popped off, probably when the first broke).

With the replacement parts in hand I went back out to the trailer. I jacked it up and got it on the new hitch. The wiring had been cut when the trailer was riding the curb, so I went to the service station that had directed me to the auto parts store. They provided me with some butt splices and the crimping tool to repair the wiring. There was a local man that had offered help in jacking the trailer while I was getting things back together. I tipped both him and the service station mechanic $5.00 and spent about $60.00 at the auto parts store. There was no damage to any of my equipment, but I should have the frame member that rode the curb reinforced.

This whole episode took around an hour to resolve, after which I proceeded on to Laconia. I unloaded the trailer and proceeded about my business there.

Yesterday I participated in a benefit for a local musician who has been stricken with a serious illness that is preventing him from working. Reuben ‘The Lounge Lizard’ Morgan has been part of the local music scene for many years. He has played locally and generally promoted live music in the area. The community held a fund raiser to help out with his expenses while he is unable to work. I was pleased to be invited to mix the sound for the main stage at this event.

I took the new SAC rig down to the venue and tied it in with the house system. This was my third time out with the rig. I am beginning to find my way around without problems, but I have only scratched the surface of the capibilities of this virtual mixing system. There were 9 acts that performed on the main stage within a 10 hour time peroid. The show went smooth as there were plenty of experienced volenteer stage hands available and there was provided backline so that set changes were quick.

The SAC rig performed flawlessly through out the day. The sound is very well defined. With the experience that I now have I can tell that this system is going to be a pleasue to use. Things will only get better as I gain more experience with using the system. Things become easier and I learn more each time that I use the system. The work flow becomes more natural and I do not have to think as much about how to do the things that I want to do. I had never had opportunity to mix on any of the hardware digital systems prior to putting this virtual system in service. I have been strictly analog up to this time. The digital workflow is a bit of an adjustment for me.

One thing that has amazed me about the system is the reaction that I see from both the musical community and the crowd in general. Everyone thinks that this is a natural way to do sound in these times. There are a lot of ooh’s and aah’s about the system and the GUI. One other thing that I have noticed is that noone has asked if I know what each of those knobs (as in big hardware) do. Most of them do not realize how much hardware is replaced by the Mixer In A Box.