SSE Hire gave its new L-ACOUSTICS K1 system its first airing at the Download Festival at Donington Park on 12-14 June, providing sound reinforcement for the main stage.
The new system was an immediate success and contributed to what all agree was the best ever Download - the festival has already been named ‘Event Of The Year’ at this year’s Metal Hammer Golden Gods Awards. The ceremony took place at the Indigo2 at London’s 02 Dome, just 24 hours after Def Leppard closed the Download Festival with a momentous performance on the Main Stage.
This year, organisers Live Nation were determined to make as much history as possible, with a line-up boasting the reformed Faith No More, the 10th anniversary of Slipknot's debut, Limp Bizkit, one of Thunder's final shows and of course, Def Leppard's return to Donington, after 23 years.
"We made history last weekend on two counts." says Download boss and Live Nation Chief Operating Officer, John Probyn. "First, we produced the best rock festival that the world has ever seen and second, we listened to it through the best PA system anyone has heard!"
He continued: "Comments from bands, agents, managers, environmental health officers and the public have been amazing! Please pass on my thanks to Pete Russell and all your crew that helped us make history!"
The system certainly made an impact with all the bands' engineers.
"Every single engineer had something good to say about the system - that's something I've never known before" said Project Manager Pete Russell, who put the job together once again this year, assisted by the rest of the SSE Hire team.
Tim Cleasby, who engineered Skin and Stone Gods said: "The system sounded great for both bands I mixed on the Sunday; loads of balls and plenty of clarity. I loved it from the first kick drum hit. It provided great coverage throughout the field so there were no worries about anyone complaining about not being able to hear.The SSE crew were as usual top notch and very accommodating and made my life very easy."
"It was great working with SSE and I thought the K1 system at Download was amazing!" said Adam Correia, FOH Engineer for DOWN. "It was great sounding, loud and clear. I was able to feel the subs at FOH which I love. Great stuff! I look forward to the next opportunity I get to mix on it."
"The System was HUGE and in your face - it made mixing a pleasure! Every band I saw sounded great" said James McCullagh, FOH engineer for Journey.
The layout of the site was completely changed from the previous year, so the audio system design also had to be reconsidered. This was done by SSE Hire's Miles Hillyard with the assistance of L-ACOUSTICS SOUNDVISION acoustical simulation software.
"Obviously the objective is to deliver as much sound as possible, as evenly as possible, to the audience areas, while minimising noise off-site" says Miles Hillyard.
Live Nation asked audio consultants Vanguardia to do a noise pollution prediction based on the new layout and the audio system design from the previous year.
"The modelling we did in conjunction with SSE showed that the stage relocation was likely to adversely affect a small group of properties near the site." says Deni Butterfield, Principal Acoustic Consultant with Vanguardia.
"It's very useful to predict noise issues in advance so the event promoter can liaise with the local authority and address possible problems with local people before they arise."
The initial predictions were based on a V-DOSC system and showed that levels would need to be restricted to 98dB 15 minute Leq at FOH to keep within licensing requirements.
Following the redesign of the system by SSE using K1, the predictive data looked very encouraging with a 2dB decrease at off site monitoring areas while achieving 102dB(A) at FOH.
SSE Hire's trucks arrived on site on Wednesday morning and the system was up and running by Wednesday evening, ready for full testing at Midday on Thursday.
The system actually deployed comprised two main L-ACOUSTICS K1 hangs left and right of stage, each with 12 K1, 6 K1 subs and 12 SB28s in cardioid configuration. The system was supplemented by outer hangs with 8 KUDO per side.
"The K1Subs at the top of the arrays were very effective at helping us to achieve a controlled tonal balance across the site. We also utilised the mechanically-adjustable K-Louvers on the KUDO boxes, which helped us to optimise the coverage and blend in with the V-DOSC delays" says Miles.
Two outer delay towers were positioned 80 metres apart and 85 metres from the stage carrying 8 V-DOSC and 2 dV-DOSC on each, plus a centre delay using 9 KUDO.
"I was really impressed with the sub configuration", James McCullagh continued, "huge punch out front and great cancellation on stage. A lot of people are trying the cardioid sub thing and not everyone is successful. Well done to SSE and all their staff on a fantastic sounding PA!"
ZZ Top FOH Engineer, Toby Francis said:
"As always your crew was top notch. I thought the PA sounded great and was very easy to get a big full sound quickly. And If you counted the number of boxes that produced that big sound, you were even more impressed. I can't wait to use it again."
"It's my new favourite system - don't wanna use anything else. Blows the competition out of the water" said David (Shirt) Nicholls Slipknot FOH engineer.
Neil McDonald Live Nation Production Manager for Download was equally fulsome in his praise: "I was eagerly awaiting the chance to hear the K1 in action and it certainly didn't disappoint. Quick to rig, great looking and most importantly had power, clarity, definition and control."
Following the event, Deni Butterfield from Vanguardia said "We understand that the EHOs from North West Leicestershire District Council were very happy indeed with the way the weekend went. We still need to analyse the data we collected, but initial indications are that the actual measurements were very close to the predictive model, which is great."
More information on : www.sseaudiogroup.com
Except courtesy of SSE HIRE
Photo credit: SSE HIRE