June 2010

HK Audio selected by Remedy Sound for comedian Rhod Gilbert Shows

Celebrated welsh comedian Rhod Gilbert, and creator of the fictional Welsh village of Llanbobl,  has recently completed a series of shows which included a stint at St. David's Hall in Cardiff, and culminated in two nights at the Hammersmith Apollo, London, which were filmed for an upcoming Channel 4 DVD release.

Luton-based, tour and concert specialists Remedy Sound were asked to provide FOH audio solutions for these very different and complex scenarios.
“The most challenging thing about the St. David's Hall venue is that the audience area goes right around the sides of the stage so a very wide angle of dispersion is required to hit every seat evenly" says Remedy Sound owner and MD Andy Pullinger. "Combining this with acoustics designed for acoustic performance makes for a complicated set-up. With the pick point for the speakers lower than the highest seating, we had to trick the array into firing at an upwards angle to cover them” .

With this in mind, Andy had no hesitation in specifying HK Audio Concert Sound products. "We used 4 x HK Audio CDR210C and 5 x CDR108 ground stacked on each side of the stage to cover the lower level of audience" explains Andy, "and in the air we had 2 main hangs each comprising of 2 x HK Audio CDR210C subs and 7 x HK Audio CDR108 and then 2 additional out-fill hangs comprising of  2 x HK CTA208 a side. Rhod needs to be able to hear himself clearly in these larger halls to try and combat some of the horrible reflections you get in venues of this size.  In-ear monitors are not possible as he needs to be able to hear the audience and respond to them quickly. For this show I chose 4 x HK CT108’s placed along the front of the stage as wedges because of their low profile.  I also used 2 x HK CT112 as side fills to add some weight to the stage sound. The show also involves photo and video projection which has to be delivered perfectly for comedy effect. Simon Mason, Rhod’s tour manager looks after this backstage so I made sure he could hear what was happening by giving him an HK CT112 as monitor."

Amplification for the entire system comprised of 3 x Lab.gruppen FP10000QSP and 1 x FP13000.  The speaker processors were 2 x HK Audio FIRNET’s and 2 x HK Audio DSM2060 Andy continues, "The front of house console was an Allen and Heath iDR48 and T112 hired in for the show. We used a wireless router on the stage that was networked to the desk and the speaker processors which meant we could walk to any seat in the venue with a wireless laptop and not only mix the show but also have complete access to the processors.  This meant we could change system zone eq, delay etc, we even had the itunes remote app on an iphone so we could controlling what tracks we were listening to as we walked around. There’s no excuse these days for an engineer not to walk the venue and ensure that every audience area is receiving the correct amount of coverage.”

However, for the Hammersmith Apollo shows, a new set of criteria needed to be met, as Andy explains. “This show was quite different to the one at St David’s Hall as it was being filmed for a DVD release. There was a lot more lighting but under no circumstances could anything be put on the front of the stage. This made things tricky as Rhod would need to have clear monitoring but it would have to be placed a long way away from him.  For this I chose to place 2 x HK CT112’s on yokes high up in the air on a truss above the stage pointing directly down.  Again I also placed 2 x CT112’s as side fills.  I was really impressed with their throw and clarity at a distance.  The whole system was again powered by Lab Gruppen’s with the HK processing and an iLive on foh. The Front of House system was different to St David’s Hall as it didn’t require such a wide angle of dispersion so the out-fills were dropped. The system comprised of 4 x CDR210C subs and 5 x CDR108 a side, ground stacked on the front of the stage.  In the air we had 2 x CDR210C subs and 11 x CDR108 a side with 1 x CT112 a side as front fill. All in all both shows were a great success with clear audience coverage and lots of laughs.”

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