The hours are long, the work is hard, days off
are rare and family time is limited. You live in
a rolling submarine for months at a stretch,
in close proximity to a dozen other guys, eat
whatever the catering room prepares—and
you can forget about sick leave or benefits. In
this economy, chances are you’re also pulling
double duty as tour manager. You’re the front
of house engineer: the alpha and omega of
what the band sounds like onstage. There’s a
lot more to FOH than knowing when to turn
up or how to run the signal chain. Knowing
how to control the mix is key, but you also
need people skills and grace under pressure—
because there will always be pressure. Five
front of house engineers, mixing for five very
different artists, spoke to Premier Guitar about
the rewards of the gig, the challenges they
face, why they do it and what it takes, professionally
and personally, to be the best.
Doug Nightwine is tour manager and front
of house engineer for Shinedown, and a
respected veteran in his field. Joining him
is his longtime colleague, guitar tech Galen
Henson. The two met 12 years ago when
Nightwine was Joe Satriani’s tour manager
and Henson was Satriani’s rhythm guitarist.
Shinedown is currently performing in arenas
and theaters, playing two-hour
shows on a
three-nights-on,
one-night-off
schedule.
Kevin Padilla is front of house engineer
for Sick Puppies and Hurt, with whom Sick
Puppies shared a summer co-headlining
tour.
When Hurt went on break, Padilla joined Sick
Puppies. “It worked out perfectly,” he says.
“I went from one tour bus to the next.” Since
he began his music career as a guitarist,
Padilla understands the instrument’s place in
the mix, which is crucial in this case because
there are only three musicians onstage and
every note has to count.
Shawn Hammer is front of house engineer
and tour manager for Adelitas Way, whose
selftitled
debut was produced by Johnny K.
With two guitarists coming from two different
schools of rock, Hammer—whose resume
includes a year and a half as drum and monitor
tech for 10 Years—has the challenge of
separation and balance on both sides of the
stage, in both arenas and clubs.
Billy Kirk is front of house engineer for
Blackberry Smoke, a two-guitar
country/
rock/bluegrass/blues band that Dann Huff
saw playing in a club and decided to produce
before they even had a record deal.
Kirk also has a background in monitors,
and has worked with Patti LaBelle for the
past 11 years, in addition to stints with
Eric Benet and Vanessa Williams. When we
caught up with Kirk, Blackberry Smoke was
on tour with Lynyrd Skynyrd, and preparing
for a stunning 22-date
back-to-back
run of
their own in Europe.
Hugh Johnson is in his 21st year as front of
house engineer for Vince Gill and is Gill’s
production manager. Johnson also taught Live
Sound Reinforcement at Belmont University
in Nashville. An English major/Broadcasting
minor from East Carolina University in
Greenville, NC, Johnson credits “the school of
hard knocks” for his music industry education.
Doug Nightwine
SHINEDOWN
What’s your background in front of house?
I grew up in Memphis, Tennessee. The public
school system had a vocational tech program
that offered a recording class. I got to spend
three hours a day for the whole year in a small
studio. I fell in love with it immediately. My
teacher had working relationships with techs
and engineers who had worked on a lot of the
Stax and American Records stuff. He hooked
me up with internships with several of the studios
in town. I was 17 or 18, and it’s the only
thing I’ve been doing ever since.
What does it take for a front of house engineer
to earn the trust of his band?
That can be tricky. Fortunately, I have a long
career record, so it’s easy for people to check
up on me. Then it comes down to the feedback
that the band hears from other people. If
they talk to fans after the show and they say it
sounded great, then you’re good.
Tell us about Shinedown’s equipment, setup
and signal chain.
Zach [Myers] uses a two-channel rig: clean and
dirty. The dirty is a Diezel Herbert into a pair of
Mesa Boogie 4x12s. The clean is an Ashdown
350 bass amp. We wanted a loud, punchy,
clean sound that didn’t break up. We have two
Shure 57 mics on each amp; it’s the perfect mic
for loud rock and roll guitar. I don’t do much,
EQ-wise. I high pass to 160Hz and low pass
to around 5kHz. That way I can turn it way up
and it’s not piercing. I prefer to dull down and
turn up so that it doesn’t fight with the vocal. I
use Palmer speaker simulators in line with the
clean, pan both mics to 10:00 and the clean
Palmer to 2:00, add a little bit of delay to align
them; about half a foot of delay. You have to
play with it because it depends on any number
of things. The dirty is panned more to 9:00
and 3:00 or 7:00 and 5:00. Then I bring in the
Palmer in the middle and push it up until it fills.
The Palmers, in this situation, are a little too
bright for me, so I just put a little of that in the
middle. If the mics are at 100 percent, it’s 60 to
70 percent added into the middle. The board is
a Digidesign Profile rig. The onboard compressor
takes a little edge off the top. I don’t use
any delay or anything else on the guitars. The
key to a loud and in-your-face guitar mix is to
take the top and bottom end frequencies off
because you don’t need those frequencies at
high volume. I run a little bit of support track
of strings and piano when he goes to solo, but
a little goes a long way and I don’t want to be
able to pick that out in the mix.
What happens when the crowd comes in and
changes the balance?
I tune the PA with Soundgarden’s “Outshined,”
Seal’s “Dreaming in Metaphors” and Sting’s “If
I Ever Lose My Faith.” Soundgarden is a big,
powerful rock track with heavy vocals and guitars.
I smooth out the high mids in the PA at the
1.6kHz–3.15kHz range. It can be really harsh,
and that’s where Brent’s powerful voice really
builds up. Seal gets the bottom end and lowmid
stuff balanced. At that point, the Sting track
should sound nice and huge and pristine, if I’ve
done my job right. Then doors open, the show
starts. When the set change into Shinedown
comes, I use the Soundgarden track again.
I have my reference with the room full and I
can hear what’s changed. Mostly, the top end
responds consistently. The bottom end can fool
you on how it does and doesn’t tighten up.
How does size of venue affect sound?
I’m fortunate enough to get a fairly consistent
mix across any sort of PA. There are concessions
and compromises you have to make, but the
overall sound does not change dramatically. A
lot of that is in the experience of having worked
with the worst bands, clubs and PA. In those situations,
some days you do nothing, some days
you EQ the hell out of it, and knowing how bad
it can be, you suck it up and get it done.
How much of your job is technical expertise,
and how much is knowing and understanding
the band?
Certainly, the more familiar you are with the
band, the better. You can hear what’s not there
and turn up the parts that are missing. It has to
be musical. You have to be able to adjust things,
leave space around things and listen. I pick out
what Eric [Bass] is doing on the bass, and what
Barry [Kerch] is doing on the bass drum or hihat.
Some people don’t listen musically; they
concentrate on one guitar or one bass or one
hi-hat. None of those things should be on top
unless it’s time... it has to fit with the song and
in its own place as well, and you have to make
space in the kick drum in the low mid and put a
boost from the bass so that the two instruments
don’t fight for the same sonic space.
What does it take to be a good front of
house engineer?
You need a solid understanding of the gear.
That doesn’t mean you need to be able to
take it apart and fix it, but that does help. The
biggest mistake I see is in gain structure. The
idea is you are transferring electrical current
into acoustic output. How it goes through the
chain is your gain structure. You need proper
gain structure because the system protects itself
along the way. Push the master fader to zero,
the kick drum to zero, push it up, build around,
know your limitations, don’t choke yourself in
the wrong places. Again, it comes back to listening
musically and knowing that your kick drum
isn’t the loudest thing in the mix. It’s the foundation,
and you build everything else on top of
that. Technical knowledge is important, but I’ll
take a guy who’s listening musically any day.
Kevin Padilla
SICK PUPPIES
What is your background in front of house?
I started out playing guitar in bands. A lot of
techs start out that way. Being a tech was a
backup plan for my “rock star” goal, and I fell
I love with it and never looked back. I believe
that to be a tech, you either have it in you or
you don’t.
Tell us about Sick Puppies’ equipment, setup
and signal chain.
Shim [Shimon Moore, guitar] has a cool setup.
He uses a Gibson ES-335, two Marshall 4x12
cabs with Marshall heads, and a Dual Super Lead
100-watt head going stereo through all the pedals.
I’m mic’ing the guitar twice for stereo imaging.
He also uses a boost pedal. Emma [Anzai,
bass] has two 8x10 cabs, with one as a sub and
one full range, for a lot of low end and good
stage volume. I mic her 8x10 with a Shure Beta
52 and a direct line out of an Avalon U5 DI. It’s
a standard, good-sounding DI. I blend the signal
between that and an onstage mic for good
top and low end, and clarity. I use a Beta 58 for
Shim’s vocal and a Beta 87A for Emma’s vocal. I
have Shure SM 57s on the guitars. They’ve been
around forever; they’re workhorse mics and they
sound great. At the board I’m using a Digidesign
VENUE Profile console, and it sounds great. It
has everything from compression to effects all
built in. It’s an awesome console. I’ve been using
a compressor plug-in called Smack!. I put it on
the stereo bus to tighten it up.
What happens when the crowd comes in and
changes the balance?
The console has individual channels, so we can
mix down. No matter the size of the venue or
the crowd, you’re always going to have reflective
surfaces: hardwood or cement. The crowd
always changes the sound, usually for the better
because they soak up the room reverb and
tighten up the room. The more you do this,
the more comfortable you get with the situation,
and no matter how much you do this,
there’s always going to be a technical problem
at some point. It’s a fact of life and it happens
to everybody. With experience, you learn to be
calm, focused, and you know what needs to be
done in the shortest amount of time. There’s no
second-guessing. You just make it happen. You
know how to pull channels up on the fly. You
have 15 minutes to do a set change and line
checks. You get comfortable.
How does size of venue affect sound?
Stage volume is really important. A lot of guitarists
think they have to be on 11 for their guitar
to sound good. That was in the old days. Now
there’s a sweet spot you can get to with volume,
but you don’t need to be as loud as you can. In
a smaller room, you can get good levels onstage
and not kill the people in the front row. It can be
too loud even without a PA. In smaller venues,
guitarists should use lower stage volume and
make it up in the monitors so they don’t injure
people with their guitar signals. That actually
makes the band’s overall mix much better.
How much of your job is technical expertise,
and how much is knowing and understanding
the band?
Technical knowledge is a big part because it
definitely changes the way you do a mix, and
you have to know how to EQ everything. But
if you’re mixing a band you’ve never heard of
and don’t know their sound, it might make you
want to add, for example, a lot of attack to a
kick, like a metal band. If it’s country, that’s not
going to work. Knowing the dynamics of when
to get loud, the mic techniques—a lot of little
things you might think aren’t really important
actually are.
Do you control the entire mix?
It’s all in my hands. The band has a Yamaha 01V
onstage for in-ear monitors, so they have monitor
control. They also use wedges.
What does it take for a front of house engineer
to earn the trust of his band?
It takes being with them long enough, and talking
with them after the shows. They hear things
from onstage that you don’t. There’s a level of
comfort that can only be reached with time.
You also get feedback from the fans, who say,
“It sounded great,” or “This is too loud.” That
feedback matters.
In some rooms, every band sounds horrible.
The audience walks out complaining that
the band “needs a new sound guy.” It all
falls on you.
Yes, in some places it does, because a lot of
times the sound of the actual room is the last
thing that club owners think about. They have
concrete or tin walls and roofing, or they didn’t
spend a lot on a PA. That’s always the last thing
they think about, ironically. You work with terrible
PAs and the worst possible rooms. I’ve
toured for eight years, and there’s almost never
a perfect situation. Most clubs don’t sound
good. You have to work through it and learn
tricks along the way. You do your best, but
there’s only so much you can do with the potential
of the room you’re working with.
What does it take to be a good front of
house engineer?
That’s a really good question. I think knowing
sometimes when less is more, knowing that it’s
not always about adding. It’s about subtracting
what you don’t want, for example, stage volume:
knowing when to back down and balance
instead of turning up. Also, having a good gain
structure. We just did nine shows in a row, and
on our off day today, we’re doing an acoustic
show and then driving 700 miles to the next
city. There are no sick days, insurance or 401ks
on tour. You’d make better money and have
more benefits working at Home Depot. You
really have to love this to do this.
Shawn Hammer
ADELITAS WAY
What is your background in front of house?
I studied music theory at Youngstown State in
Ohio and was playing in bands. By default, I
was always taking care of the sound. I started
recording my band, then I began working in a
studio, and then doing house sound at Forward
Hall in Erie, Pennsylvania. That was my first front
of house job. I did monitors and front of house,
and I was the only guy, so I took care of all the
technical aspects for every band. When I first
worked there, there were more instruments
onstage than I could ever have imagined—
horns, organs, vintage keyboards—and any challenge
that you can imagine was thrown at me.
Adelitas Way is a two-guitar band, with Chris
Iorio playing lead and Keith Wallen playing
rhythm. Tell us about the equipment, setup
and signal chain.
Keith has an amazing Soldano HR-50 with a
Marshall vintage 30 cab. He’s got a couple of
Les Pauls, and his tone is great and easy to work
with. Chris plays an EVH 5150 with EVH 5150
cabs. He’s more high-gain and out there, and
his leads stick out. Both guys use Dean Markley
medium-gauge strings. When I mix, I try not to
do much EQ. I roll off a little top end to make
room for Rick [DeJesus, vocals] and the bottom
end so it isn’t muddy. I fix things here and there,
but I keep it simple. Keith’s chain is straightforward:
tuner to amp, no frills. Chris uses a TC
Electronic delay pedal, a chorus pedal and a
wah for his solos. Chris is a more ’80s-style guitarist
who was raised on Van Halen and Guns N’
Roses. Keith is a straight-up, modern rock and
roll guitarist; no frills, just solid rhythm and background
vocals. Derek [Johnston] is endorsed by
Spector, and he is now playing a new NSJ2R
bass that has improved our sound dramatically.
He’s running it through an Ampeg rig, a classic
8x10 and SVT-3Pro he’d like to upgrade. We’ll
work on that as we go. The guys don’t do much
as far as effects, and I only use compression out
front, especially in this situation where we have
the Digidesign Pro Tools rig.
How do you like the VENUE Profile?
It’s great! My mix is ready, and Smack! is an
amazing plug-in. The compressor is an emulator
of a distressor, which is a favorite of mine in
the studio, and now I can use it on the guitars,
vocals, bass, kick, snare, everything. I don’t have
to do much during soundcheck. My settings are
saved and I’m ready to go. On a tour like this,
with four bands [Cycle of Pain, Adelitas Way,
Sick Puppies, Shinedown], all the compressor
and gain are usually taken over by the headliner.
With Pro Tools, everyone has enough to use.
I prefer analog, and the knobs and changing
things immediately, but I got acclimated to this
and it’s almost as fast as an analog system.
What about mics?
I’m using a Sennheiser e902 on the kick, e604s
on the toms, classic Shure SM57s on the snare
and guitars, SM81s on overheads and hat, and
SM58s on vocals.
What are the challenges of mixing a two-guitar
band?
Having two guitars can make things more cluttered,
and it’s harder to find space for everyone.
There’s also more competition to keep the
vocals out front. The leads are out there with
the vocals, and the rhythm guitar I keep with the
bass and drums to keep the music moving. Keith
and Derek are on stage left, Chris is stage right,
Trevor [Stafford, drums] is in the middle and Rick
is everywhere. I advise the band. They change
the volume levels to their comfort. Unless you
carry wedges, you’re not going to guarantee the
same sound every night. I try to give each guy
his own mix. I want it to sound as full as possible
onstage, but a bit more aggressive live than on
the CD. I definitely help push that.
How much of your job is technical expertise,
and how much is knowing and understanding
the band?
It’s definitely a balance, but technical knowledge
is more important. Knowing the band and their
music puts the polish on the whole thing to
make it accurate, but you can’t get that far without
at least the basic technical knowledge.
In some rooms, every band sounds horrible.
The audience walks out complaining that
the band “needs a new sound guy.” It all
falls on you.
When you have those sound systems, there’s
nothing you can do. You make what you can out
of it and you get around it in ways, such as only
pushing what you need through the PA and
using the PA for sound reinforcement and not
clutter. The room has a lot to do with it as well.
If it has a lot of reflection and noise, it’s challenging.
At the same time, it can be fun to pull
it off. It’s definitely rewarding when you walk
into a bad venue and terrible PA and at the end
of the night you think, it kind of sounded good!
We’ve been spoiled on the Shinedown tour.
After this, it’s back to whatever house console
there is, and sometimes the challenges are so
great that you ask yourself, “Why are we doing
this?” But in some places, the small dives, you
find amazing old gear and it’s exciting just to
see it; to see a vintage console or a vintage
effects unit. I know it sounds strange, but those
challenges are my favorite part of the job. I
enjoy troubleshooting, and it’s a main skill in this
job. That and crisis management: finding the
problem and fixing it quickly.
What does it take to be a good front of
house engineer?
Patience and a good ear. Recognizing a problem
when it happens, catching it before the
crowd notices it, and remembering that you can
always do better.
Billy Kirk
BLACKBERRY SMOKE
What is your background in front of house?
I have been interested in live sound since I
saw the front of house engineer for the band
that was playing at my high school prom
and decided he had the coolest job ever. I
moved to Atlanta in 1987 to pursue the goal
of getting the coolest job ever. I met Richard
[Turner, bass/vocals] and Brit [Turner, drums]
shortly after that. Since then, I’ve mixed the
bands they were in, and Richard and I have
become business partners in our own audio
production company, Fly By Night Audio Inc.,
so I’ve really been working with Blackberry
Smoke even before that was their name.
What does it take for a front of house engineer
to earn the trust of his band?
Don’t let them see you do anything stupid. You
could come highly recommended and have an
excellent resume. These things help get your
foot in the door. Really, though, the best way is
to do a good job consistently over a period of
time in a number of different situations.
Tell us about some of Blackberry Smoke’s
equipment, setup and signal chain.
We’re making the transition from wedges to
ear monitors, so we’re carrying our own mic
package, a new PreSonus StudioLive 16.4.2
mixer, a really powerful little machine, and
some Shure PSM 700 wireless ear monitor
systems for Richard, Paul [Jackson, guitar/
vocals] and Charlie [Starr, lead vocals/guitar],
and Shure PSM 600HW Hardwired systems
for Brit and Brandon [Still, keyboards]. Our
goal is to give them some consistency from
day to day but still be super portable and
musician friendly. The console is a Digidesign
D-Show Profile. All effects, processing and
EQ are on the console. The console feeds
XTA 226 processors, which splits the signal
according to bandwidth to feed the proper
sub, low, mid and high power amps, which
feed the appropriate components in the
speaker cabinets. All the power amps are
Lab.gruppen fP 6400.
Richard plays a Zemaitis BMF-DCPJ Metal
Front Black bass, Fender Jazz Bass Special
Neck with Precision Body with hipshot,
Gibson 1971 Goldtop Les Paul Signature and
1971 Les Paul Recording bass through an
Orange AD 200B amp and Orange OBC 115
and 410 cabs. He uses GHS Flatwound Long
Scale Plus strings, Mogami cables, a Cherub
Metronome and Boss Tuner. Charlie plays a
’56 Les Paul Jr., Dan Armstrong Plexi, Fender
B-Bender Telecaster, a Performance Guitarsbuilt
(1989) Haggis Custom Tele and a gold
Gibson SG through an Orange Rockerverb
50 head and cabinet. He uses GHS Boomer
medium strings, a Boss Tuner and MXR Phase
45, Dunlop Crybaby and Expandora pedals.
Paul plays a ’79 Les Paul Standard, Gibson
Firebird VII and Fender ’52 Reissue Telecaster,
using GHS Boomer medium strings, through
an Orange Rockerverb 50 Combo, with Boss
Chromatic Tuner Pedal and Boss EQ Pedal.
What happens when the crowd comes in
and changes the balance?
The balance you get during soundcheck is a
starting point. Obviously, things change after
the audience comes in, but since these variables
are also variable from night to night and
place to place, there are no hard and fast “put
knob here” rules. I just try to react to whatever
changes have taken place as fast as I can.
How much of your job is technical expertise
and how much is knowing and understanding
the band?
Both are important. If you have some kind of
musical common ground with the band, they
will probably be more inclined to feel that you
are presenting them to the audience in the
way that they want. But your technical skills
are going to allow you to actually do that,
and that is what will keep you employed.
The audience wants the live show to sound
like the album. How do you accomplish
that and make the mix more dynamic
and powerful?
I think on a good night a live band playing
through a nice sound system can sound
better than a CD. The dynamic range of a
band is more than that of a CD, and most
professional sound systems will go louder
and lower than most home and car stereos.
The best way to accomplish this is to pay
attention to every little detail throughout the
entire day, starting with hanging or stacking
the system to cover the entire audience
evenly, mic’ing everything properly and so
forth. It’s kind of like painting a wall. The bulk
of the work is in the prep. The actual knob-twiddling
is easy if you’ve done a good job
before you get to that point.
What are the challenges that come with
mixing two guitars?
Having two guitars worth of stage volume.
Actually, the Blackberry Smoke guys are all
very conscious and reasonable about their
stage volume. I would say just making sure
that they can both be heard at all times and
that they both occupy their own little space
in the mix, whether it’s a dual lead thing or
one soloing with the other playing a rhythm
part. I try to stick to a less-is-more kind of
mix with Blackberry Smoke—just some basic
dynamics and a little bit of reverb and delay
on the vocals. They’re a rock band. They
don’t need me putting a lot of makeup and
perfume on them.
What does it take to be a good front of
house engineer?
The ability to deliver high-quality audio consistently
in all types of situations, and being
able to keep a level head. Understanding at
least a little bit of all the other facets of the
show, such as lighting and video, so that you
can work with them or around them. The
technical ability to get a good mix together
fast is important, but when it’s time to open
the doors, the people are there to see a
show. If you’ve demanded that the mix position
be somewhere that makes it hard for
the lighting guys to see the stage, and then
made the band nervous by telling them how
hard your day has been when you see them
in the hallway before the show, you’re probably
not a good front of house engineer.
Hugh Johnson
VINCE GILL
What does Vince Gill need from his front of
house engineer?
Vince is not alone in his perception of what
the front of house should do, but he is in
the minority of guys who have very little say
about what I do. He trusts me completely.
Early on in our relationship he got a lot
of feedback from producers and management
that I was doing what needed to be
done. I get very few complaints. He does
meet-and-greets after the shows and always
gets good reports of how good it sounds,
so he’s never asked me to do anything other
than what I do, and over the years that
hasn’t changed. He has a somewhat different
relationship with our monitor engineer, Sam
Parker. Vince has more interactive comments with Sam because of the nature of the monitor
mix. As front of house engineer, my primary
duty is to be the conduit from band to
audience in most all situations. My job is to
deliver what the band is playing, and hopefully
to do that in a way that is as consistent
as possible throughout the room, so that the
people in the front row aren’t blasted and the
people in the back row are able to hear.
Vince has always had very good bands. Some
of them have been with us since the beginning.
They’re all studio-quality players and
they give me the ultimate gift every night of
great sounds and not having to do a lot of
polishing. Other than that, the biggest challenge
is tuning the PA. Sound Image supplies
our equipment and is the best sound company
in the world, in my opinion. We carry
our monitors, monitor board, front of house
console, microphones, stands, cables, etc.,
but we depend on the venue or promoter to
supply racks and stacks—the PA and amplifiers—
to our specifications. I tune the PA so
that it lines up with what I want the band to
sound like, and I don’t have to adjust every
single input on the console every day.
Tell us about his equipment, setup and
signal chain.
Sam and I both mix on Digidesign Profiles, a
great digital console that provides us with an
almost unlimited amount of resources. From
a sophisticated snapshot feature to plug-ins
that emulate some of the best studio-quality
rack gear on the planet, and great sounding
preamps, these consoles have just about
everything needed to mix, without using any
outboard gear. We have had a Shure microphone
endorsement for about 15 years and
exclusively use their products…. I recently
began using the KSM313 [ribbon microphone]
on Vince’s guitar amps in conjunction
with a standard SM57, and wow, what a great
combo. Great low end with just enough bite,
and very little EQ.
As far as blending the guitars together—our
steel player, Russ Pahl, also plays electric, our
acoustic player, Jeff White, also does background
vocals, and our rhythm guitarist, Tom
Britt, is also a soloist—they take care of a lot
of that. I can only manipulate the sound of
what they’re playing, so I make sure they fit
together. It’s not unlike any instrument: they
all have to fit. The method I’ve learned over
35 years of mixing is to take certain frequencies
out of one instrument because another
instrument needs that range. You weave frequencies
together and find separation in the
sounds so that tones don’t overlap.
The other thing that’s very important about
guitar sounds in particular is mic selection
and placements. I find the right mic and
the right spot on the cone and move things
very little after I find the sweet spot. For
example, on most guitar speakers, the most
air is moving near the outside edge of the
speaker cone; to be more specific, the most
low end comes from the outside edge of
the cone. Generally speaking, the closer you
get to the middle of the speaker, the thinner
the tone. Since most guitar players—at least
ours do—stand with their guitar amps on
the floor, pointed toward the backs of their
legs, their tone tends to be thinner than you
would want in the PA. So I always go for a
spot right on the outside edge of the cone,
get the warmth I am looking for, and have to
take less of the high-mids out of the channel
EQ. For a few years now, my favorite guitar
amp mic is the Shure KSM32, but I am quickly
moving to the new KSM313/SM57 combo.
I’m very specific about mic placement, as it is
one of the most important parts of the job.
Our crew is very good about duplicating what
I’m looking for every day. That also goes for
drums, the Leslie cabinet connected to the
B3, everything. Vince doesn’t use 100-watt
amps much anymore. He uses Fender Deluxe,
Rivera, Goodsell and 65Amps. His choices are
mostly based on the venue. His stage volume
has come down considerably over the years.
It’s different when you have to fill up an
arena. We did an acoustic tour in 2008 and
they all played very quietly onstage. He really
enjoyed the lower volume.
Vince plays hard, especially the electric stuff,
and that’s why you see him change guitars
on just about every song—he plays hard
enough that he plays them until they are out
of tune. Our guitar tech, Benny Garcia, is tuning
all night. Vince has an arsenal of guitars
at home. But on the road he carries probably
six electrics: Fender Strats and Teles, Gibson
335s and Les Pauls, and a couple of custom
jobs, and four or five acoustics: Martin 000s
and Gibson J-200s. His main guitars are a ’53
Tele and a ’64 Strat. He has a couple with
alternate tunings.
What does it take to be a good front of
house engineer?
The answer sounds overly simple: good ears.
Not necessarily good hearing, although that
is important, but knowing how to put sounds
together, being able to take what the band
gives you and make it work for the audience
in the environment in which you’re playing.
With Vince, I’ve always got a great band
to work with, so that is seldom a problem.
Acoustical challenges are always a part of
the job, and being able to deal with that on
a daily basis and being consistent with your
tuning is very important. Being able to take
the left and right brain functions, the art and
technical sides of mixing, and making them
work together—that’s what it takes.
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