My FOH at The Tropic at Ruislip 2/3/2014
[Last update 23/05/2016]
Hi, I am John Bell, a self-taught, 64 years old, amateur sound, recording and stage lighting engineer.
I have been providing and engineering my sound and stage lighting rigs for several local blues and rock bands based in Hillingdon, London and Kent for the last 20+ years.
My private rehearsal/demo recording studio, is currently being used by several bands and artists, recording demos and EP's.
I also session drum, sing and occaisionally provide my own lyrics for a songwriter/guitarist friend.
Andy Lee, Sarah Johnstone, Bill Coates and his nephew Jason have been assisting me at the large charity gigs, when they are available. (Chinnor Bike Dayz, The Dirty Donkey, Twisted Iron, The Overland Event, The Tropic at Ruislip/Wealdstone Football Club/Ruislip Social Club and other charity live music events)
My current PA set-up is now a JBL/Matrix/Crown/Smart Sound combination. The full rig is now 5Kw RMS FOH using 2x LP8SP-Pro 18" subs, 2x LP8SP 18" subs, 4 x JBL MRX515 15" mid/hi cabs and 2x LP115 15" full range cabs & powered by 2x Matrix XT4004EQ and 1x Crown XTi2000 amps.
The rig is modular and can be split into 2 for smaller events.
Monitoring is now 4x JBL MRX512's (vocal monitors) & 2x Smart Sound SP5SP 15" subs + 2x LP5M 15" monitors (all 4x uprated to 500w rms with new Eminence 15" drivers) as a stereo drum fill, (ideal for midi V-Drums), or split into 2 for drum fill and keys monitor, powered by 2 channels of the Matrix XT4004EQ amps (JBL's), 2x Crown XLS2000 amps (Smart Sound cabs) and a further spare. FOH & monitor amp racks on wheel boards.
My new Midas Venice F-32 and Thon roadcase, now takes the place of my 2x Mackie mixers for big gigs.
A Mackie Onyx 1640 16 channel mixer with FireWire, a Mackie CFX16 MKII mixer for small gigs.
A 12u outboard rack with 1x DBX iEQ31 dual 31 band graphic with Peak-Stop Limiter, type V noise reduction and Advanced Feedback Supression for FOH, 2x DBX 231 dual 31 band graphics (for 4x monitor mixes), 1x Lexicon MX200 FX unit and 4x DBX 266XL dual compressor/gates.
A 3u outboard rack with 2x DBX AFS224 Advanced Feedback Suppression units (used in front of the DBX231's for the 4x monitor mixs) and an Omnitronic Power Distributor (this powers and illuminates both racks, when this rack is sat on top)
A 3u outboard rack with 3x SoundTech Q310 31 band graphics (re-cycled from my FOH outboard rack upgrade), which I now use with the function/pub-gig rigs and studio vocal monitors.
I now use my son's Pioneer DJM-600 DJ mixer & fight-case, connected to a 6u rack with a new JB Systems twin CDDJ unit that plays anything you can connect to it and another Omnitronic Power Distributor/rack light. I use it myself for testing the rig and for pre-gig and interval music. (At smaller gigs, I just use my iPod).
I can now record live and in my rehearsal studio, with my new 27" iMac with 16Gb memory and 3Tb serial ATA hard-drive, running Mountain Lion, Tracktion 4.5.6 and IK Multimedia Total Studio 3 Bundle and White Channel Strip and other Custom Shop software.
I also have the new Tracktion 5, but I am happy with T4 at the moment, as it does everything I need and is dependable with my set-up.
This is connected to my new Midas Venice F-32 mixer's Firewire port via a Thunderbolt to Firewire 800 adaptor and Firewire 800 to 400 cable. Back-ups taken care of by a 3TB Time Capsule and a Seagate 3TB Back-Up Plus external drive, all driven by the Time Machine.
I still have my old 20" 2Ghz Intel Core Duo iMac with an internal 7200rpm 250gb hard with 2gb of ram, running Tracktion 3 Ultimate Bundle and IK Multimedia Amplitude 2 and Ultimate Mastering Bundle software, to work with my Mackie Onyx 1640.
I have backed-up all of the files on 2x Seagate 750gb external hard-drives and 2x Seagate FreeAgent 1tb external hard-drives.
The new Midas Venice F-32, lighting desk and outboard racks are now supported by a 6' DJ stand and a 4' DJ stand clamped together in parallel. This is a much more stable platform and takes the weight, with no need for reinforcing bars or outriggers.
All racks are CP Cases EMS400 and an EMS500 for the old PowerSource 1602 digital spare amp.
A very heavy Thon Roadtrunk looks after the Midas and at nearly 100kg loaded, it takes some handling. Flightcases for the 27" iMac, DJ mixer and Lighting desk.
30 metre 16/4 multicore on wheeled cable drum unit (stays in the studio). 15 metre 8/4 Drums multicore, 15 metre 8 way stage box multicore and 5 metre 8 way snake for linking the graphics outputs to the multicores return amp feeds, inside the cable management of the Midas Roadtrunk.
1x16/4 45m and 1x 24/4 45m multicores on wheeled cable drums from TheLoudest.co.uk.
I use one each side of the stage so that I can feed each amp rack from their 4x returns.
The 16/4 is normally positioned on the side where the keys are sited and this now feeds channels 25 upwards on the new Midas Venice F-32.
Shure mics,
1x Beta87C
3x Beta58A
5x Beta56A
1x Beta57A
3x Beta 52A
5x SM58
3x SM57
1xWM20 head-set mic
2x AKG C1000S mics
2x Rode NT2-A Studio Condenser mics with shock mounts (1x permanently installed in the SE Reflection Filter with a heavy duty stand and 1x used for recording acoustic guitars)
A matched pair of Rode NT5's with SM4 shockmounts (used for drum overheads).
3x ART Dual X-Direct Active Dual DI Box's (ideal for stereo keys)
3x ART Direct Professional Active Direct D.I. box's
1x ART Tube MP (valve mic-pre/D.I. box) (superb on acoustics)
1x SE Reflexion Filter (used for shielding vocals during recording and taming loud Mic'd up guitar combos in the studio)
2x Behringer Power Play Pro-XL, 4x channel head-phone amplifier units and 1x Presonus HP60 Headhone Mixer/Amplifier in a 3U Gator rack.
4x Beyer dynamic DT250 (250 ohm) head-phones. (studio mixing & vocal monitoring)
1x Sennheiser HD280 head-phones. (FOH, or drums, live & studio)
My collection of speaker, mic, patch leads and various audio adaptors have grown and evolved considerably over the years.
I have separated my heavy duty JCB mains cables, 32 amp distro, 4x16 amp to dual 13 amp adaptors and my range of 13 amp leads and boards into 2x large storage cases.
My old halogen stage lighting rig is now used by one of my crew for his mini festivals in his big garden. It also keeps everyone warm in the early hours.
4x Mobil Truss 4m (85Kg load) winch stands and 4x2m, 2x0.4m, 2x0.25m & 2x 3xway corners of Mobil Truss triangular trussing and 4x T-Bars.
I have kept my older 4x Mobil Truss 3m (60kg load) winch stands, for use with the 4x bigger T-bars at function gigs.
The LED lighting rig, is mostly Stairville units from Thomann, which I now use for most gigs.
4x LED PAR 64 Long 3W Pro (36x 3W high O/P LED's)
4x LED PAR 64 Long 1W Pro (36x 1W high O/P LED's)
8x LED PAR 64 Short 10mm Black (183x10mm high power LED´s)
19X LED PAR 56 ALI Schwartz (153x5mm LED's)
6x Eurolite 252 6000k white LED flood lights for blinders.
3x Stairville Outdoor Stage Par 12x3W Tri for lighting up the load in/out areas at outside gigs (and for the garden when not needed for gigs)
4x MULTIFORM MULTISPOT (307x5mm LED's) [supplied by Terralec] (These are now semi-permanently rigged in my studio)
1x BOTEX DC-2448, 48 channel DMX lighting desk & Thon flight case.
1x 50m DMX 3-core cable drum and various shorter DMX leads and end plugs. 6x 5way fused and 4x 4way IEC distribution boards and various IEC leads.
I also carry spares of each of the 5x types of LED lighting fixtures.
For function gigs, I rig 8x of the big par 64's on 2x winch stands with T-bars, for a very quick set-up, with a high out-put, from both sides of the stage and use a lightweight T-bar stand for 6x PAR 56's as wash lights at the rear of the stage, or 2x lightweight stands with 2x short LED par 64's either side at the rear of the stage.
I now also have 2x JB Systems Cyclope and 1x Calypso LED DJ lights, which I rig to these stands, for the dance floor.
All lighting, mains cables & all lighting and audio leads contained in 21x Pro-Light/Protex hard fibre cases.
I have had to purchase 2x 300kg load trolleys, to help me and my crew move equipment in and out of venues.
I now also have a suitcase style ramp, so that we can get the Midas in it's roadcase in and out of the van without having to lift it.
All of this is now too much to fit into my VW LT35 2.5 TDI MWB High Roof gig van, so I either do 2x runs for near, full-rig gigs, or use 2x vans.
My big event crew is Andy Lee, Sarah Johnstone, Bill Coates and his nephew Jason.
John.