Glasgow, Scotland (November 4, 2019)—Scottish singer-songwriter Lewis Capaldi has been touring the world this year on the back of a hit album—a journey that included a string of arena dates, all of which sold out. Bringing some of the fruits of that success back home, Capaldi hit the road with Glasgow-based SR company FE-Live.
FOH engineer Andrew Bush oversaw one of two Allen & Heath dLive S5000 consoles on the tour, chosen in early 2019 when they were planning out the year ahead: “We were looking for an audio package that was powerful, flexible and compact enough for us to use on every show, be it a Lewis headline as part of a tour, or a run of overseas festivals where space, weight and set-up time were at a premium.”
Capaldi’s full arena set-up includes dLive S5000s on both FOH and Monitors, paired with a DM64 MixRack (monitors) and DM0 MixRack (FOH). Additionally, Bush utilizes two DX32 expanders for further I/O.
Bush originally opted for a smaller dLive Wings rig, which is now used for fly-in dates and comprises a multi-surface set-up with two C1500s and a DM48 MixRack. Bush and monitor engineer Nick Lawrie make use of dLive’s built-in FX and onboard DEEP processing features, particularly when it comes to Lewis’ vocals, as Lawrie noted: “Lewis has an incredible voice, but the first time you mix it, it’s terrifying! Lewis can go from head-voice to chest-voice in a matter of seconds and so I use the Dyn8’s multiband compression and dynamic EQ, which is a complete godsend and allows me to quickly even the mix out where needed. I also love the routing options with dLive and being able to double bus, it just means I can just refine my mix more and get a really even sound at the end.”
While 2019 is almost over, 2020 looms large and will see Capaldi perform to over a quarter of a million people during his UK and European headline shows. Bush added, “In terms of the shows, they’ve added so much since the start of the year and they’ve increased in scale and capacity as we’ve had to try and keep up with Lewis’s trajectory. It’s really shown us that dLive can definitely handle the demanding needs of this tour, while providing class-leading tools and studio-quality sound.”
Allen & Heath • www.allen-heath.com
FE-Live • https://fe.live
