JPS Australia

History

Cher – Here We Go Again Tour

Cher 2018

The Here We Go Again Tour is the seventh solo concert tour by Cher in support of her twenty-sixth studio album Dancing Queen. The Australasian tour was a brand new production and as Cher shares the same management as Pink, some of Pink’s crew stayed on for the tour.

JPJ Audio supplied an audio package and crew for the tour including an L-Acoustics K1/K2 PA system.

I do like the L-Acoustics K1/K2 PA and although there are many good PAs on the market, I believe it to be the best sounding,” commented Cher’s audio engineer Tony Blanc. “The setup on this tour is pretty generic from the board out, it’s exactly as L-Acoustics recommends; the cable lengths, the hangs and the combination of the K1s, K2s and the KS28 subs. It’s configured off LA Manager and I’m fortunate to have Johnny Keirle with me and he is probably the best system tech in the business. He knows how to tweak the PA. He sets the PA everyday depending on the parameters of the room, the sizes, the elevation of the seats and the throw. I am in the driving seat and it feels like a Ferrari.

Tony reports that the K1/K2 combination allows him to precisely ensure that all the seats have the same energy. Quantities of PA varied a little at each venue depending upon the ceiling height and how far round the seats had been sold. However, the specified system had 24 x K1, 36 x K2, 24 x KS28 and 9 x Kara.

For FOH control Tony ran a DiGiCo SD7 console which he said is worth twice as much as his original house!

It’s an amazing console,” he said. “Before I started with Cher, I had three or four years on budget tours and I got quite used to Waves as a source. I had it with this console but after a day, I turned it off as it just changed the way the console felt. The only auxiliary gear I have are six channels of Summit DCL200 compressors to warm things up and a Lake EQ inserted on Cher’s vocal subgroup. I also have a couple of Bricasti M7 reverbs.

With a fifty year career, a Cher show covers many different genres of music including ballads, sixties pop, rock and disco, all of which keeps Tony on his toes.

Monitors were run by Martin Pare also on a DiGiCo SD7 console with a TC Electronic M6000 MKII system. All of the band, and Cher herself, wore Shure PSM 1000 IEM systems with L-Acoustic ARC sidefills to give the dancers some audio to dance to.

Cher’s customized, handheld microphones were Sennheiser SKM5200s. Guitars and keyboards are all direct outputs. The kick drum had a syn901, plus the Audix D5, the snare an e905, toms e904 and cymbals ATM450s.

Tony made special mention of the two JPJ crew out on tour with him – Kellie McKee and Joel ‘Cellphone’ Pearson – praising their work effort.
Cher 2018

Stage is covered by Hilario Gonzalez, a Solotech audio crew chief tech who works on the Vegas show, and his main concern being prepping Cher.
Cher 2018

 

The Merivales

The Merivales

The Merivales (the Merivale Company’s Internal Awards) brings together some of the leading hospitality personalities in Australia to highlight success within the Merivale business. It’s an evening charged with the electricity of celebration, decadence and communal spirit.

The 2018 Merivales was held this year at Fox Studio’s Stage 7 with JPJ Audio working closely with Bailey Holloway, Group Production Manager for Merivale, to ensure a successful event. The night comprised of speeches, DJs and a traditional Japanese drumming troupe.

Fortunately Stage 7 is a very well treated room – well it is a sound stage after all – which benefited FOH engineer Will Krienke who remarked that the production was fairly simple in terms of time alignment.

It wasn’t like a standard show where you’re mainly taking care of a band,” commented Will. “It was the same amount of priorities but applied to making sure the client was satisfied with the flow. It was seamless from beginning to end with no changeover or down time.

With the back of stage exposed, including dimmer racks, and high bay lights used, the theme was set for an ‘industrial’ feel to the night.

We used an L-Acoustics KARA system which is a smaller box but it worked out perfectly for this job as there was no band and we were throwing on the short end of the building,” said Will. “We had nine KARAs per side over four SB28 subwoofers and ARC outfills. We had also had 108Ps around the stage for front infills. As simple and standard as it was, the main obstacle was making it look good as the client was very concerned with the aesthetics of the room.

At FOH Will ran a DiGiCo SD11, the perfect size console for this job, using solely onboard gear as he only had ten inputs.
Shure radio microphones were used for the speeches with DPA d:vote 4099 added specifically for the drummers.

They’re just more musical as far as wireless is concerned,” said Will. “They’re full range and great for drums and all sorts of percussion.

The entrance to the event featured a small L-Acoustics 112P PA which was driven wirelessly with a Sennheiser in ear unit.

JPJ Crew:

Joel Larsson, Chris Robinson

Australia Day 2017 at the Opera House

Australia Day 2017 1

Directed by the highly-awarded John Foreman, Australia Day 2017 – Live at the Sydney Opera House brought together a collection of Australia’s best talent, including Tina Arena, Guy Sebastian, Human Nature and Dami Im. The concert was hosted by Grant Denyer and Kerri-Anne Kennerley.

JPJ Audio provided audio production with Will King in charge of the design and running front of house. It has been well publicized that the forecourt of the Opera House is a tricky venue due to its’ strict noise control limit. Added to that was the fact that the show was broadcast live and the television producers wanted the Harbour Bridge as a backdrop.“This meant that the stage wasn’t orientated in a way that was helpful in achieving that sound level,” commented Will. “The sound was directed towards the Botanical Gardens and in places, could hit the sandstone wall. We had to do our best to deliver a sound system that would shoot down enough to not hit the wall, only the audience.

The PA system comprised of L-Acoustics K1, ten a side, with a side hangs of KARA enclosures to cover the steps of the Opera House, as well as SB28 subs. A single mono delay hang of eight deep KUDO enclosures was also utilized. A large number of Clair 12am wedges covered the stage and the thrust that jutted out into the audience. Usually a thrust allowing performers in front of the PA can cause problems but not in this case due to the concert’s strict noise limits.

Australia Day 2017 2That was probably the only good thing about having a strict noise limit!” laughed Will. “I used a DiGiCo SD10 for control and it was the first time I didn’t have a single channel to plug anything into. The entire console was full – if anyone else had turned up I don’t know what we would have done!

It was important that Will remembered the larger audience was at home watching the concert on the television and he had to be careful not to do anything that would affect the broadcast.

For example, feedback is an absolute no-no on TV,” he elaborated. “If it happens once or twice at a gig, you can get away with it but with television it’s very noticeable in the quiet of your living room as opposed to a noisy gig.
Those who have seen the broadcast of the show will remember what appeared to be a momentous audio fail when Grant Deyner’s microphone didn’t appear to work for what seemed like an age. However, JPJ are relieved to be able to state that the microphone was working perfectly at the gig.

Tristan Farrow ran monitors using a DiGiCo SD5 console.

Photos:

©Troy Constable