Singer-songwriter Alex Clare headlined the Future Stage at the recent V Festival in Celmsford Essex, with The Old Lion Touring Company providing a pair of Harman Soundcraft Vi6 digital consoles for FOH and monitors.
According to Alex Clare’s FOH engineer Harry Devenish, Clare’s performances showcase a human approach to electronic music. “Alex’s performances fuse the weight and power of electronic records with live elements,” he said. “A lot of that is due to the bass setup—the bass guitars trigger a synth and a sub, creating a heavy, dynamic sound on stage.”
Devenish has significant depth of experience with the Soundcraft Vi6, having used one of the first models several years ago. “I come from more of an analog background and was slow to embrace digital, but I’ve always been comfortable with the Vi6,” he said. “It has a very intuitive surface, with hands-on encoders and two layers, it’s very flexible. You can do a lot on the Vi that you can’t do on other digital desks.”
“Vi Series consoles are so easy to work on,” said Tim Boardman, tour manager for The Old Lion Touring Company. “I’m from the studio world but I can walk up to the Vi6 and make it work, which is saying something!”
This fall, Old Lion will provide a Vi3000 and Vi6 console for a 10-week tour with Clare, where Boardman and Devenish plan on using the Soundcraft Realtime Rack library of plug-ins from Universal Audio. “We’re really excited about using the Realtime Rack library,” Boardman noted. “Bringing those effects that are predominantly used in studio settings to live performances makes a lot of sense.”
“Realtime Rack will be massive for us!” Devenish remarked. “The Vi6 is already a convenient console to work on and this will take the performance up another level.”
