This year’s Deichbrand festival, billed as the ‘Biggest Open Air Event on the North Sea’ had dBTechnologies’ brand new T12 boxes rocking the ‘Festzelt’ (Party Tent), entertaining a good proportion of the 18,000 ticket-holders who visited over the three-day event.
Comprising of 40 bands on 4 stages over the weekend of July 22-24, the festival included German headliners Die Fantastischen Vier and Guano Apes, as well as international stars Bullet For My Valentine, Skunk Anansie and Extreme on the line up.
In association with technical services company Professional Event Solutions (PES) who were on site handling the logistics and technical support for the festival, dbTechnologies supplied 14 DVA T12s, 30 DVA S10 subwoofers (provided by German rental company Delta Vision) and a further 4 DVX D12s.
PES owner, Carsten Mueller explains further, “Two arrays of seven T12s were used left and right of the stage, and two lots of nine DVA subwoofers were positioned under these T12 arrays. The remaining S10s were arranged in clusters of two in a bass array in front of the stage, to get the absolute optimum bass performance. Two of the DVX D12s were used as monitors for the DJ and the other two as in-fills on stage.”
Michael Herweg, managing director of dBTechnologies Germany says, “We have been responsible for the Party Tent at Deichbrand for a few years now, and for the last three, the T4 line array has been ideal. Looking at the size of the festival this year, we realised what a good job it is that we now have T12.”
Daniel Lieske, Project Manager and Event Technology Specialist at PES helped install the dBTechnologies system and was impressed. “The T12s have got a smooth, punchy sound. Not only did they sound great in the Party Tent, but the whole system was a breeze to set up,” he comments.
Müller adds, “This is our fifth year being involved with Deichbrand, and it has to be said that dB Germany is a great partner for us. The company trusted us with the whole project and went out of their way to help whenever we needed support.”
SGM Lighting was also used in the Party Tent, whilst the main stages were equipped with dBTechnologies’ other sister brand, RCF speaker systems, all provided by PES and Session PA Rental.
Seven years ago, visitors to the first Deichbrand festival came in their hundreds to the little town of Cuxhaven on the northern coast of Germany.
“5kW of power was all we needed,” reminisces Herweg. “Back then we used a few three-way systems and a couple of subwoofers.”
This year, in addition to the “musical fireworks”, a host of activities were available from kite-surfing and wake-boarding to beach volleyball and shopping in the festival market, offering guests “..a long weekend of unique experiences on the North Sea coast,” according to the website. Not even squally weather dampened the spirits of the festival goers, indeed the Party Tent, being under cover, held extra appeal to the crowds.
“Roughly speaking, this year’s system needed ten times as much power than the one used in 2004,” laughs Herweg, who said he was “blown away” by the DVA T12s at the event. “Yes, it was loud – really loud – but the sound was crystal clear.”
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