A recent European and UK arena tour by British rock band Kasabian saw front of house engineer Rob Waite delivering mixes on a DiGiCo Quantum338 console while monitor engineer Jamie Hickey worked with a Quantum5 desk provided by UK-based Britannia Row, which also supplied two accompanying SD-Racks.
“I joined the team at the start of 2022 and was really pleased to discover I could specify whatever I wanted,” says Waite. “I’ve been a DiGiCo user for a very long time, starting with the D Series and following a natural progression through the SD Series, and now with the new Quantum range. I trust DiGiCo. Regardless of genre, the brand always helps me fulfill the artists’ vision and get the sound they want.”
The tour started in May, opening with a Jools Holland TV appearance followed by a series of global festivals, an autumn European run, and finished with a UK arena tour. “I know DiGiCo consoles inside out,” Waite continues. “The Quantum338 is a new model, but the workflow is familiar. The bus structure, the architecture, make it very flexible and powerful. In fact, the high buss count means you can make it do anything you want and then some. Quantum’s new Mustard suite opens up a new palette of processing, which allows me to reduce the amount of outboard I use. There are a wealth of different compressor types, giving you great tonal choice, and the all-pass filters are a nice addition, providing more flexibility when you’re lining up low-end inputs, as it makes it that much more phase coherent.
“The Tubes on the Mustard processing are highly versatile, and you have more choice on distortion, which is very useful for a band like Kasabian who use a lot of distortion on vocals and drums. The bigger, brighter screens are a lot easier to use in daylight, and the automation system and general user interface are as flexible and usable as ever. I also have two DiGiGrid MGBs running to allow me to record from the console. The bottom line is it’s an old friend with some exciting new bells and whistles. And they’re complemented by L-Acoustics K1 and K2 PA, which means we’ve got a system that delivers all the horsepower a band like Kasabian needs.”
Meanwhile, Hickey, who has employed the company’s consoles since 2014, joined the tour in September in time for the European leg and UK arenas. “For me, it’s the lack of limitation that’s the greatest appeal to using DiGiCo,” he says. “There’s so much power, so many routing options and so much flexibility built into the core of the console. My workflow is never inhibited or restricted. No matter the situation, I know the console will always deliver.”
Hickey’s monitor count is 92 inputs from stage, including talkbacks, clicks, triggers and comms, with around 40 outputs, all spread across two shared SD-Racks running 32-bit I/O cards, with Con Send/Receive running between FOH and monitor consoles to increase the communications network between the band and all the crew members. There are also two DiGiGrid MGB interfaces plugged into the MADI ports to multitrack record at 96K, and he is running Waves SuperRack and Live Processor from the Quantum5’s built-in Waves card.
“I really like the Mustard processing on the Quantum5. Having used a Quantum7 on Snow Patrol for the past few years, I was delighted to see that the SD5 has had the Quantum upgrade,” he continues. “I particularly like the Mustard Tubes and Mustard Optical Compressors, so was really happy to be able to use them on the tour. Implementing the Timecode to recall Snapshots feature certainly changed my workflow; having multiple Snapshots in a song and having them recall automatically is liberating.”
