A new dance festival called Electric Woodlands, held recently on the idyllic grounds of Bygrave Farm in Baldock (about 30 miles north of London, offered three stages hosting a “who’s who” of drum & bass, house and bass exponents over an 11-hour period, supported by Capital Sound (London) equipping all stages with PA, the two largest utilizing Martin Audio components.
The service providers had been introduced to the event by Alex Anderson, a production manager with whom they had worked previously. Capital senior project manager Martin Connolly explains, “We were then contacted and initially asked to quote on the main stage before extending this to the other two stages.”
The crew worked alongside the event’s main production manager, Catherine Bates, observing sound thresholds set by F1 Acoustics. “It was a remote site so there were no real sound restrictions,” Connolly says.
The main Big Top, managed by DnB Allstars, comprised a 6-pole Kayam tent and hosting drum & bass fans performers such as Chase & Status and Rage, was served with 14 MLA Compact arrays, flying left and right, with 12 MLX subwoofers in a broadside array and six XD12 loudspeakers for front fill. “We chose MLA Compact because we were weight restricted to 850 kilos per side,” notes Capital’s project manager. MLA and system tech on this stage was Dan Leaver, with Lee Furnell as the crew chief.
Meanwhile, for The Clearing Stage that hosted by the bassline collective CruCast, Capital Sound elected to fly eight WPS per side, run off iKON iK42 amplifiers in 1-box resolution, again with restricted weight capacities in mind. “It was the best weapon in the Martin Audio armory that was also sufficiently light to give us the required number of speakers per side,” he says. Subwoofers comprised 12 SX218 and four XD12 provided front fill.
Sam Cunningham was the FOH tech at the Clearing Stage and system tech was Alistair Helliard.
