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Ray Davies Tour Utilizes NEXO 45N-12 Line Monitors

NEXO 45N-12 stage monitors were recently utilized for a recent U.S. tour as well as a series of high-profile gigs in the UK by legendary singer-songwriter Ray Davies, founder member of The Kinks.

Chris Wibberley, monitor engineer for Davies for 11 years, had a chance encounter with the 45N-12 wedges at last year’s PLASA show, which led to a demo, and almost immediately, use of the monitors at the Meltdown (UK) shows at the Royal Festival Hall in London.

“We set up a pair of N-12s to the left and right of Ray,” explains Wibberley. “Of the pair to his left, the outside one is on its own mix, giving a discrete mix to guitarist Bill Shandley, with the remaining three delivering Ray’s mix. When Bill isn’t at the front, I can just mute the mic inputs that go into his mix and use all four wedges to give complete coverage to Ray. The N-12s are so phase coherent that I can flick between the two modes.

“Because of the way the units’ couple, the N-12s act as a single source,” he continues. “If Ray, by himself, wants more of anything, I can put it into Bill’s wedge. Or I can put it into acoustic mode, turning down Ray’s bits and turning up the Bill bits – any of Ray’s bits that Bill wants to hear will be completely in sync with Ray’s wedges. They sound absolutely fantastic.”

Wibberley is using two NEXO NXAMPs to drive the 45N-12s. “The problem with a lot of wedges is that they can sound too clean and hi-fi,” he explains. “But these have a bark to them. They’re still rock ‘n’ roll but they sound like a wedge doing what it is supposed to do.

“There are parts of the show where Ray goes off mic and off-axis with his guitar to watch the band. The definite dispersion of the N-12 allows him to step in and out of focus, so when he physically walks out of the zone, I don’t have to turn it down.”

Front-of-house engineer Tristan Mallett, guitarist Bill Shandley and Davies himself all support Wibberley’s enthusiasm for the 45N-12s. “This is the best box that I’ve used on stage, and Ray may agree with that. He certainly got used to them pretty quickly, and he seems very happy – which is unusual.”

Yamaha Commercial Audio/NEXO

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