# Rig Rundown - Band In A Rack (Continued)



## ACE IT UP

Hey Guys, wanted to share the latest evolutionary stage in our rig setup for A Distant Calm. We started with rectifier heads and giant pedalboards and now it's all come down to this... A 4U rack system which amplifies, routes signal, and processes each one of our instruments. This is a continuation of another thread I started which you can check out here if you'd like to see the progression...

http://www.sevenstring.org/forum/live-performance-stage-sound/235541-rig-rundown-band-rack.html

So let's get started, we are now using a MBP (2.7 GHz i7) with SSD to pretty much run everything. I know this concept is going to frighten some people, but let me tell you that after much trial and error it is possible to achieve a stable, smooth working setup. Logic is our main DAW and within that we our routing our backing tracks, click, instrument processing and an automated light show.







We use a combination of native and 3rd party plugins to do this. For guitar we are using the TSE X50 plugin and it sounds awesome (better than axe fx imo). Here we're able to automate things like noise gate, overdrive, channel switching, etc. For lead tones, included with Logic is an awesome all in one Pedalboard plugin. These effects are easy to automate and go off/on automatically throughout our set. 2 signals for each guitar are being sent out of our interface (Focusrite Saffire Pro 40) in the DAW's mixing window, one with cab simulation on and another without which goes directly to our power amp (QSC PLD 4.3), more on that later. For bass we are using the native modern bass amp designer that comes with Logic. It is by far the best sounding bass plugin I've heard and sounds great through our power amp with cab simulation off and the Amp/Direct box tones blended slightly. For kick trigger we our using a Roland module that connects to the midi port on the Focusrite, sampling Superior Drummer. This trigger also effects our light show for interesting real time sound dynamics that are synched up to the bass drum. For lights we are using the very user friendly and intuitive DMXIS by Enttec. It's a simple to use program that allows you to store banks and presets for each song in your set and it can all be automated in Logic for a smooth, seamless light show. 






Here you can see how our set is setup in Logic. Automation lanes tell the plugins when to turn on and off for leads, volume swells, effects and more. Knowing how to tidy up your session and fine tune your computer to run this type of setup is paramount. Logic has a funny way of distributing core work loads within the program, once you find out more about this and how your computer handles certain processes you can then start to take advantage of all the capabilities (note my mbp was not cheap).






Two very awesome companies are making this setup possible for us, QSC and Focusrite. The Focusrite Saffire Pro 40 is our main interface and takes all the ins of our instruments and spits them back out with a roundtrip latency of about 7 ms. We feed most of these outs into a DI snake for things like DI guitars, bass, and backing tracks. Our instrument outs with cab simulations off are going into the QSC PLD 4.3, which is freaking awesome. It basically serves as an all in one power amp for us where we can set 2 channels up for 100 watts/8 ohms each (guitar cabs) and then bridge 2 more channels together into a 800/8 ohm output (custom bass cab).






A 1U drawer sits on top and houses our Line 6 wireless receivers.






A lot more goes into this kind of setup so if you have any questions feel free to ask! Here is a quick live vid where you can hopefully see and hear the thing in action.

Live Video

- Cory


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## Oxygen42

Do you guys run in ears? Also, regarding setting up the backings, I know this sounds like a stupid question, but were there any tricks you used for setting up the gig project? My band is running backing tracks/click off of Cubase, and it's been a nightmare getting the tempo track right.


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## TonyFlyingSquirrel

Nice setup, similar to what Periphery are doing, according to their recent Rig Rundown episode. 

This is completely "in the box" which I find all the more impressive.


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## ACE IT UP

Besides our drummer, we do not use in ears currently. I haven't had much experience with Cubase but Logic is easy to drop files in and if a track has 'tempo data' will automatically adjust for it. I do remember now rendering the click tracks themselves seperately and not using the DAWs own metronome for keeping time, this technqiue might help you? You still need the correct tempo track info though if you plan to do any effect automation at all, otherwise effects would be going on/off at all the wrong times.


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## Alex Kenivel

How do those L6 G30 relays hold up?


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## ACE IT UP

We're about to upgrade to the G50s. The G30s get the job done just with occosional dropout over long distances. Turn your WiFi off!


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## iron blast

This is the most streamlined setup I've ever seen


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## jeremyb

Wow this is pretty cool! Do you have a backup laptop in case it fails? that would be my only real concern, I assume you have to stick to the songs as is, you can't improvise etc or the timing gets all thrown out?


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## Given To Fly

Its impossible not to respect your rig! Even though you documented everything I still can not imagine the amount of work involved to make this setup work. 
I'll admit this concept does frighten me and certainly raises some philosophical questions that are worthy of discussion. Ironically, that is the main reason I respect it so much. Funny how that works.


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## AryaBara

simplicity at it's finest 
dope stuff, man


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## vkw619

Thats really cool. Way to high tech for me (I'll stick to the PC side of things) but it amazes me how reliable these setups have become over the last few years. I remember going to a show back in like 09 seeing someone using a MacBook on stage and going "I really hope that doesn't fail" but I don't think I've EVER heard of a rig like this failing at a live gig. Or at least I've never seen it.

Also, video link doesn't work


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## ACE IT UP

We've added a new piece of hardware to the setup... The Focusrite Clarett 8Pre. This interface gives us a round trip latency of about 3 ms, which feels substantially tighter than the Saffire Pro 40s 7-8 ms. 






We do have a backup laptop on hand just incase. For MacBooks that still use the optical drive there is a feature to turn off the vibration stopping sensor so you can use those on stage as well


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## KristapsCoCoo

Great setup!
Don't you get a quite bit of .... from sound-guys once in a while? Although this is as simple as it gets, I can imagine how confused some of them must be when they have to run something like this, haha.


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## ACE IT UP

There's never any confusion. Cabs can be mic'd as usual and we actually make things simpler by having a DI snake delivering balanced XLRs straight to the soundboard/patch bay.


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## concertjunkie

ACE IT UP said:


> There's never any confusion. Cabs can be mic'd as usual and we actually make things simpler by having a DI snake delivering balanced XLRs straight to the soundboard/patch bay.




can you explain this part a bit more? I'm looking to streamline my live setup and will soon be investing in a tower rack + mixer + interface . 

So if I have the snake, I'll be running all my Outs from the interface into the or mixer to a snake, then the snake runs into theirs?


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## ACE IT UP

concertjunkie said:


> can you explain this part a bit more? I'm looking to streamline my live setup and will soon be investing in a tower rack + mixer + interface .
> 
> So if I have the snake, I'll be running all my Outs from the interface into the or mixer to a snake, then the snake runs into theirs?



You have the right idea! Outs will go from the interface into the snake and then from the snake to the soundboard/patchbay. Check this one out! It's a DI box and snake all in one!

Whirlwind Medusa MultiSnake 8 Channel Audio MLTSN8X4KITM-50 B&H


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## concertjunkie

ACE IT UP said:


> You have the right idea! Outs will go from the interface into the snake and then from the snake to the soundboard/patchbay. Check this one out! It's a DI box and snake all in one!
> 
> Whirlwind Medusa MultiSnake 8 Channel Audio MLTSN8X4KITM-50 B&H




Doesnt the venue usually have their own snake? Would I actually be running my own snake to the soundboard directly instead of using theirs?


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## ACE IT UP

concertjunkie said:


> Doesnt the venue usually have their own snake? Would I actually be running my own snake to the soundboard directly instead of using theirs?



Yes but you need to ensure your lines are going through a DI before plugging into theirs. A DI box accomplishes this but a snake like this one gives you the added benefit of having multiple DIs and XLR outputs.


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## iron blast

Insane setup I'm not to fond of The native bass plugin in particular but everything else looks quite epic


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## Elric

Amazed... So, are you, like, from the Future?


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## iron blast

Any updates? I'm thinking of going in a similar direction with my band. We are planing on only running cabs on large shows and ones with poor soundreinforcement. Im planning on snagging one of the qsc pld power amps for the cabs when we need it. The rest of the time we will just run a split snake to the front of house off our mixer and use in ears to monitor.


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## concertjunkie

iron blast said:


> Any updates? I'm thinking of going in a similar direction with my band. We are planing on only running cabs on large shows and ones with poor soundreinforcement. Im planning on snagging one of the qsc pld power amps for the cabs when we need it. The rest of the time we will just run a split snake to the front of house off our mixer and use in ears to monitor.



What are you wanting to know?

I made adjustments to our rack and will (before our tour) switch to using the Jason Richardson Toneforge (for guitars) instead of our Axe Fx Ultra/Pod HD 500X combo, and FRFR speakers instead of our 2x12 cabs. Currently our set up is in two smaller racks that stack on top of eachother, but at least it can fit in anyone's car!


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## PBGas

Pretty amazing setup! Clarett is a fantastic unit. Really love mine! 
I am so looking forward some day to ditching any hardware modellers and going this route. 

Well done!


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## Jano

Im just here to say I found this amazing.


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## BenSolace

Any problems/crashes with this setup so far? I am thinking of doing something similar myself with my MacBook Pro but it's only got a 2.2Ghz i7 and (IIRC) 8gb RAM plus SSD. I'd be using Amplitube Mesa (specifically the Mk. IV model) for both guitars but am worried about the stability at low latencies.


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## kingo

This is great. Really admiring the effort here.


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## drjeffreyodweyer

Amazing and interesting stuff!

Could you please elaborate the whole lightning angle? Do you bring your own lights for effects or do you somehow connect to the venues lightning? Thank you!


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## Drezik27

This is awesome. Just curious, what do you do for vocals?


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## Screamingdaisy

Old thread. OP hasn't logged on in over a year.


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