Al Krow

Another big fan of wireless and the freedom to roam. Audiences seem to love it, right?! (And also super useful for sound checks, too). What a great performance reminder: "people listen with their eyes" - I'm making note of that one!

Have been really enjoying the combination of IEMs plus personalised monitor feeds we've now got via our digital desk (A&H CQ18T in our case). By way of background, in case of help to anyone (and apologies for those of you who are already familiar!), it's been a bit of a journey for me: switching to KZ ZAR IEMs a year back from the more budget KZ ZS10s which I had tried out for about 18 months prior was a game changer in providing a fuller more rounded sound vs something that I found a little toppy/harsh in the case of the more budget option and which had almost made me want to give up on IEMs. The better preamps in the A&H desk plus the personalised feeds was yet another step up and I was finally getting an experience that was comparably good to using a backline amp. And with a line-up change six months back and the new guitarist being very happy not to have a stage amp (he doesn't have a car so is able to get to gigs with pedal board and guitar on public transport) was the icing on the cake in terms of not having to deal with an overloud guitar amp on stage, which I'm sure we have all had to suffer from from time to time! Our singers seem to particularly love IEMs, in general guitarists I work with the least keen; they miss the harmonic richness they get from their amps. But the thing that I've had to wake up to is going from an overall sound where the non-IEM stage monitoring was sometimes meh (and that was on us for not wanting to invest in and lug separate stage monitors for each band member) but where our FoH sound generally pretty good to my ears, to a few gigs over the past six months where the band have had a really good gigging experience with IEMs, but me wandering out into the audience mid-set and discovering that the FoH was far from decent and punters getting a drum heavy mix, which didn't seem to be the case at initial soundcheck. Has been particularly the case with new venues and/or if they have an in-house PA. It's rare that the venues we play at have sound engineers on site and we certainly can't justify having one ourselves. So I guess the key learning point I wanted to share is that if you are getting a good IEM mix from your desk, don't let that lull you into a false sense of security about the FoH sound! If anyone else has similar stories, please do share!

Having bought a filter pedal off Paddy, he's now returned the favour 15 months later and bought one off me which I've no doubt he will be putting to far better use than I would ever manage to! Another quick, straightforward transaction and a pleasure to deal with.

Do any of you guys also find that you sometimes get a "resonant boominess" from the low end of the guitar and bass overlapping and reinforcing each other? Just wondering if the answer might be to set the HPF on the guitar at say 150Hz, which wouldn't impact any of the 2nd harmonics, but would cut the fundamentals on the guitar's low E, A and D strings which directly overlap with the important 2nd harmonics on the E, A and D strings on the bass?

Old (and forgot to sling their boots) Order

+1^^ Put our RCF 912As through their paces at a decently sized pub venue last night. Was very happy with the tone and "weight" of the bass in the mix, despite not having a sub. A key for me getting more "weight" has been giving my bass a little (+3dB) EQ boost at around 125Hz - we can do that on our mixing desk, but any decent EQ pedal will also allow you to do this. Having said that, there was a 3 piece function band at the same venue the previous week with a LOT of kit, tops, subs and a Markbass combo as backline. Can't deny they sounded really good!

Sounds like you're sorted, but worth mentioning that Harley Benton do a very compact range which are not spendy. Their Iso2 Pro looks like it also matches your spec.

I'm wondering whether picking up a solitary 910A as and when it appears, rather than waiting for a pair might be a good alternative approach? 😊 On a completely separate note, and just thinking aloud (!): would it make any sense to try using a 12" PA speaker on the floor or if we have one going spare (or even better, your 745A!) and just use for low bass and kickdrum with crossover set at (say) 120Hz, plus HPF maybe at 30Hz, and then let your tops just deal with everything above 120Hz? I suspect you would get a bigger sound than just your two 310A tops, and not have the weight of a heavy sub to deal with? What do you reckon?

Thanks for that Phil. Yeah 43 kg would be a non starter for me! I'm sensing you're not yet a covert to adding a sub, and might be happier with a couple of RCF 932As as your standalone rig? Out of interest, what drum synth do you use with your duo?

Thanks Phil. Let us know what you think of the ART 905 mkIII - I'm guessing you will be pairing with your 310As (or are they 910As now)?

Heartbreaking to read. RIP Sam x

Ordered 😊- just £20.50 on Amazon Prime.

Good question - I was about to place an order following Woody and Steve's recommendation! Haha thanks Phil. I think I may have ended up with B stock RCF 932A coming tomorrow as the fall out (as we can't be gig ready with only one working PA speaker!) 😂...may actually have saved me a few quid and I'll see if I can bag another used / B-stock one at some point soon - as it was definitely my plan to upgrade the 912As --> 932As at some point this year, having seen how much better for vox the 732As are than the 912As, but with the 912As delivering a fuller bass. Does come back to the question of whether mixing and matching a 912A and 932A is going to work? - I guess I'm going to be best placed to find out! Another mate of mine pointed out that given how close the speakers are in many aspects any downside should be, fingers crossed, limited and we can get some improvement in vox until I bag another 932A to get the full benefit.

Perfection is often the enemy of the good! Get as good a sound as your budget and ability to transport allows: better than doing nothing right?

I'm guessing someone hadn't properly connected the lead to the desk output, which would account for both the hum and the lack of output. Didn't occur to me on the night it could be something as basic as that... but now noted for future reference!

Hmmm...just tried all possible combinations of desk outputs, PA speakers and PA leads and both the 912As seem to be working fine. The hum was there on both when I had the PA lead plugged into the speaker but not into the desk, so I can only guess that this was user error on my part and I / bandmate had not properly connected the desk to the PA speaker. All's well that ends well, fingers crossed!

And I'm guessing sounds better and fuller than without a sub and just 2 x 12 tops, Steve?

A lot of pub bands gig with just 2 x 12" tops and no sub and get a pretty decent sound. Are folk saying it's pretty pointless adding a 12" sub into the mix, to primarily put the kick through, for larger venues and / or outdoor gigs?

They do indeed, thanks John. And I'm planning on getting it repaired under warranty, but will involve shipping to Germany which could take a couple of month for the round trip and we will be needing a full PA in the meantime. Happened once before 5 months back - they couldn't find any fault with it and sent it back and seemed to be working fine since Jan, but 2nd time this has happened, so I'm thinking I may have a definitely faulty unit.

Have been using a pair of RCF 912As for a couple of years. One of them seems to be on the blink - giving out a worrying hum but no output at a recent gig, so we had to do the gig on one speaker! Not ideal, but a couple of comments about being too loud at one point put my main worry about a lack of volume to rest! I've got the possibility of picking up a used single 932A to replace the faulty 912A. Essentially same woofer, but better mid range coil which will be better for vox and guitar. Bad idea to mix two speakers even when their specs are pretty close? Or will the overall impact be a slightly better mid range from the two PA speakers, despite the mixed mid-range 1" and 3" coils/horns and potential interference? I'm guessing the interference may not be too bad, given the greater directionality of the higher frequencies, and not something the audience at a given location will notice, whilst benefitting from the better vox? Or should I just get a replacement 912A, instead?

Agreed! They really are a great piece of kit!

Just picking up on your excellent post on the "distortion that keeps the 'thump'" post: I'll need to give your recommended X-bass distortion a try out! I've been using the AIRD Preamp Orange stack which gives a very juicy fuzz that I'm liking a lot. As we were discussing, so much more weight to it with a clean blend parallel path, and with the EQ in the +125Hz bass/low mids given a boost on both paths, combined with using a comp as a sustain on the fuzz path but something much more standard on the clean blend path.

I think that's what's called an "open mic night" 😅