My band’s live sound setup
June 29th, 2008 by Derek
A few people have asked about the gear my band The Neurotics uses in our live shows. We run our own sound, without a sound engineer, and have found over the years that this arrangement works well for us. A lot of the stuff would also be useful for recording:
The setup consists of instruments from Fender, Gretsch, Pearl and Sabian (my drums in the back), Korg, Matchless, Dr. Z, and Yorkville, as well as PA equipment from Shure, Mackie, Yorkville, and AKG. Our Mackie mixer sits on top of one of the guitar amps.
This collection of gear might be a bit overkill for a small venue like the golf club wedding we played last night, but with levels low, we can create a good balance between instruments and vocals. At a larger venue, it has enough power to help us entertain several hundred people in a hotel ballroom or outdoor show.
Click the picture for a larger view, which includes notes on individual items. I was pretty tired after the show and the hour-long drive back home, which got me to bed at 3:30 a.m.—I’m not used to that anymore.
Entry Filed under: Blog
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6 Comments Add your own
1. CheapAdviceGuy&hellip | July 15th, 2008 at 12:05 pm
Hey, nice setup! And a cool photo too.
I run sound for an acoustic oldies band and I am wondering how you get the vocals balanced right without having someone out in the audience area. The band might have to go on without me someday!
2. Derek&hellip | July 17th, 2008 at 9:37 pm
We just get all the mics set up to an equal level — one of us goes out during sound check and makes sure they’re roughly even. Then we adjust the levels by singing closer or farther from the mics as necessary: lead vocal closer, the rest of us further back, depending on who’s singing lead on each song.
If necessary our roadie guy or one of our friends might let us know if anything is out of whack (usually it’s a guitar too loud, honestly) and we can adjust. But we’ve been doing this for 15 years now with this band, so we’ve become reasonably good at that.
3. Vintage Amps&hellip | September 7th, 2009 at 6:06 am
Great setup. Dr Z & Matchless are just awesome sounding amps. I think managing your own sound only makes a band sound better.
4. Emmanuel&hellip | December 13th, 2009 at 10:05 am
Sir I am despirately in need of help with my church sound (flock of christ mission in warri Nigeria.). We have good equipment but are still having problem with good sound. Please sir if u are willin to help please let me know so I’ll send you the list of our equipment and areas we’re having problems. Please sir reply through this forum or through my email. Thanks in advance.
5. Carl&hellip | April 3rd, 2010 at 6:42 pm
We are using the same set-up as you are and we are wondering at what levels you set your gain at in general or on individual channels ?
6. Derek&hellip | April 6th, 2010 at 5:37 pm
We try to set everything at unity gain as much as possible, then adjust the main and monitors outputs accordingly. We’ll adjust trims on the mic inputs, since those tend to be more variable, especially when you have both passive dynamics and phantom-powered condensers in the mix. Direct inputs like keyboards tend to run close to maximum output.
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