The band have just released their new Simpatico album, and with a loyal concert going fanbase, all the gigs have been packed with punters and enthusiasm.
The tour visits a variety of venues and is being mixed by FOH engineer Dian Barton. For the larger spaces, the standard configuration is 12 VerTec 4888 elements a side, together with six ADLIB 418 subs a side, explains ADLIB's systems engineer and FOH 'babysitter' Steve Pattison.
VerTec is an ideal system for a band like the Charlatans, who combine a serious rock 'n' roll attitude with power, driving guitars and intricate lyrics. They are not a band that requires rocket science to get a good sound, as they all play well and solidly, it's more a question of making their natural sound appropriately loud and lively for the environment. This is a task that VerTec performs exceptionally well.
From the rigging aspect, says Pattison, VerTec is incredibly quick and simple to get airborne and unlike a lot of line arrays, if needs be, it will also ground stack and still perform well. The whole system is driven by Camco amps, with BSS Omnidrives for system processing and a BSS FCS 960s taking care of the crossovers and EQ.
Barton uses a Midas Heritage H3000 console, and ADLIB are supplying a selection of outboards including Lexicon PCM 81s, two SPX 2000s for reverbs, an old SPX 990 for 'chorus' effects and a TC Electronics D2 delay unit.
There's dbx 160 compression across Tim Burgess' vocal, along with dbx160As for bass and acoustic guitar. They also have a frequency conscious BSS 901 compressor running along with the 160s to eliminate the sibilance on his voice, and his mic is a standard Shure Beta 58A hand held.
Most of the other mics that ADLIB has supplied are also Shure, with Beyer M88s on the kick and bass, Shure SM98s across the toms and AKG 414 overheads.
At the other end of the multicore is James Neale, looking after monitors which are engineered by Ian Barton using his desk of choice - a trusty Midas XL3. His FX rack contains Drawmer gates and BSS Opal compressors. The monitors are powered by Crown Pulse amps with a dbx Drive Rack doing all the processing.
The band all use wedges, so there's eight pairs in total - of the original ADLIB 15" + 2" wedges - which were requested after being used successfully on the last tour. They are combining these with the new ADLIB FD4 side fills, a 3-way active version of their FD cabinets, specifically designed for larger shows.
(Chris Henry)
