Currently performing around Asia before heading to Turkey in early July, Thee Sacred Souls is enlisting the help of DiGiCo consoles – a Quantum326 provided by the Escondido, California office of Sound Image, a Clair Global brand, with a Quantum338 and other Quantum desks being used to fill in for fly dates along the way, as well as an SD-Rack stagebox.

“On our riders, DiGiCo is always the first; for our run in May, 90% of it will be DiGiCo,” said Josh Benton, Thee Sacred Souls’ FOH engineer for the last five years. While he’s used both the Quantum326 and Quantum338 on Thee Sacred Souls shows, depending upon availability, Benton says the Quantum326’s specifications and flexibility make it his favourite road companion. “Either desk is good with me but, when we get on tour, I prefer the Q326 just because it’s more compact. But we both appreciate the flexibility of the consoles. It goes without saying that they sound great, and their flexibility to let users move anything anywhere means we can each have our own workflows exactly as we want them, in any situation. I’m also a huge fan of the ability to swap out DMI cards – if we want to use different protocols on the back of the desk, it’s just swap it out and off you go. And honestly, that’s been a huge asset as of late as we started using the Dante protocol for some of that.”

Benton is a fan of Quantum’s Mustard processing, particularly its optical and other compressors, as well as some of the Spice Rack EQ features. But it’s the console’s ability to accommodate his workflow and the band’s onstage configuration that he believes makes the Quantum326 such as great fit. “Our input list isn’t terribly big, no more than 40; they’re not playing with tracks,” he added. “If you don’t see it onstage, it’s not happening. So the processing power on the Quantum far exceeds anything I will ever use. I could have two bands onstage, double our input count and I’d still have more than enough processing. That really lets me concentrate on the mix and on the evolving show onstage, which can be pretty complex: as a band, it’s the three guys, but as a live act, we are at minimum an 11-piece band, and sometimes a 15-piece band if we have a string quartet with us. And with a single SD-Rack, we’re actually able to cover our needs and any of the support artists that tour with us, which is something we’re planning on doing for the summer run, all within one infrastructure. It makes for a very streamlined workflow.”