No doubt there will be plenty of comedians saying thank goodness for small mercies, but paying £70 for a stadium gig and not being able to hear the act is taking the Mick.
I’ve never actually been to a gig at the Millenium Stadium, does anyone who has have an experience of the sound being below par?
Sound crap at stadium gig shocker. Next you’ll be telling me you couldn’t see anything and the drinks were overpriced.
I guess a lot of people were attending their first stadium show and didn’t know what to expect, ie terrible sound, seats miles from stage, rip off prices, people constantly wandering back and forth to bar & toilets with long queues for same, nightmare traffic to and from venue. All reasons why I gave them up many years ago!
You gave up the Spice Girls many years ago? God, I always thought you were a stayer.
Well, your loss is our loss too.
Shame.
(and have I ever mentioned that my band provided the backing to Baby’s first ever live singing gig?).
Yes, I am embarras.
I saw Macca at the Millennium Stadium about ten years ago on a balmy summer’s night. The sound was a bit boomy, and the roof was open, by me ears tuned into it pretty quickly. We could certainly hear his ‘spontaneous’ between-song patter perfectly well, which I’d say is the acid test for big venue sound. I had a blast. Fleetwood Mac at the O2, however, was awful.
If I go to stadium gigs then I have to be on the pitch or at least in the lower seats. Upper seats forget it. O2 is a venue mainly for concerts so should be better. Only been once (Manics) and it was fine. However I am sure that up in the 400 seats it’s not as good.
I was so high up for Steely Dan at the O2 that I could have reached up and touched the roof but the sound was pretty good to be fair. I’d never go there again though.
Ironically, I saw Macca at the O2 in December and the sound was fine.
But where were you?
I saw the Mac at the O2 and it was fine (about half way back at ground level)….mind you, my abiding memory of that gig was the fucking twats talking all the time in front of us. Yes, I had a word….
I’ve often heard the soundcheck story regarding the Spice Girls.
Apparently the vocals in the early days were on tape/disc and the best way to mime is to sing into mics at a low level, so getting the lip movements correct…..i.e, NOT like Roy Wood on TOTP.
Now the myth go’s, during a soundcheck a enterprising sound man hooked up some live mics and recorded the output at the desk…..the vocals were supposed to be at best, cat like.
If there is any truth to this story it would go some way to explaining the terrible sound.
About 20 years ago, I spent a week with a camera racks engineer who had seen the first performance of the Spice Girls when they were unveiled as the next big thing to their record company (Virgin?) at a staff only event. She said they were not only terrible but unrecognisable as they didn’t have their “identities” at that point.
Full marks to the BBC online news reporter who headlined this story ‘Sound at Dublin Spice Girls gig-a-big-nah’.
There is a discussion on a closed Facebook group I belong to regarding the Dublin stadium concert. Opinions vary but:
Poor sound design, not enough speakers, not in the right place
Wind
Sound is always bad there and venue is known for it
Front of House engineer had been told not to make the vocals too loud as the girls can’t sing.
Haven’t they heard of backing tapes to “liven up” the sound? Bowie and the Stones were using those in the 80s already.
Funny to think that the SGs are one of the few acts for whom playing huge stadiums constitutes going back to their roots.
Whether the girls can or cannot sing is irrelevant to the live experience of such a concert, with today’s technology.
Poor sound will be down to the amount the promoter is prepared to pay, the setup of the equipment, whoever is in charge of it and how much of a shit they all gave about it.
I’m curious who is more responsible for the sound – the venue or the act? Does the venue usually have dedicated gear and sound technicians, or would those be brought in by the band? I’m just wondering where the path of blame lies.
I don’t miss my gigging days in small venues with a dedicated sound guy. I have NEVER experienced good sound anywhere, ever! There seem to be always problems. The sound guy blames the band, the band blames the sound guy…. and the arguments go round and round….
In any stadium, there is an optimum spot where the sound is just perfect. Imagine positioning your sofa just so for the surround sound on your cinema TV (we’ve all done it, haven’t we?). Just like the sofa, only a maximum of four people can enjoy the show. The rest of the 50,000 audience can go hang.
Near the sound desk is normally the sweet spot. I ften gravitate there, if I don’t have a reserved seat.
Yes. Those sound guys can only hear what they hear where they hear. The sound is best at the sound desk alright.
@fentonsteve might have a detailed technical explanation.
Well, the thing is… [continues on page 94]
If it still sounds rubbish at the sound desk, either the venue acoustics are truly dreadful (which makes you wonder why they use it as a venue) or the soundman is incompetent.
The Police at Twickenham September 2007.
Worst sound at ay Stadium gig I have been to.
It was better in the old Webley in the 1980s!
I read an article quite a while ago now in a sound engineer-y technical type magazine with an expert in the field, maybe in U2’s crew. Anyway, he was saying that, at whatever level gig, the technology is now such that you should by rights be able to claim a refund for bad sound at a gig. That a general sense of ‘you pays yer money’ that has always applied to live gigs (rather than recordings) is cultural status quo and deserves questioning. Friend of mine actually got free tix for subsequent shows after complaining about Springsteen sound quality in Sydney a few years ago. (And it wasn’t just Springsteen not opening his mouth when he sings, either)
There’s an awful lot they can do with technology, but some of it is just physics. Saying that, given modern-day ticket prices, good sound should be a given.
The Looe Music Festival used to have a ‘BBC Introducing’ stage in a tent. The first year we went it was great – some fab new bands, mostly local, and everything was spot on technically. The next year was a shambles – they just couldn’t get the sound sorted at all, with musicians frantically signalling their monitors weren’t right, poor sound mix etc. You can expect a one off problem in those circumstances , but it kept happening until punters were in open revolt and derision fell upon the mixing desk! Turned out that this was the last year of that festival and they were desperately trying to cut corners and save money…!
Small gigs/venues usually don’t have a dedicated monitor desk and engineer these days as digital desks can run monitors but rather than having a tech on the side of the stage, musicians will have to communicate with front of house which, as you say, means waving, grimacing or speaking their request for (usually) more in the monitors. Theoretically, if the desk is sufficiently sophisticated (not difficult these days), a monitor engineer could control the monitor mix from the stage with an iPad while the front of house engineer sits at the desk itself but that requires an extra engineer to be paid. Mostly, I find that vocals are rarely loud enough in the mix for me or maybe everything else is too loud.
It’s this. Pretty much every gig we do is in a smaller venue and most bands have their back line too loud and the sound engineer can’t get the vocals loud enough to sit nicely on top. We do have the advantage of having possibly the only lead guitarist in the whole wide world that engineers routinely ask to turn up a bit. As for outdoor gigs… I’m none the wiser…
Two local pub venues I go to see bands at DO have a dedicated desk, monitors and engineer. Most expect the performers to supply all their own setup.
In one, which has gigs most nights and sometimes 2 or even 3 on a Sunday, there is a smallish stage and a permanently-installed PA, mixer (with house engineer) and feeds to stage boxes for mics, instruments, monitors etc. plus video feeds to a couple of screens where the stage is hard to see clearly.
In the other the mixer and the multicore feeds to a couple of stage boxes are permanent fixtures but there is no stage in the main room, just a tiny stage in the back room. The performance area is cleared and speakers, monitors, mics and stands are set up where and when required. Drum kits are almost never miked and electric instruments only rarely. Generally the drum kit is the loudest sound source and everything else is set up to be heard over the drums. The licencee’s husband (a trained sound engineer) is in charge of the mixer and setup, but he has a very competent stand-in for when he’s not there.
I haven’t been to all that many stadium gigs. In fact the last one I can remember was the Stones at Wembley Stadium in 1996. I don’t recall being disappointed by the sound on that occasion but I was some years earlier in 1991 at a Guns ‘n Roses show. The breeze blowing that night seemed to wash the sound away at certain times. I remember thinking how outdoor gigs were more events rather than performances to appreciate. No decent view. People milling about constantly, the noise of conversation all around. Things to turn up at and wait for the big finish. A bit like public executions at Tyburn.
The Kinks and then Status Quo both at Wembley Arena were echoing noises.
The oft-mentioned Albert Hall has form for iffy sound. I’ve seen Mark Knopfler there a few times. At one show a few years ago the sound was the usual RAH mud for the first 20 minutes and then lo! it cleared into lovely crystal clarity.
I think I can just about hear a little bit of singing.
Some thoughts from someone in the trade in this BBC article: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-48446798
It also includes this bit of perspective:
“Allan points out that just 12 people complained about sound issues in Croke Park out of an audience of about 80,000 people. “The whole thing is just a made-up story. It’s not real,” he says.
“Nobody left, nobody asked for their money back. It’s really lazy journalism just to repeat a couple of angry tweets from the back of the stadium and make it front page news.
“That wasn’t the experience for most of the people in that concert.”
I’ve only ever been to one actual Stadium gig. Stones at Old Trafford, and right at the back but facing the stage I was pleasantly surprised by how it sounded – loud enough – reasonably clear mix and a plenty of bass. It was great, and that’s their natural habitat – they know how to work at that scale and their crew know how to get it sounding as good as it can. The wind was still and it was a warm day and that surely helped though.
I’m not really one for Festivals and big outdoor shows – Beezer is right – too many variables and it’s just people milling about – they’re for civilians really. John Cale did The Velvet Undergound & Nico at a disused dock in Liverpool and it was dire, far too quiet, windy sound and a succession of guest artists – would have been great indoors in a smaller place but didn’t work at all amid paper cups of lager, chips and piss.
Biggest gig I’ve been to in years was The Cure in Hyde Park last year, and while it’s impossible to really engage with the music in an event that size they were the perfect band for that sort of event – like The Stones they’re at ease in that environment and their epic music fills it out nicely. Considering the size of the place the sound wasn’t too bad actually. However I’m only a very casual fan of The Cure, so I was enjoying it as a spectacle from a distance and being thankful that most of the bands I really love I can see at close range indoors and hear properly.
I’ll be interested to see how this Dylan/Young thing goes down in that vast space – they’ve got their work cut out there.
I saw Pink Floyd at Wembley Stadium (don’t look for it, it’s not there anymore) and they sounded fantastic – and we were deliberately sat at the very back to catch the light show…I have it in my mind that the PA wasn’t in use and they had house-sized piles of speakers dotted around in the stands…Same band again at Earl’s Court (don’t look for it, it’s not there anymore), also a fantastic sound.