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Adele Wows Britain with Neumann and Sennheiser
Adele, the young British soul singer who began the year as the winner of the BBC's ‘Sound of 2008', is currently undertaking her biggest UK tour so far. And an essential addition to her touring package has been a range of microphones from Neumann and Sennheiser.
According to front of house engineer Dave McDonald the Neumann KMS 104 was always going to be an essential part of Adele's audio makeup.
"I've been touring for the last year with Air," he explains, "and we were using the Neumann KMS 104. It takes the vocal and really throws it to the back of the hall with clarity. When I started working with Adele I said: ‘let's get you one of these, a) for health reasons, because you need your own microphone and b) it's the right mic for your vocal'. The KMS 104 just has this depth. It goes right to the bottom and the high end of the vocal and it's crystal clear. That's what I always want. I don't want to be messing around for ages EQing a vocal when I can just put a really good mic on it."
The singer herself is enjoying her new mics. Although apparently, it's more of a case of if it's not broken, don't fix it.
"Adele's one of those people who doesn't really say much about anything unless it's wrong," reveals McDonald. "I asked her what she thought of the KMS 104 and she just said it looks good and sounds clear. That's high praise."
Aside from the Neumann vocal microphones, McDonald also took delivery of a selection of Sennheiser evolution mics for Adele's band's extensive backline, including an e 901 on the kick drum, a pair of e 905s on the snare, e 904s on the toms and floor toms, e 614s on high hats and overheads, an e 902 on the bass amp, a pair of e 906s on guitar amps and e 840s for backing vocals.
"I've been using evolution mics on drum kits for quite a while," continues McDonald. "I've always liked the sound I get from them, especially the toms. I'm using digital boards, and it's good to plug the mics in and know they'll give me what I want every time. The e 901 on the kick drum is great. It's got a clip on the top, and it gives you the bottom end. It's giving me the all round sound that I want. The drum kit's pumping away and the bass sounds great. I don't have any call to complain. We're going on tour to America soon, and I'm going to take all the mics with me. I know what I have every day, and I know that they're going to work. If you don't tour with your own mics, you know you're going to find places that have mics with their own ecosystems growing on them."
In addition to the host of microphones on the tour, Adele has been using Sennheiser EW 300 IEM G2 in-ear monitors for the very first time. They've been welcome additions.
"Adele absolutely loves them," promises McDonald. "It's only been a week since we started but it's the way ahead. She'd never used IEMs before, but she'd never go back. And audio-wise, it's been pretty rock steady."
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