Death Cab For Cutie - Radar II *(or V) used in Live Performances?

[michaelepstein]

Hey All,

I recently saw an episode of PBS "Austin City Limits" with live performance by "Death Cab For Cutie."
I noticed that Death Cab was using a full on Radar System alongside their keyboard rig during this performance.
I only am speculating this because I saw the Radar Meter Bridge LED, when the camera focused on the Keyboard Rig.
In fact, I only saw the meters flashing during the performance of the song "Crooked Teeth."
What I could see from a distance were maybe only 4 Tracks that were metered at a time; all set to playback mode

Anyone know what this whole radar rig is designed to facilitate? backing track playback or something?

[bleen]

The RADAR is part of their normal touring rig. It was a last resort after spending a ridiculously long time trying to get their drummer's (Jason) Powerbook to not freak out during the loudest portions of their set. He and I spent a looooooooong time trying to get that to work, including turning off the g-force shock protection via Terminal, but it would just fail at all the wrong times.

He was trying to run samples in Logic's EXS24 and play the tracks back simultaneously, but invariably, he'd get either "Disk too slow" or "Core Audio overload" messages. It's possible it could have been traced back to the MOTU 828mkII he was running, but I tried this same set up on a backup 828 and another Powerbook with the same results.

We were working on this in their rehearsals up to two days before their first show for the new tour and it just became too risky so he went with an Akai Z8 for sample triggering and one of Chris Walla's RADARs for the tracks.

[arthurchino]

I have worked with a number of touring artists who use HD recorders as playback devices for backing tracks etc. I have also seen people using triggers from a sequencer. It's not uncommon.

Although I have never worked for them I know, for example, that U2 and Lionel Ritchie have substantial Pro Tools rigs under the stage and side of stage respectively.

In my experience they work best with IEM (In Ear Monitoring) as it is obviously crucial that, even when the drummer is not playing, the musicians stay synced to the track. Thus, with some of these artists, the monitor engineer (me) has muted / unmuted click in relevant sections from a seperate track. Of course the drummer has constant click supplied to his IEMs. It is also possible to edit the click to be silent when not needed.

One of the great benefits of this is that the click track "beeps" the band in, so it can also beep in other members of the crew. For example the Lighting Director can know when something is about to happen without any sonic cue which is audible to the audience. Which can result in spectacular sycned scene changes etc. Some bands here in the UK have one Pro Tools session which runs from start to finish of the show, cueing all sorts of things. Of course timecode can run around the stage, as can MIDI information. If you want to take it really far it can use MIDI program change to change guitar effects, synth patches, everything really. The downside is if it goes down, the show stops. Due to this most touring bands (coldplay for example) employ a B system with silent switching. Even automated silent switching. This is acheived using a handmade bespoke rack unit, which is very expensive, but very clever.

"What other artists are using a Radar rig or similar*(Pro-Tools, Ext. DAW, etc.), as part of their main stage rig; what are the practicallities of a set-up like this?"

I guess I answered this above, but if I were to list all those I have seen it would be a long one. Often used for Loop playback, strings, fx, extra guitars (acoustics when guitarist plays electrics etc.) even for specific FX which it's easier to playback than have at FOH for the show.

Does anyone has any advice or tips of how I could incorporate my own recorded tracks from the studio into my live set-up; or would a sampler/trigger (i.e. loops, One-shot, etc.) be a more plausible/practical solution?

Get the best HD playback device you can afford, record the tracks you want to have stuff from on it, make sure drummer (at least) has click and away you go! Of course if you don't play to a click and the samples are not long loops then you can just trigger in time from a sampler.

I would imagine Death Cab chose the Radar as a reliable unit which sounds great and suited their playback needs.

In fact, I only saw the meters flashing during the performance of the song "Crooked Teeth."

This is also fairly common. If a track (I can't say I know this one) has beats etc... it can be more straightforward to just play them back than trigger them.

hope that helps. Of course, I know nothing about what Death Cab are using it for, just making an mis-educated guess.

There's a whole question of authenticity and keeping it "real" of course. But I'm sure I heard Pink floyd and the Who used tape as playback in the dim and distant past. The Who certainly use playback now. or so I heard.

[arthurchino]

haha! so i waffle away all sorts of bollocks, and then someone from Death Cab's crew gives you a wonderfully succint and accurate insider's view.

Bleen, hard drive trouble on tour in loud bits; I feel your pain!

Pete

[bleen]

Just for the record, I'm not on Death Cab's crew nor have I ever been. Jason is a friend and I offered to help out with the issue to try and get things happening for him.

[arthurchino]

bleen, my mistake. nice one for posting though.

Pete

[michaelepstein]

Originally Posted by bleen

Just for the record, I'm not on Death Cab's crew nor have I ever been. Jason is a friend and I offered to help out with the issue to try and get things happening for him.

I still appreciate all the great information

Thanks again!

[N.J.]

Hi Michael,
http://mixonline.com/mag/audio_death...tie/index.html
Here is an article on their setup for the tour.

They used a RADAR 24 w/ Adrenaline Plus for playback on the tour, and also to record the "Plans" album.

[Meriphew]

Sorry to bump this old thread, but does anyone know what (DI boxes - what kind) Death Cab was using to interface the RADAR unit to the FOH, and how many backing tracks they were using? Thx.