Hi all....

Andy here, from SteamRadio, a 6 piece folk rock band based in the North East of England.

Our line up is mostly as follows....

Vocals, electric guitar, fiddle, winsynth, acoustic guitar, drums, bagpipes, mandolin....etc etc, you get the picture. Our bass guitarist has been removed from the equation (for lots of reasons) and now uses a good quality lightweight bass combo on stage.

We typically play halls accommodating 50 to 300 people.

We share 2 L1s c/w bass units.

I now feel we have given the L1s an extensive and extended workout, in a variety of live applications. Most of what I have to say here will be positive - I would welcome comments/suggestions from the guys at Bose - any criticism I might offer will be in the nature of a genuine observation, and not a 'dig' at Bose.

These things sound great. Almost all of the claims made by Bose in terms of performance are true. They have served us really well - we have since invested in the Tonematches (1 per stack) and we are very happy with the concept and the execution.

The first time we used these things 'in anger' was for a wedding in the medieval hall at Durham Castle. (Look it up, you Texans!!) Very high, very long, 1,000 years of reverb! The gear performed really, really well. Very little 'decay' (i.e. it really did sound almost as loud at the back of the hall as it did directly in front of the speakers, and no-one I have met yet can get their heads around that). Just as Bose promised. It's a notoriously difficult venue for sound, and it was a revelation just how it solved all the reverb problems, etc etc.

However a few issues have presented themselves over the last year and a half, and I wish I had known about these - perhaps I didn't use the forums properly.

In a confined stage space, it is very difficult to get far enough forward to hear what is going on, if you need any kind of volume. And almost impossible, in our situation, to hear what is coming out of the other L1 on the other side of the stage. Get 14ft in front of the L1, however, and these problems disappear.

This though is my no. 1 criticism - it is absolutely maddening that all of the inputs, and controls, are at the BACK of the base unit and, by virtue of the fact that you will want them as far back from you as possible (usually aginst a wall) you will be reading all of the labels etc etc UPSIDE DOWN!! Why could not these have been on the front of the unit? No, really, why??

Might seem a small thing - but not at 9.30PM on a small dark stage!!

However - if you'e thinking of buying these things, just do it. Give in, just do it. You WILL be in and out of a venue quicker than you ever thought possible. You WILL be amazed at the sound. You WILL be the envy of lots of other similar bands and you WILL be able to dispense with the services of your sound man.

Best wishes

Andy

Thanks, Andy, for your review of your experiences with the L1's!

quote:

Originally posted by Andy McLaughlin:
...In a confined stage space, it is very difficult to get far enough forward to hear what is going on, if you need any kind of volume. And almost impossible, in our situation, to hear what is coming out of the other L1 on the other side of the stage. Get 14ft in front of the L1, however, and these problems disappear...

In those situations where it is difficult to get far enough in front of the L1, there are some approaches folks have reported trying in order to minimize the associated problems:

1) Move the two L1's closer together, near the middle. That way everyone hears the same thing. Move the performers out to the sides (instead of the L1's).

2) Angle the L1's quite a bit toward the stage, instead of directly out toward the audience.

3) Cross-feed a bit of the sound from one side to the other -- as long as you have one "spare" input on each side, that is! The T1's make it easy to "compose" a cross-feed signal using the Aux output.

quote:

...This though is my no. 1 criticism - it is absolutely maddening that all of the inputs, and controls, are at the BACK of the base unit and, by virtue of the fact that you will want them as far back from you as possible (usually aginst a wall) you will be reading all of the labels etc etc UPSIDE DOWN!! ... Might seem a small thing - but not at 9.30PM on a small dark stage!!...

Yep!

One suggestion, at least during setup:

DON'T put the column in first. Turn the base around "backwards", make all the connections and check all the Trims and Presets, etc. (You still don't need the columns in place to do that!! -- you're adjusting by sight, not sound.)

Then, turn the base back around and insert the column pieces. It won't hurt anything even if you do that while it's powered on.

I know, it doesn't help when you later need to make changes 'on the fly', but it can help speed the setup.

Andy

Yeah, the L1 is really at its best on a more "generous" stage. (Then again, it's really better than anything on a small stage, if you think about it more globally).

When you have to play on a postage stamp, you have to get creative about making more room but not seeming to (in the eyes of the managers of the venue). Getting some of the band members off the stage and into the audience is sometimes a real benefit as it puts the audience in much more close contact with the performers. If you can deal with this as a player it may even improve your show, putting you in everyone's face just that much more. Also, you can put L1's IN the audience without hurting their ears. It depends on the venue, but the L1 does allow you to do things in a small space that you simply couldn't do with a standard triple amplification system.

Thanks for a frank discussion.