Auckland, New Zealand (September 18, 2026)—Lorde wraps up her current world tour next month at the Austin City Limits Music Festival, but through the journey, her audio team has been ensuring audiences hear every note—and that she hears them as well through her IEMs.
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Front of House Mix Engineer Philip J. Harvey and Monitor Engineer Kevin Glendinning have accomplished that by leaning on a variety of gear, including DPA mics and Wisycom RF equipment.
Capturing Lorde’s vocals nightly has been a DPA d:facto 4018VL capsule, says Harvey: “To me, it’s the most natural-sounding microphone out there. Whether it’s a whisper or a full-on scream, the d:facto captures everything with incredible detail and consistency.”
Her mic is one of only four onstage, it turns out, as the tour’s microphone count is intentionally sparse. “We’re essentially working with just four microphones on stage—Ella’s [Lorde’s] main vocal and three backing vocal mics,” Harvey says. “Everything else is direct. That makes the quality of those microphones even more important.”
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While Harvey focuses on delivering a polished front of house mix, Glendinning attends to the in-ear monitoring systems. “All our in-ear monitoring runs through Wisycom MPR50 belt-packs, MTK transmitters, MFL optical link and a CSI16T combiner,” he explains. “We’ve outfitted everyone, from the band to crew members, with the same system. Consistency is key.”
Perhaps the biggest challenge to the RF system comes during a segment where Lorde performs from the front of house position. To accommodate this, the team implemented a fiber-linked RF distribution system. “We run a Wisycom MFL RF over Fiber to extend coverage out into the audience area,” Glendinning says. “It was all part of the system design, and it’s been flawless.”
