Nashville, TN (June 12, 2023)—Paramore is back on the road behind its latest album, and while the band is once again carrying audio gear from longtime audio provider Eighth Day Sound (Highland Heights, OH), there’s plenty going on that’s new. Key among those is engineer Travis Bing’s move from monitor world to the front-of-house position—where he’s manning an SSL L650 FOH console—and the new addition of an L-Acoustics K2 line array system for the current U.S. tour leg, scheduled to run through August 2.
While he’s only been mixing the band’s house mix since 2022, Bing has actually been part of the group’s audio team for 13 years “We did some shows last fall on a brief US tour of smaller venues where we didn’t carry a PA,” he recalled, “and every time I found myself on an L-Acoustics rig, the mix just came together faster and sounded more musical. It could easily handle that back-and-forth between aggressive and dynamic songs that is a huge part of our shows now. That’s when I knew I wanted to carry L-Acoustics for our future tours. I don’t mind mixing on different PAs night to night—it does keep you on your toes—but I’m also very excited to have such great consistency and see where we can push this band’s mix sonically in these larger venues moving forward.”
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With that in mind, the new tour’s PA centers around 60 L-Acoustics K2 enclosures: 18 flown per side for mains, and 12 per side as side hangs. An additional 32 Kara II, 16 per side, are deployed to cover up to 270°. For reinforced LF, 10 K1-SB are hung behind each of the main arrays for low-frequency extension and are complemented by six KS28 subs ground-stacked per side in a cardioid configuration. Eight A10 Focus are spread out across the stage lip as front-fills. The entire system is driven by 48 LA12X amplified controllers paired with three P1 MILAN AVB processors.
Systems engineer and FOH tech Brian Sankus points out that the band members are all big advocates of performing as close to the crowd as they can, so, with a five-foot-high stage and barricade often five feet or less from the downstage edge, focusing the energy where needed is crucial. “By deploying K2 with K1-SB, we can get a good wrap on the mains to drastically bring that gap between the mains and front-fills down,” he said. “We also try to be low-end conscious for both the front row and the band onstage. Having the flown K1-SB and cardioid KS28 on the ground really helps manage the direction of the low end.”
With seven musicians onstage generating over 70 inputs, Paramore’s expanded touring outfit has a lot of layers to its music and live performance. “It’s more than just ‘gain it up and go’—it’s about trying to find space and dimension while still sounding massive,” Bing said. “Also, the band’s catalog has evolved over the years, so going from harder and faster songs to more rhythmic and dynamic songs back-to-back in the setlist can certainly present some mixing challenges each night.”
