Atlanta, GA (July 10, 2026)—Brooklyn indie duo Ray Bull went far afield for its recent Please Stop Laughing tour, playing major cities throughout North America. Sliding in behind the FOH desk at each stop was engineer John Michael Young, who first met the band while working at a venue in Atlanta.
“I got to see Ray Bull performing at a local music festival,” recounted Young. “I really liked their music and started a conversation.” While that led to mixing house for the band at a show, it was a separate monitor mix he provided them from the house desk that led to a regular gig.
“They didn’t have their own in-ear monitor rig, so I was mixing their ears that night from my front of house console,” said Young. “They mentioned it was one of the better monitor mixes they had on tour, so I helped them put together a monitor rig to get that consistent experience every night.”
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Young recommended Allen & Heath’s SQ-Rack console, sporting a 48-channel 96k core of the SQ series in a faderless rackmount form factor. “I wanted them to avoid analog splits and have a very simple setup and teardown at each show with a limited crew,” he explained.
Since Young also brought along his own SQ-5 for front of house mixing, integration was simple, and the SQ-Rack’s 16 local inputs also means it can act as the duo’s stagebox.
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The drummer can control the monitor mix wirelessly using the SQ MixPad app. “The drummer has a tablet next to him, and I also have one at front of house to remotely operate the monitor console,” explained Young. “I also have the various monitor mixes from the SQ-Rack routed to my front of house console, so I can solo any of their mixes and hear them in my own ears to listen for issues.”
