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November 2013 l 37


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FRANCE STM hopping in Paris


New system brings the beats in familiar Nexo confines of Stade de France By Erica Basnicki


URBAN PEACE 3, Europe’s largest hip-hop and urban music event, was an all-Nexo affair with 60,000 fans packed into the Stade de France in Paris for five hours of live performance, headlined by IAM and Sexion D’Assaut. Sound rental provider Melpomen brought Nexo’s new STM Series line array systems into the national stadium for the first time, tying into the permanently-installed Nexo GEO S12 PA for extra coverage of the uppermost seating areas. Sound designer Vladimir


Coulibre used a total of 78 sets comprising one M46 main, one B112 bass and one S118 sub.


“STM handled the job easily,” said Coulibre. “As soon as the rigging was completed, I felt comfortable with the headroom and the dynamics. What I liked above all is that it is pretty much plug-and-play,” he said. Melpomen engineers devised


a new configuration for the S118 subs, which proved hugely effective in the massive Stade de France. Groups of nine S118 sub cabinets were groundstacked along the front of the stage, in each group six units facing forward and three facing back. “The new cardioid pattern has given us a 16dB drop in volume behind the stage,” said Melpomen director Thierry Tranchant. “This two-and-one configuration has made the


sound even tighter. “This is the largest of all the


French STM shows so far; everyone’s been so happy at the way the system sounds, which of course means less work for them, and the carry of the low- end is particularly beneficial when working with this type of music. Tuning went very smoothly. We have SPL limits of 115dBA (Leq 15mins) here in the Stade, but headroom remained high, and we positioned the delays so that STM was able to work absolutely optimally.” System techs Cedric Bernard


and Alexandre Borel supervised at the FOH riser: “Although this is the largest STM show we have ever done – physically, it’s taken one-and-a-half days to put it all


Urban Peace 3 featured the cream of French rap music on the city’s largest and most prestigious stage


in, do the EQing, set the phases, and so on – it was very easy to tune, and everyone is very happy with the results,” said Bernard. “All of the engineers have found it very easy to just turn up and mix on this system – no problems at all – and they have commented particularly on how beautiful the low-end is as well as the great clarity in the highs.” On stage, a selection of


Nexo loudspeakers made up the monitoring system. Most of the performers were using IEMs, supplemented by


PS15-R2 wedges and 16 45°N-12 line monitors. Summing up, Nexo concert sound manager Stuart Kerrison comented: “The coverage in the Stade was way better than I thought it would be in a venue like this; when I walked into soundcheck, arriving from the back of the stadium, the sub was killing – I assumed subs were on all the delays, but they weren’t using any on the delays. It was very impressive!” www.melpomen.net www.nexo.fr


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