Having
released Automaton – the band’s
first album in seven years – at the end of March, Jamiroquai are soon to embark
on a world tour of arenas and festivals. A Yamaha Rivage PM10 console will be
mixing the front of house sound at every show, beneath the experienced fingers
of engineer Rick Pope.
Rick has
worked with the band and its frontman Jay Kay for 23 years, both live and in
the studio, and with Yamaha digital consoles for almost as long. So he jumped
at the chance to show the world what the company’s new flagship console can do.
“I grew
up on the Yamaha PM1D and then the PM5D,” he says. “I have always liked the
workflow and the way that Yamaha digital consoles have their own operating
system from the ground up. It makes them incredibly stable – I’ve never had a
single fault in the 20-odd years I’ve been using Yamaha digital boards, which
you can’t always say about other consoles.”
With the
album having gone to No.1 in the iTunes chart in 24 countries and Top Ten in
several more, ticket demand for the tour is extremely high. And with the
inherent challenges of festivals to add into the mix, Rick is happy that the
Rivage PM10 will have almost everything he needs.
“The first
thing about the PM10 is that it’s very user-friendly. I haven’t had to look at
the manual once, which I think is always a really good sign,” he says. “It
really is the easiest console I’ve ever used and I’ve used them all over the
years.”
Alongside
the reliability, user-friendliness and flexibility of the platform, it’s the
audio quality and processing of the Rivage PM10 that many engineers have been
extremely impressed by. Rick is no exception.
“Firstly,
the clarity on the top end is amazing, it’s got the clearest imagery that I’ve
ever heard on a board,” he says. “Being able to put eight inserts on to a
channel is insane, you can’t do that on most other desks. And you can EQ for
days!
“On top
of that, the effects really are the best available. Previously I have always
have to have at least some outboard, but the onboard processing on the PM10 is
absolutely stunning. For example I always used to take a tc6000 out with me,
but the emulation of it on the RIVAGE PM10 is spot on. I also really like the Open
Deck circuitry emulation – I put it on the left/right busses and it sounds
amazing at 96kHz. I even put it on Jay Kay’s vocals. It gives the sound real
depth and adds a certain warmth.”
