Warning: tech talk

day 6 Sept. 30 Winnipeg MA - West End Cultural Centre

The tour is now hitting stride. It's seems we're getting our shit together now with lighting cues, and pacing. Mark's voice miraculously came through for us. We could have had CBC record the show after all, but how were we supposed to know.
The new WECC is a dynamic arts centre, rebuilt with acoustics in mind, not to mention artist load-in and secure parking (always a plus). The total bonus, though was that on arrival, sitting there having a smoke was none other than John, a middle aged soundman, and probably my favourite in this country, though I don't know his last name. We first met him back in '04 at the Dawson City Music Festival, and it turns out he lives here in the 'Peg. This guy is so laid back, seems to love music, and always churns out great sounding shows (I will try to generally lay off techtalk, but good sound is obviously a primary concern to a touring band). Bear with me. The WECC is sporting top of the line Digidesign mixing consoles with total recall for monitors, and front of house. As chief acoustician for the venue, John stocked the room with these magnificent digital consoles, but still laments that he would've preferred analog. So Ryan no doubt got pretty excited about the equipment in front of him, and before we knew it, Ryan was mixing in Front of House, and John took care of our monitors. What a coup ! This will set the stage for the rest of the tour. Ryan has fully earned cred as our soundman, and I expect he will want to mix every show following (not to mention selling the merch), and relegate house sound engineers to lights or monitor duty.
As I've promised, there is a photo of our "Future Ghost Towns" tour stage set (affectionately known to insiders as the "shit show").
-Steve