After a temporary break from a world tour that has straddled three continents, Grammy Award-winning EDM trio Rüfüs Du Sol will resume their global trek with a run of November shows in their native Australia and elsewhere. The journey, in support of the group’s most recent album, Inhale/Exhale, and its subsequent remix iterations, has included some of Rüfüs Du Sol’s biggest headline shows yet, including California’s Rose Bowl Stadium, Guadalajara’s Estadio Tres de Marzo, New Jersey’s Red Bull Arena, and Texas’ Q2 Stadium. Everywhere that Tyrone Lindqvist (vocals, guitar, keyboards), Jon George (keyboards), and James Hunt (drums) have traveled, crisp high-energy sound with robust low-frequency energy has followed, thanks to a huge L-Acoustics K Series system provided by Miami’s Unreal-Systems.
The size and scale of the loudspeaker setup varies according to the venue. The tour’s shed-level design has 40 K1, 16 K2, a dozen A10, and 40 KS28 subs, all powered by 27 LA12X amplified controllers, while the stadium-sized system comprises 48 K1, 16 K2, six Kara II, 14 A10, four L2, five L2D, and 64 KS28 plus 16 K1-SB, driven by 56 LA12X and nine LA7.16. The Rose Bowl system – considered the “statement show” of the recent North American tour leg – brought together 64 K1, 16 K2, six Kara II, 14 A10, six L2, seven L2D, and a massive bass combination of 76 KS28 and 40 K1-SB subs, powered by 72 LA12X and 17 LA7.16.
The entire system runs on a Milan-AVB signal path with a third layer of AES redundancy hitting each amplified controller. Fallback setup and management is particularly efficient with Milan Manager to handle the AVB network configurations. Front-end input is also managed over AVB, with analog backup, feeding main and backup L-Acoustics P1 processors at FOH.
All About That Bass
The LFE proved most challenging aspect of the system design, according to Systems Engineer Johnny Keirle, system designer and engineer for Adele, Benson Boone, and the Super Bowl, as well as RDS, as the trio is known to fans. “The biggest challenge is delivering the low-frequency impact and coverage required for live EDM,” he explains. “Unlike pop and rock shows, where low end is typically transient-based, RDS has sustained sub content alongside percussive transients, so we lean more on the ground subs than I usually would.”
This required experimentation to balance coverage and impact. “Sheds present challenges with variable real estate for ground subs, steep seating, and concrete construction, while stadium shows demand much larger coverage across all axis with potential time-arrival variations, and multiple source interactions,” he describes.
Ground-based KS28 subs are deployed in cardioid configurations wherever possible, says Keirle, while flown cardioid KS28 are deployed in end-fire configurations with the K1 main and side hangs. For the Rose Bowl system, the audio crew deployed an additional dozen K1-SB in an end-fire configuration behind the main hangs, and the increased ground sub lineup of 36 KS28 was deployed in 18 positions of subwoofer pairs running in cardioid.
The L-Acoustics K Series systems are also able to help manage LFE challenges. K1 allows engineers to manipulate coverage characteristics in lower-frequency ranges, offering better control over flown LF propagation, as well as over interaction between the flown LF sources and ground LF sources. Extending the line source by adding K1-SB above the K1 main hangs further improves low-frequency control.
“The K Series flexibility across diverse venue types and sizes makes it ideal for a tour spanning intimate sheds to massive stadiums. The adaptability of the system, alongside the precision of Soundvision modeling, allows confident deployment across vastly different acoustic environments, knowing the system will perform as predicted regardless of scale or venue characteristics.”
L Series is a Switch Hitter
The entire system acts as a sonic toolbox of sorts, allowing Keirle to choose components on site to best suit each environment, with the L Series acting as the go-to elements for many of the fill deployments. For instance, he says, the stadium shows use up to seven positions of L Series: two hangs of L2/L2D rear arrays, four positions of L2/L2D delays, and a standalone center L2D hang.
“The cardioid polar pattern of the L2 is particularly valuable in delays, matched with cardioid-configured KS28 subs, and the voicing matches well with the K Series main system,” he says. “For the Rose Bowl, where we were limited with tower capacity, three L2 were flown per, with four KS28 on the ground, deployed as two cardioid stacks in an end-fire configuration. We were fortunate to be traveling with the full stadium system for the whole American run – we could pick and choose different PA elements for each venue as suited best.”
In fact, all of the L-Acoustics products perform critical roles. “Some venues present particularly challenging and resource-demanding conditions,” he says, describing extremely harsh environments for HF propagation. “Again, I rely on the tools in Soundvision, with some custom calculators to know how sources will perform, even in challenging atmospheric environments,” he says, noting that many stadium shows are very exposed to wind. “The density and coherence of the K1 HF wavefront has been essential to maintain stable coverage and SPL at higher frequencies.”
As the tour carries on in Oceania, the L-Acoustics loudspeakers will continue to prove their value. They also underscore the fact that, despite its reputation as a bass-heavy format, EDM has plenty of nuance that a system like this can reveal. “There is a huge amount of detail in the RDS live mix,” says Keirle. “FOH Engineer Cam Trewin’s output is exceptionally controlled and consistent, meaning I can confidently and precisely dimension the entire system for linear reproduction at high SPL. Smaller or less powerful formats wouldn’t deliver, and the layers of detail in the mix would get lost. This is a system that can, literally, do anything we ask of it.”
