When K-Pop band B.A.P. (Beyond Absolute Perfect) descended upon Indio, California last month to play for thousands of fans at the Fantasy Springs Resort Casino, the newest member of dBTechnologies’ VIO series, L212, took the stage with them.
It was a highly anticipated show, preceded by a special VIP Meet-and-Greet with superfans, and Troy Choi of Solid Sound Solutions saw it as the perfect opportunity to see what all of the excitement around the VIO L212 was about.
“I’ve never worked with B.A.P. before, but I’ve been a part of over twenty different shows at this venue,” says Choi, the production manager and front of house engineer for the show. “It’s a pretty reverberant room without any acoustic treatments. It’s definitely not an easy acoustic space, so we had to put a lot of thought into the PA design for this room.”
Twelve VIO L212 boxes were hung per side, twenty-one S218 subs lined the front of the stage, four VIO L210s acted as outfills on each side and two VIO L208 boxes were front fills. After playing a large part in the first VIO L212/S218 U.S deployment, Ruben Santa Cruz was at the B.A.P. show to assist with system design, deployment and tuning.
“Now that we have a larger format box in the VIO series we’ve rapidly expanded the type of shows we can handle. Furthermore, having different line array modules in the VIO series with the same HF drivers and phase response makes scaling the system quite simple,” says Colin Studybaker, national sales manager for dBTechnologies. “When you can control the flown line arrays, subs, outfills, and front fills all with the same software, in our case Aurora Net, it really allows you to maximize the efficiency of your setup and have total control of the entire system in one place.”
“I’m a big fan of the VIO L210, and when I heard the VIO L212 for the first time, it felt like the L210’s big brother with a warm and deep heart. It was very clear but not piercing at all. I think 212 is ready to go out on big shows. The S218, as well, was a big two thumbs up for me,” comments Choi. “It was super-punchy, tight like a muscled tiger rather than a fat, lazy bear. Artists can be pretty particular with sound, and B.A.P. has understandably high standards- but they said the VIO L212 and S218 really delivered for this show.”
Choi, who has toured internationally as a sound engineer in some of the world’s top venues, also remarked on his experience with the dBTechnologies brand as a whole.
“There are so many big PA names in this industry that people look for, and I feel like VIO L212 especially is right up there with those names. It’s not second-best by any means, it’s clear that the research and development department at dBTechnologies has done their homework with this one. The people at dB really pay special attention to the needs of their clients, and they’re humble.”
