Reality Check: Getting Into The Act
An “old man” latches on to in-ear monitoring
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We’ve reached the tipping point. Sales of conventional stage wedges
are down, most professional bands carry their own in-ear monitoring
(IEM) systems, and even weekend warriors are getting into the act.
For live audio professionals, IEM presents several well-documented advantages. Without wedges blaring on stage, feedback potential is significantly lessened. |
And all of that outboard stuff we carry to equalize out rings, peaks (mic, speaker and room), as well as the associated skill/voodoo needed to make it all work, is much less in demand.
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As a long-time monitor engineer, I hate to see my skill set thrown
in the dustbin, but I refuse to be one of those guys (like the analog
tape and vinyl advocates) preaching to a shrinking choir (that can’t
hear me any more). |
TAKING TO IT
What really convinced me was a training session with a local band in a
basement rehearsal space. I sold them a big IEM rig with Shure PSM200
wireless packs being driven by an Aviom A16 T splitter. Each of the five
band members has his/her own A16 mixer to attain a “personalized” mix
from the Mackie console. All mixes travel over a single Cat-5 cable that’s
daisy-chained from one station to the next.
The band took to it immediately. Comments ran along the lines of “I never
knew you could sing like that”, “Do I really need a speaker cabinet anymore?”
and “I can finally tell what we sound like and we sound great!” The band
played much tighter and “in the pocket” than before, and they were listening
to each other rather than just themselves.
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I set up a sixth Aviom station for myself, to listen along, demo how to save presets, and add effects and solo inputs. On the way home it occurred to me that the neighbors never called to complain about the noise, and my ears were not ringing they way they do after a typical gig. I turned on the car radio at the volume I always listen during the day and it sounded fine rather than the usual “too-soft” after a rehearsal. We all know the tale about non-audio folk who ask us to mic the loud band so we can turn them down. In this case, it’s true. You mic the guitarist’s monster stack and run it into a mixer, a splitter, a wireless transmitter and receiver belt pack. Then it’s on to an IEM system (also acting as ear plugs), and turn it down so you don’t go deaf. Strange but true. |
At this point I decided to go to a local audiologist to get something
in a custom-tailored earpiece instead of those “off the rack” jobs. After
all, I’m a professional and I deserve it! Around these parts (Chicagoland),
the prominent ear guru is Michael Santucci of Sensaphonics. (And by the
way, “audiologist” is not the name of an obscure Charlie Parker solo;
it is a highly technical term for “ear drummer”.)
Michael is more evangelist than salesman. When you walk in his door, he
offers a survey to be filled out, and has collected data on the hearing
of more than 3,000 musicians. That’s quite a data bank to work from
as I recall, Masters and Johnson only had a few hundred patients in their
study of sexuality, and that’s certainly got to be a more popular sport
than rock ‘n’ roll. Following “data time” comes an inspiring lecture on
how and why hearing can and does get damaged.
Did you know that drinking caffeine can make your ears ring? Did you know
that the blood flow to your ears is the most important repair device after
a hard day at the rock pile? Did you know that smoking tobacco and drinking
alcohol restricts the flow of blood to your ears? Put it all together
and the typical musician (and sound person) is often doing everything
he or she can to damage their hearing and then making sure it can’t be
repaired after the show!
THE MARSHALL PLAN
Next, I took a hearing test to establish the whereabouts of my own personal
hearing ground zero. Michael also compares your results with the averages
of the rest of the folks he’s tested. Perhaps a bit surprisingly, my hearing
in the 9 kHz to 16 kHz ranges measured better than the average of my age
group (over 45) and comparable to the average, including kids down to
20 years of age.
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Nice going, old man! I guess that 200-Watt Marshall stack I used
in the ‘70s isn’t going to win me any lawsuits after all. Michael
is likely the only audiologist with such specific data of this type.
My understanding is that typically, hearing response is only measured
up to 8 kHz. During the test, if anything is found to be impeding hearing (wax, bugs, cigarette filters), it is removed. (And you thought only you got the glory gigs!) Next, tiny foam plugs, with pull cords, are inserted into the ear canals, and then a small batch of XL300 molding compound is hand rolled, put into a syringe and squirted into the ears. It feels like you’re under water for a few minutes while the rubbery compound hardens. |
These rubber molds are removed via the pull cords (which Bill Kruetzman
of the Dead calls “mental floss”) and presto out comes exact impressions
of the outer ears and canals. These go next door to the lab to be reverse-cast
into molds used to cast the actual inserts that will hold the tiny IEM
drivers in your head. (They’ve also been known to keep your thoughts from
leaking out.) If it’s a rush job, Michael can get these done in 24 hours,
with an added fee accessed. Otherwise it takes about a week.
Material can be hard plastic or softer silicon, Sensaphonics being the
only lab to figure out how make the latter. The hard plastic allows a
bit more leakage. I went for the silicone because it provides an average
of 26 dB of isolation (all the better to put on shades and sleep at the
console) and smoother bass response through bone conduction to your skull.
The silicon, which is devoid of color, also lets you show off the hardware,
like those plastic joke ice cubes with the fly floating inside. Colors?
Sure, Rick Nielsen of Cheap Trick has black and white checkerboard to
match his stage gear.
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After they’re done, the molds go onto the “wall of fame” actually an alphabetized archive of all the famous folks ears. Without naming names, everyone who is anyone is on the wall, and
it’s not a museum attraction but a convenient, handy filing system
when an artist or sound pro needs a fresh pair of inserts. Pick
up the phone, tell ‘em who’s calling, and its off to the wall to
find the molds and make up a new set of earpieces. |
LIKING THE GACK
I opted for the $750 Sensaphonics “house brand” ProPhonic 2X-S earpieces,
which include top of the line, hi-fi dual drivers sunken inside the silicon.
Drivers are not removable. To my above average hearing (grin), these sounded
smoother and less harsh than the other models. Reverb also had a pleasant
top end in my insane membrane.
Many folks prefer more “gack” produced by some of the other models, thinking
it cuts through a mix just like a horn-heavy wedge. To each his/her own.
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Word of caution: Just because you’re blocking out high levels of sound from the outside is no reason to create high levels of sound on the inside. Feedback does provide an acoustic limit as to how loud a stage wedge will get (as good a job as I can do). You must resist the “Ferrari Theorem” which states: give a truck driver a Ferrari and he will find that he can only drive at 100-plus miles per hour. |
In other words, you can turn up IEM systems to levels that will make your
nose bleed (literally), so DON’T DO IT. Michael advised that I should
come back in a year for a hearing evaluation, which he will compare to
the present results to see how the ears are holding up.
I’m looking forward to my new freedom and protection (sounds like Arnold’s
campaign slogan) and the confidence of knowing I’m hearing every last
detail, now and forever. And while I’m being so totally cool; if I drop
‘em down the toilet by accident, I can call my inside gal, Doris and she
will overnight me a dry pair. To paraphrase Dr. Timothy Leary “Push in,
turn down, rock out.”
Gary Gand moved to the mixing side of the console in 1976, and is the owner of Gand Music & Sound in Northfield, Illinois, just north of Chicago. He can be reached at ggand@gand.com
October 2003 Live Sound International