On the Road with iLive: Gomez

British indy band Gomez is hitting the road in 2012 in support of their most recent album, Whatever's On Your Mind. Minding the controls in monitor world is their longtime engineer, Rob Elliott. "We've been using an Allen & Heath iLive-T112 since February this year, and it's been great," he says. "Very intuitive, very easy to use."

That ease of use is important in mixing for Gomez. While the band retains the same lineup of players from its beginnings in 1997, the members are now spread throughout the US and England, coming together only for the actual tour dates.

"The band almost never rehearses," says Elliott. "They just get together for soundcheck before the show. When we started with the iLive console, I basically had to learn it right then. Fortunately, I had done some advance programming on the Allen & Heath Editor software on my computer, so all I had to do was find my way around on the control surface. It was quite easy, really."

For their 2012 tour dates, Elliott specified an iDR-48 MixRack outfitted with a Dante card, which enables full multitrack recording. "We record every show, and the Dante card makes that easy," Elliott explains. "So instead of a complicated computer interface, we have a single Cat5 cable carrying every track onto my computer, using Logic recording software. The band then releases a live album with the best performances from each tour, which they sell on the road and offer on the website. The fans love it."

With 48 inputs, 24 outputs and a 64x32 DSP engine, the iDR-48 provides Elliott with all the processing power he could ask for. "The band usually takes about 39 inputs, and even with everyone on stereo in-ears, I rarely use more than 16 outputs, so the T112 is a comfortable fit for us," he notes. "We also give a PL-6 remote control unit to the drummer, Olly Peacock. That gives him eight faders with guitars, vocals and such, so he can do his own band mix, which he prefers. It's very simple, just plugs right into the MixRack and I assign him the channels he wants, which feeds only his mix. It's a great little tool, that PL-6."

Operationally, Rob Elliott has a separate scene programmed for each of the band's songs. "It's probably not really necessary, but it helps make sure I've got everything sorted," he reports. "The band likes to swap instruments around, so it's just better this way. Plus, if I'm out and someone else is mixing, another engineer will have an easy time of it."

Having used it for a few months now, Elliott is a big fan of the Allen & Heath iLive system. "It's very intuitive, a lot simpler than a lot of digital boards I've used," he concludes. "I'm using all on-board gates and comps and effects. I use a lot of effects on Ben's voice and in his ears, and everything sounds good and very natural. Another thing I like is that I can save my settings to a USB stick, then open the show file in the offline editor and adjust things on my computer between shows. The iLive is really a brilliant little console. I'm really enjoying it."