Primal Scream is known for a lot of things: taking loads of drugs, creating innovative music, taking more drugs and getting crowds on their feet through explosive live shows. Lead singer Bobby Gillespie is the leader of the rock n roll party establishing the band as a mainstay in the UK music for decades.

Through many line-up changes and collaborations, Primal Scream has grown up from its avant-garde routes and borrowed from the late 80s acid house movement, which brought the group its first chart success in the 90s with the album Screamadelica. Almost two decades later, the Scream was back in London’s Hammersmith Apollo, hooting and hollering hits from its back catalogue, along with songs from the latest album, Beautiful Future.

The band’s monitor engineer Ger Colclough is no stranger to being on the road. Just before he jumped on the buss with Primal Scream, he was on a world tour with My Bloody Valentine (MBV). It seems that Colclough is on most of the interesting tours that come through town, as he is also the monitor engineer for New Order, Placebo, The Charlatans, Kosheen, Adele and Divine Comedy, in addition to working with Primal Scream for more than eight years.

Colclough was spoiled by being able to use an analog Midas Heritage H3000 on MBV’s tour, but he is back to using Yamaha’s digital PM5D for the recent Primal Scream outing. He has been with the band so long that he knows the songs just as well, even more than some of the newer members and does a lot of on-the-fly mixing, making slight adjustments to different songs to adapt to different acoustics in the various venues on the tour.

The PM5D was chosen for the tour because, with two opening bands, Colclough felt it necessary to use a digital board to save on set up time and space. He has been very happy with the board’s work on tour, aside from a power surge that reset it to its original software version. He explains, “I had a power surge last week and as the board didn’t come with a UPS back up, it reverted back to its original running system of 1.12. Even though I save each show it was in the 2.2 version, so I couldn't access any of my shows. Luckily I was able to get online and download the 2.23 version and reboot the board before the show, otherwise it would have been a disaster. Note to PA companies: all digital consoles should be supplied with a UPS to avoid situations like this.”

Colclough has not been personally affected by the cutbacks often reported from modern touring productions, nor has he been forced to use a certain piece of gear by a tour manager to save on space and costs. In fact, Primal Scream’s two trucks and 14-man crew seems extravagant by today’s standards. “I haven’t personally seen any effect. I presume some accountant is having a sleepless night  over a budget, but the show must go on,” he jokes.

The band performs extremely loud rock n roll that does not require the use of outboard gear for monitors and Colclough only uses the board’s onboard gates and compression on keys and bass channels. He is running 32 channels over 11 different mixes through ten L-Acoustics 115XT HiQ wedges, two V-Dosc side fills with two Arcs per side and two SB118 drum subs. The FOH PA for the tour features 12 dV-Doscs per side with eight V-Dosc subs and three dV-Subs per side with Arcs as infills, mixed by Michael Brennan on his own Digidesign D-Show Profile.

The no frills, rock ethic is also demonstrated on stage, as only drummer Darrin Mooney uses Shure E3s IEMs, with other members relying solely on the stage wedges. “Mooney has a mixer that I send three lines to, which comprise guitars, vocals and his kit that he mixes himself along with a click track,” says Colclough.

The board’s saved scene feature is also not needed and most of the mixing is done during the show as cues from the band members and Colclough’s memory.

“There are a couple of songs where the guitarist will give me the nod to up the solo in his mix and a couple where Gary ‘Mani’ Mounfield (the bass player) likes to hear the track maxed out in his mix. He simply loves the volume of it,” he explains.
MBV’s own Kevin Shields also joined the band onstage for the Apollo show to play songs from Exterminator and other hits. “Shield’s took a regular mix of drums and bass and his guitar, nothing special as he was only playing on a couple of songs with us,” Colclough notes.

“It can get very crazy on some of the songs and difficult to balance Gillespie’s vocal over the ensuing volume, so I try to reduce some elements of his mix to get him above the carnage. Some of the dancier tracks are hard and aggressive and the volume is incredible on stage, so at times it’s a fight to get his voice above it all.”

The mics used to capture said ‘carnage’ are a typical mix of Shure and Sennheiser. Each guitar amp is miked with an SM57 and a Sennheiser 606, which creates two contrasting sounds that are blended together. “Gillespie has used a Standard SM58 as long as I can remember. He really puts the mics through their paces; dropping it, throwing it – usual lead singer behaviour – and the 58 takes it every time. We use SM Beta 57s on the backing vocals because they seem to give more bite to the occasional shout given by the musicians.”

The past ten years in the business have been extraordinary by all accounts, as he has consistently worked for innovative and legendary bands. His only complaint is the way the music business has lost its soul with accountants calling the shots. He also feels that manufacturers should develop road versions of new gear, rather than making live engineers use reverbs and dynamics designed for studio use.

Colclough will stay on the road with Primal Scream in 2009 and travel to Japan, Australia and the US. He has also hinted at more MBV shows. Based on his schedule in 2008, he will be on a tour bus for most of the year. No doubt, whatever stage he is on will also feature a great band benefiting from his talent and passion for good music.
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