Nine Inch Nails Live Issue 9

Nine Inch Nails FOH engineer, Jon Lemon, is another
Aussie expatriate kicking butt worldwide. Trevor Cronin
hears how the Lemon approach bears fruit.
I
first met expatriate Australian concert sound engineer,
Jon Lemon, in London a number of years ago. He
was mixing one of my favourite bands, The The, at
the Brixton Academy. They were fantastic that night
and had such an awesome sound that I decided to
take some friends and see them again the next night at
the Kilburn National... and it was even better! A while
later I was at the Glastonbury Festival in England mixing
monitors for Jesus Jones. I saw Jon backstage and learnt
that he was there to mix Sinead O’Connor, who was
currently at the top of her popularity with Nothing
Compares To You.
After the Jones boys did their spot I popped out front
with the masses to check out a few of the other acts. It
was the first big show I’d heard using production
company, Britannia Row’s, new Turbosound Flashlight
system powered by BSS amps. Everybody’s sound was
okay, but I noticed a bit of a hole in the coverage at the
mix position which would have made it a little difficult for
the person in control of the mix. Sinead came on and,
wow, what a difference! I was totally blown away with the
clarity of the sound and the balance of the CD-quality
mix, featuring one of the best vocal sounds I’d ever
heard, then or since!
Jon started his professional life early, when as a 13
year old kid he worked weekends at Trevor Marshall’s,
TrevMar Audio in Adelaide. Still as a teenager he
traveled up and down the east coast doing sound for
small bands and working pubs. A band called Rum
Jungle (with James Blank and JJ Hackett) led him to
work with Sports, and big name Aussie acts like Billy
Thorpe, MiSex and Australian Crawl. A five year tenure
at Jands followed before the offer of a stint overseas with
John Williams’ Sky came through in 1984. Jon stayed in
London cultivating the good contacts he had. In 1987 he
40
struck up a working relationship with Level 42, who
quickly became massive in Europe, block booking
Wembley Arena and the like. After fitting out and running
Mark King’s (Level 42’s front man) SSL-equipped studio
he began working with names like The The, The Cure,
Sinead O’Connor, Depeche Mode, and The Verve.
More recently Jon returned to these shores to mix
Nine Inch Nails on the Big Day Out Tour. Naturally I
jumped at the chance to catch up and have a chat with
one of the world’s best concert sound mixers.
Trevor Cronin: How did the Nine Inch Nails gig come
about?
Jon Lemon: A representative from Nine Inch Nails rang
up and said they wanted me to do this tour and I said I’d
love to, but I can’t as I have another commitment with
the Pet Shop Boys. It wasn’t long before the manager
rang saying, “we want you!”. Apparently Trent [Reznor,
Nine Inch Nail’s songwriter and front man] had seen four
shows on The Cure’s Wish tour, and dug the sound, he
also had seen some Depeche Mode shows in 93/94 and
loved the sound on that as well. It was a case of Trent
loving all the bands I’d done. Now, I have never left a
band in my life, but in the end they made me an offer
that I just couldn’t refuse. And, musically, it’s pretty hard
to turn down a guy who, for my money, is in the same
league as Prince or Robert Smith. The new Nine Inch
Nails album is just unbelievable – the sonic quality, the
depth and the lyrics are all amazing. That was why I
ended up saying yes.
TC: What sort of pre production work do you do on a
new job like Nine Inch Nails?
JL: An enormous amount. Trent is a hard working guy,
and takes his audio seriously, you only have to take a
look at his studio to tell. His studio in New Orleans has a
72-frame SSL, 196 channels of ProTools, and any
outboard or effects pedal you could think of. Then there’s another room within that
studio with another 48 tracks of digital. Impressive stuff. He’s completely into his
work, there’s no two ways about it.
There was an enormous amount of rehearsing for the MTV Music Awards in late
September early October – they started rehearsals six weeks beforehand in the
Bahamas with the backline crew. Then I came in and they did the MTV Music Awards.
Then there was another month of rehearsals on a stage in a theatre in New Orleans
before we went on to London to start a European run in three or four thousand seat
theatres. I think we now feel on top of things enough to kick off the forthcoming tour
in The States.
TC: So do you approach a live show as a blank canvas or do you constantly refer
back to the recorded material?
JL: When a lot of punters go to a gig they need to feel or hear a connection with the
CD to be fulfilled. From my perspective I ask the artist what type of approach they
want to take to the sound of the tour. Because there is usually a reason why they want
to use someone like me – either they’ve heard one of my shows or associate me with
a certain style. An act like Nine Inch Nails has some very complex recordings behind
them, so you’re not going to capture the album sound completely, but, in saying that,
Trent knows that you’ve always got to have the hooks and the catches present in the
live show, and from there we can let it take on a life of its own. Generally, most people
allow me to put my own slant on things. Lots of artists don’t mind – once they know
that it sounds quite reasonable out the front, they’ll be happy to go with it. But I do
prefer working with people like Trent who take an active interest in the sound. We
keep talking about things and keep honing things, and it makes the tour more interesting over a long period of time.
TC: What gear do you prefer to use?
JL: On this tour I’m currently using a Midas XL4 console, and I’m quite happy with it.
The board that I was using prior to that was a Cadac, which was amazing, but virtually
double the rental price of an XL4. Midas still make great quality products, so I’m
happy with the XL4. Outboard-wise I’m using quite a lot of Smart Research compressors. We have a lot of radically dynamic stuff going on, from percussion sequences to
bass sequences, so the Smart compressors work well for me. Then I have Focusrite
mic preamp/EQs, which I now actually use just for the EQ section. I’ve got Empirical
Labs Distressor compressors which I love, and Summit DCL200, and TLA100A compressors. I’m a big compressor guy – for example, I use
a lot of dbx 160x compressors on all the guitars – just
light compression that holds
it all together. By way of
effects I’ve got a Lexicon
480L, PCM70, TC Electronic M5000, a fairly ‘hotted
up’ Eventide H3000, and a
Roland SDE3000. Fairly
simple, just enough to get
the job done.
TC: What would you see
as being the major
advances in audio technology in recent times?
JL: I think the ‘80s saw a lot
of advances in digital technology, which made effects
units and digital processors
far more accessible. The
‘90s were much more about
speaker technology –
starting off with the Tur-
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“In the 16
shows we’ve
done, we’ve been
through around
30 SM58s”
bosound Flashlight system in 1991, which was
a really big advance. Then a couple of years
later the L-Acoustic V-DOSC linear array
system came out which never really took off
until a year or two ago. I think that was just a
case of bad marketing, because the system
hasn’t changed.
Computers have done a lot for getting
greater efficiency out of a PA system. Right
now I know we’re heading into the world of
digital amp, which is pretty intriguing. I have
seen Function One from the people that designed the Turbosound gear. Also the
whole DSP advances from the likes of XTA and BSS is changing things. So in the next
few years I see people concentrating more on amplification, and speakers will keep
moving forward along with that.
I’m one of those who believe that a console is a console – I think it is going to be
hard for people to crack the market with digital work surfaces connected to analogue
racks – like the Harrison ShowConsole or even Yamaha’s PM1D, which is totally
digital. For me flying faders and enough mute memory and all that kind of stuff is
great, and sure there’s times I would love to have on-board reEQ’ing – but that’s why
God made the BSS Varicurve, just insert one where you need it.
TC: What is your approach to system EQ?
JL: I’m a big believer in letting the system designer do his stuff. If it’s stacked and flown
right, and the amps are spot on, with the crossovers set correctly, then I’ll hardly EQ.
TC: Even at smaller venues where you have to DIY?
JL: It comes down to experience. Certain components and certain amplifiers are only
really only going to deal with so much, so you need to readjust your mix a bit.
Generally with a good sound system, the less EQ you use, the more headroom you’ve
got, and the better it breathes, the more natural things sound. I like things on stage
sounding the way they do to your ear.
TC: Do you grab the vocal mic and talk into it?
JL: Yeah always, I’m a voice man. I know what my voice sounds like, and I’ve got my
favourite real-time analyser which I’ve had for years. I can listen to the pink noise and
know where it should be anyway, as most decent sound engineers do. I’m not a big
one for playing CDs through the system unless I’m walking around to listen for
coverage, I’d rather listen to my voice, then pink noise.
TC: What approach do you use to obtain your vocal sound?
JL: With Trent I use a Shure SM58 and anyone who sees the show would understand
why. In the 16 shows we’ve done, we’ve been through around 30 SM58s, as a fair bit of
trashing goes down on stage. So we have three new SM58s ready to go on a switch
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box, so if one gets
launched into the
audience, he’ll just
switch to another. I
always use active splits
– our system is BSS –
both to the monitors
and to me. From there
the vocal goes into an
EL8 Distressor first
and then into a BSS
901 compressor – just
to pull little bits and
pieces out. Trent’s a
pretty dynamic singer,
he could be whispering
one minute and
hammering it hard the
next, and the Distressor seems to be the
fastest compressor
we’ve come across to
cope with that.
TC: What about
effects?
JL: I keep things fairly
simple, using no more
than what the music
needs. For drums I use
half the side of a
Lexicon 480L, and I
use half the side of the TC M5000 – which has replaced an AMS RMX16 reverb
because I’m sick of pulling them out of racks and keeping them working with rubber
bands and sticky tape! The M5000 has some good programs on board that you can
manipulate easily. Vocal-wise I use the other half of the 480L, the Lexicon PCM70 for
delays, and a PCM70 for music delays as well. The other half of the TC M5000 does
some weirder stuff. I also use the odd foot pedal here and there for distortion – one’s a
Piercing Moose [from Way Huge] and the other is a bass pedal called a Depth Charger
[by Pitbull], they’re good!
Trent likes distorted vocals at times and I’ve tried everything. Alan Moulder, [Nine
Inch Nail’s producer], was using Neve modules for distortion on the album, but there
were always gain problems in a live setting. Then one day I was walking by the guitar
techs and I saw these pedals and I thought I’d check them out. They were great, I can
get all the gain I need out them without worrying about feedback.
TC: What are the other microphones you’re using?
JL: I’m into using lots of different mics, most of which are mine. I’ve got about half a
dozen matched AKG 414s, a Beyer M88TG on the bass drum, a Shure SM57 on the
top snare, a 414 on the bottom, an AKG460 on the hi-hat, a Shure SM98 on the toms,
and 414s on the overheads. On guitars I’ve got them using Palmer guitar simulators
instead of mics, and you get a big fat sound out of them – especially with the kind of
guitars that these guys use. They use a little mounted radio unit that takes the speaker
output of their guitar amps and wings it to the Palmer which simulates a speaker
sound. They’re great... they’re expensive, but they’re brilliant. As I mentioned, we use a
Shure SM58 on vocals. Not to say the SM58 is the greatest sounding mic ever –
there’s more subtle and better mics out there these days – but it works for us. With
Sinead O’Connor we used a SM58, but that was because it suited the way that she
sings. With Bryan Ferry I used an AKG5900, with The Verve we were using Electrovoice EV757s, and with Robert Smith we were using the 757 as well. I’m not ‘hard and
fast’ on microphones, it’s whatever is good quality and whatever works for the
performer.
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