AES and Vietnam, day 1

Spending close to a month in Asia (China, Thailand, Singapore, and Vietnam) I was asked to set up a series of very high end bars, night clubs, and sounds for concert hall. For the past years, these places in Vietnam had relied heavily on JBL as their main loud speakers system. JBL had successfully entering Vietnam early and took many punches and now, they had established a solid market in Vietnam.

I was never a big fan of JBL stuffs and my thoughts on JBL and its gears are mediocre in sound quality. In a club set up, It is hard for some of the folks in Vietnam to figure this out...because in the club or live hall, they blast the dam thing so loud. Another problem I also found was the way the speakers were set in Vietnam. It looks like it was all set up by one guy or his cousin who had imitated him. Every dance clubs I went to, look like it was set up for a live concert, and every concert I went to, the place was set up like…’that guy’. The few front rows will go deaf after the show and the folks in the back row, can't hear a thing. I had been mostly in studio set up and work around with recording gears only. The only live sound or installations jobs I did were some gigs with some old 80's band (Bon Jovi, Yellow Jackets, Chicago, etc.) back in school when they came to tape live radio shows. The decision was made by my partners to enter the live and club installation market was quick and I got the job of choosing the right company to...kick everyone and their mother's asses.

It was an easy decision for me to choose Meyer Sound for my live set up. I had ton of experience with Meyer from my day in engineering school at Expression. Just like the recording trend, the live sound installation has made dramatic changes in all their gears and way to set up. It took me 3 days back in school to re-learn everything.
Back then, Meyer was the first company that when total active on all their speaker system. This was same with other studio monitor manufactures with the purpose of pairing speakers and amplifiers. For studio yes, but for live? Live is immediate and stressful. The usual setup would be another set of amps just in case something is blown, you can just plug the speakers into that emergency amps set up. What happen if the active speakers are blown, you have to replace it with another speaker...in the middle of a live show? And while it is hanging 50 ft in the air? Meyer had made the changes about 5 years ahead of everyone.

Have no fear, Meyer got the problem lick. I chose to distribute Meyer in Vietnam for the one simple fact, unbeatable sound clarity. I had visit Meyer Sound facility in Berkley and could not believe the quality controls the company had placed on their products.
I was asked in Vietnam if I can build a full blown high end total acoustic lounge bar/dance club with full blown live feed video VJ system. Building it, NO! Selling the gears and consulting...YES!
To make the story short our company in Vietnam got the commission to build the first real acoustic lounge with full blown Meyer Sound atmosphere speaker system. I had to call on the help of my dears’ friend Mike Cooper and 'db' Dave Dennison (Greatful Deads Engineer) for this job. I will keep you update on the construction and take some pictures for you.

...to be continue on day 2