SeSSion diary All Right On The Night
When it comes to live tV performances, having the right gear is paramount, as Adam Goldsmith explains…
These last couple of weeks have been taken up predominantly in the house band for ITV’s The Nightly Show. ‘Mixed reviews’ might be the appropriate phrase… however, from a working musician point of view, it’s been a lot of fun and at times quite challenging. The band was added at the request of presenter Bradley Walsh, who is both a very funny guy, über professional and a true advocate of live music. The musical director of the band is Steve Sidwell, for whom I’ve worked extensively over the past few years, and the rest of the band consists of Strictly Come Dancing’s Tommy Blaize on keys on vocals, Jerry Meehan (Robbie Williams) on bass, Andrew Small (who was Kylie Minogue’s musical director for a long time) and renowned sax player Martin Williams.
The first consideration for me was what gear to take, given we had been told there was very limited room. I’ve recently put together a new pedalboard for this kind of work, centred around a great bit of kit from Fractal Audio, the FX8. For this kind of work where literally any style of music could be required at very short notice (we frequently get stings and play-ons thrown at us during commercial breaks to be ready to play in two minutes’time), a unit such as this is invaluable. It’s very easy to edit (I have the computer skills of a lettuce) and built like a tank. I have it set to‘True Bypass’ mode so it doesn’t interfere with my signal chain, even though the converters are of such high quality I’m not sure you’d hear the difference anyway – so it’s mainly for my peace of mind.The only thing that I’m not 100 per cent happy with is the drives.They sound fine in isolation, but to be honest, when put up next to my favourite pedals, the difference becomes quite apparent.
I’m using two main drives on this ’board, the main being a new addition, the absolutely fabulous Strymon Sunset, a very flexible dual overdrive pedal that I’d highly recommend. The other is the J Rockett Archer, which was a present from my good friend Paul Stacey during our BBC Children In Need Take That gig last year, and has proved invaluable ever since. Amp-wise, I’ve recently been using Hamstead amps, which you may be aware of. If you’re not, they are a fairly new British company who makes fantastic sounding amps – I have mine factory upgraded to Alnico Cream speakers, which I find makes a big difference – and are built as solidly as any amp I’ve ever seen.
I’ve been required to play everything at very short notice from operatic-style mandolin, to disco medleys and a Brian May-style version of God Save the Queen, so as I’m sure you can imagine, the absolute last thing you want to have to worry about it is your equipment not working. I can tell you this with real certainty as I am writing this from rehearsals in the Royal Albert Hall where I’m part of the house orchestra for the Olivier Awards, playing second guitar to the excellent Pete Callard whose gig it is normally, and the scene of my Friedman Buxom Betty blowing up in quite spectacular fashion last night in the first rehearsal. Not fun in the slightest, especially when the only replacement amp available is a Roland Keyboard amp, which doesn’t sound ideal when you’ve been brought in especially to play a couple of the more rocky tunes. Fortunately, my modded Fender Princeton came to the rescue this morning and all is again right with the world. For five minutes at least, until someone throws a classical guitar concerto and a banjo solo at me to be performed in the next 45 seconds…