Honky-Tonk, High-Quality Sound Brings Friends In Low Places to Nashville

Nashville is known for its music. Its major thoroughfare, Broadway, it is known for its huge, loud—and often packed to the rims—music venues. When Brooks and his wife, Trisha Yearwood, announced the grand opening of their four-floor, 55,000-square-foot Friends In Low Places Bar & Honky-Tonk live music venue in downtown Nashville’s “Neon Neighborhood” of Lower Broadway, high-quality sound was imperative.

The new venue is outfitted with an L-Acoustics A Series concert sound system and a DiGiCo Quantum225 console at front of house, complete with a MADI-ready MQ-Rack stage box. The full system was designed and installed by Clair Global Integration (CGI), the permanent installation division of the star’s longtime sound-reinforcement tour provider, Clair Global.

The loudspeaker system is scaled to the venue’s dimensions, reflecting the long rectangular spaces characteristic of the area’s turn-of-the-century urban spaces. Flanking the stage on the left long wall are one A15i Focus over two A15i Wide enclosures, and another hang of one A15i Focus over two A15i Wide, which provide coverage to either side and in front, towards both the main floor and balcony, carved out of what was once the second floor.

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The design challenge was to provide even and consistent coverage to both levels. To keep the volume reasonable but still impactful, 14 coaxial X8 loudspeakers are installed as balcony underfills, each powered by one of the 16 channels of an LA7.16i amplified controller, with the remaining two channels used to power X8 in the club’s elevated VIP areas on the main floor. “That way, we could tailor the sound to what was exactly needed in each zone of the area under the balcony,” explained CGI systems designer Joe Anderson.

In addition, two KS21i subs are mounted behind the A15i hangs, along with four KS28 subs in custom-constructed, four-foot-deep cavities below the VIP areas, which give those areas significant LFE impact but without rattling the seats. The rooftop bar, known as The Oasis, has a left-right sound system comprising an A10i Focus over an A10i Wide and one KS21i sub on either side, all powered by an LA4X amplified controller. A nearby bar area is covered by eight X8 speakers with SB10i subs, also driven by an LA4X.

“The challenge for the rooftop bar, where DJs perform late into the night, is to have impact without getting too loud,” said Anderson. “One of our mantras at Clair is it has to sound great, not just loud.” That’s accomplished largely by relying on the subs for impact, which allows the roof to keep the overall volume level lower. “Our goal is to elevate the production-value level of the entire sound experience here, making it closer to what you’d expect from a concert rather than a club,” he says. “The A Series speakers deliver great sound, with a lot more punch than you’d expect from their size, right out of the box. I never have to fight to get it.”

Heins also pointed out how the compact A Series “generates the energy we want without interfering with the sightlines of a room like this. It’s a great place to see as well as hear music.”

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He said that same beneficial form factor applies to the DiGiCo Quantum225. “It’s a great-sounding console but doing everything it does in a smaller amount of space is important, because every inch of real estate is a premium on Broadway. We had to shift the location of the console to accommodate that, but the desk has the kinds of features that make even a challenging mixing space easy to work with.”

The venue’s mix position is located at the back of the bar, near stage left. From here, freelance AV technicians like Nate Warren and Gianni Gambuzza, brought in by JAG Warner Productions, utilize the Quantum225 console to provide both the front-of-house and monitor mixes for four bands a day, each playing four-hour sets.

“The performance of our DiGiCo desk is extremely impressive,” said Gambuzza. “We run it seven days a week in the honky-tonk venue from 10:00 a.m. to 2:30 a.m.—more than 16 hours a day—and it never slows down on us. The sound of the console is very clean, especially when going through our L-Acoustics A Series system. I feel like I can push my mix to the limits while still maintaining tremendous clarity. And I don’t really need to do a lot of work once I get all of my inputs in; all I have to do is push my faders up to where I want them, and it sounds just like a mixed show before I even get into tweaking EQ and compression.”

For Gambuzza, the Quantum console’s Nodal Processing has been a particularly loved feature. “On Lower Broadway, we have such quick changeovers that, in the past, there have been times at other venues when I couldn’t give a band the best in-ear mix simply due to time and channel limitations,” he recalled. “Now, with Nodal Processing, I can really get musicians’ mixes dialed in and provide every band member a personalized touch. I can give a drummer a different EQ curve on their snare, give a bass player compression on their vocal, and give a singer a boost in the high end, all in their own individual mixes while not affecting anyone else’s, and without having to double up channels for monitors. It’s truly amazing for when operating on time restraints.” He’s also a fan of the desk’s Mustard processing tube emulators: “I’ve found them to really warm up vocals and tone down the harsh mids of an electric guitar, and I can also use them to really drive a kick or snare drum to ‘pop’ out in the mix.”

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Fellow engineer Nate Warren points to the desk’s talkback system as being a major benefit. “One of my favorite features is a talkback system using the macros for every musician’s mic to troubleshoot issues much more efficiently,” he shared. “I have macros set for bands that will mute their mic sends to all sources, other than me and themselves, and set my talkback to only their in-ears to quickly resolve any issues that arise without it being in the front-of-house and without distracting other musicians while they’re playing and interacting with the crowd.”

Warren noted that the console is set up with 48 stage inputs to accommodate the four-to-six member bands that perform there, plus eight more channels dedicated for internal effects returns and local inputs for the booth. The console is also configured to run up to a dozen stage wedges, but much more typically gets used to supply six stereo IEM mixes for performers.

“Although I have only been using the Quantum225 here for a few months now, I’ve had well over a dozen guitar players specifically tell me that their guitar sounds incredible thanks to the DiGiCo audio engine. This console and our loudspeaker system were absolutely the best possible choices for Friends In Low Places. As far as I know, we’re the only venue on Lower Broadway that has a DiGiCo desk paired with an L-Acoustics PA, and they both make such a huge difference in providing the very best sound for our patrons and performers.”

Heins pointed out that from the carefully selected L-Acoustics speakers to the sophisticated DiGiCo console, every piece of equipment at Friends In Low Places Bar & Honky-Tonk has been chosen to create an unparalleled audio experience. “Garth always gives you his best,” he said. “And with this new venue, he has brought that commitment to quality to the heart of Nashville’s music scene.”