They called it a block party, but with 250,000 attendees, it was a New Year’s celebration on a grander scale than most. Affiliated with the Fiesta Bowl (this year’s National Champ-ionship) college football game, this get-together took place on New Year’s eve night and January 2 at the Tempe Town Lake, a man-made wonder in the middle of town.

Sunbelt Scenic, a leading production, events and staging company in the Southwest and early adopters of Martin Audio loudspeakers, provided four stages of sound, light, stage and roof, along with a staff of technicians. The stages covered Rock, Pop, Country, and Alternative music with every genre represented including Collective Soul, the Go Gos, Charlie Daniels and Authority Zero, to name a few.

Typically, the equipment list started with Martin Audio –– 16 flown W8L’s, 16 ground-stacked Blackline S218 sub-bass systems, and 18 Martin Audio MA 4.2s Martin Audio power amplifiers. Crown 5000 amps were also used, along with Apogee AE5’s powered by Crest.

The drive rack included three Martin DX1 controllers, along with three Klark-Teknik DN360’s. The FOH system consisted of Yamaha PM4000 and PM3500 consoles, BSS compressors and gates and an assortment of Yamaha, Eventide, Lexicon, Roland and TC Electronic effects.

16 Martin Audio LE12J’s and two W8’s sidefill speakers were included in the monitor set-up.

While Sunbelt’s expert technical staff, led by chief audio engineer Jim Jorgensen, maximised the system, Steve Hill, production coordinator for the event, commented, “The Martin line array was incredible and rocked the compound. The sound could easily be heard over seven stages.”

Jim Jorgensen adds Martin’s “versatility” as a primary reason for choosing their systems. “We can relate a variety of events to this factor. One week we’re providing the audio for the Tostitos Block Party, the next week we’re supplying similar equipment for four major corporate business meetings with nationally recognised companies. We have
to purchase products
that perform perfectly in both situations.

“Martin Audio is the ‘musical’ box we can always count on. These speaker systems bring a higher quality of audio to any application,” Jorgensen concludes.