Over at hospitality we like a challenge. So for our next event we really thought we’d try and do something really special.

Matter was a concorde moment in clubbing. Perhaps the best club to ever be built, with its stone cold walls, vibrating dancefloor, and production values. But we cant look back, we only look forward. Brixton represents a blank canvas, a huge iconic space that we can manipulate, and achieve the best possible show. For those that remember Herbal, then on to Heaven, then Matter. Brixton will be our biggest show yet.

The first step is to build a new dancefloor! For those of you that have been to Brixton before you’ll know the floor usually slopes towards the stage. To turn the room in to more of a club we will be raising the floor to a level surface, and building a new stage. To create a level playing field for you to rave equally.

Once we’ve done this we have a huge stage to fill. We’ll be building a custom built DJ booth with 2 set ups. Perfectly suited to the needs of the artists performing and visually a spectacle. We will then be Hospitalising the stage. Ensuring your eyes and your ears are treated on the 24th September.

But as you are all aware, the  most important feature to our show will always be the sound. Not one to do things by halves, we will be bringing in our own sound system in to the venue, with one of the most influential sound engineers around. Responsible for some of the best soundsystems in clubbing history. We thought we’d catch up with Roberto Pieroni, to let you know what we have in store.

Hi Roberto, please introduce yourself

I have been a freelance sound engineer for over 15 years, mostly working for live bands.
Because of this experience in music, I was asked in 1999 (when I was head of sound at the Camden Palace, now Koko) to help in setting up fabric as a club able to do live bands properly together with DJs. Fabric was the first club that I know of to do so.

In your career as a sound engineer what are your biggest events and achievements?
To see where Fabric got to after just few years, to see my ideas put into practice and working well was a great achievement for me.
Also working with so many bands and DJs within the 8 years I have worked there.
Setting up Matter was a great pleasure, but lots of hard work. With so many different speakers and concrete walls it was very hard to get it right and I think we did.
Biggest events? I have done lots of festivals all around the world. From Coachella in the US to Fuji in Japan, and of course all the European festivals. I love working at festival: having no sound-checks and often with just 20 mins change over makes it all so intense.

Hospitality are putting there own sound and production in to the venue. What kind of soundsystem will we be getting exactly ? tech spechs etc ?
For my team was great fun to work with the Hospital’s people at Matter and we all got on the same wave length straight away. The sound has always be awesome for Hospitality because we could set up the DJ booth on stage and have everything going through a great sound desk so we could have everything under control.
At Brixton we are doing the same, just on a bigger scale.
The PA is the best that technology can offer for such events at the moment.
The system is a Funktion One, with around 30 boxes flown and 14 massive 21” subs ground stacked. Also we will have a ground stacked rear stacks to make the room full of sound, instead of just having all sound coming from the front. This is not a gig, it’s a club night.

You were head of sound at Matter. Widely revered to be the best sound-system in the world. You must have been sad to see it go. How will the sound at Brixton academy compare?
I was and still am very sad to see my baby going.. very sad.
At the Academy the sound is going to be different as it’s a big room, but between the PA suppliers, Kim Lewis (who was always behind the FOH desk with me at matter) and myself we are very confident that the sound is going to be massive.

Were creating 3 rooms in to the walls at Brixton academy, what do you have planned for rooms 2 + 3?
Room 2 is going to sound amazing and being a smaller room is going to be easier. Same Funktion One boxes, just a lot less of them.
Room 3 is upstairs in a bit weird shape room. I think is going to be perfect to have a drink there while listening to some great tunes.

Hospitality main arena

Room 2

You’ve worked closely with Hospital records, how does sound engineering work differently with drum and bass over other styles of music?
Drum and Bass biggest challenge is to get the MC over such a loud music and to manage to keep DJs not to trash mixers (sorry guys).
I have worked on the most popular D&B events, and, trust me, the can be very intense… with so many DJs playing for 1 hour or so, the soundguy is always very busy.
With other styles, say, techno, trance etc it’s a lot easier, especially now that most of these DJs use serato/traktor with laptop or CD so there’s no problems of feedback and needles skipping and their sets can be over 3 hours long.

Who’s your favorite Dj to work with?
Mr Andy C, of course. It’s pleasure to see him at work, although he’s loud, very loud.
Also Ricardo Villalobos. I have worked with him so many times at Fabric and I always had a great night.
Finally the Scratch Perverts. I have learned a lot from them about DJ set-ups.

What’s sounds best, vinyl, cd or laptop, it’s hotly contested, your the man to know best, what’s your opinion ?
Best combination for me: vinyl with decks properly set up with Isonoe feet, Shure 447 needles (not brand new), xone92 (as new as possible).
CDs and laptops can sound great with pioneer 800, as long there’s no MP3s in sight. You can get away with mp3s 320 kbps, but usually I can hear it.
This is a big problem because so many people are using mp3 these days and big sound systems sound very harsh with MP3s whatever the music.

see you all there !

[posted by josh]

This article was posted by Josh.

Tags: brixton, hospitality, hospitality brixton, josh, matter london, roberto, sound

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