In the heart of San Diegoʼs Little Italy sits an upscale music venue that has quickly becomeapopular stop foragrowing roster of national performing acts and A-list corporate clientele.
Opened in 2015, Music Box has hosted such notable talent as Snoop Dogg, Halsey, Luis Fonsi, Rufus Du Sol, Jidenna, and Switchfoot, as well as private events for Lamborghini, Qualcomm, Sony, JP Morgan Chase, the US Navy, and Marriott, to name a few. With its reputation on the rise and an increasingly packed calendar, General Manager, Joe Rinaldi along with the venueʼs owners, recently decided thata full audio upgrade was in order.
After looking closely at several options from Deforest Tech Solutions, Rinaldi selected an all-VUE solution based around the al-8 line array system and hs-221 ACM subwoofers. “We definitely wantedamore versatile and robust system that would appeal toahigher caliber of talent,” explained Rinaldi. “After hearing the VUE line arrays I was instantly impressed. I also liked the idea of havingacollaborative relationship withalocal company.Our previous system was from Europe, but VUE is practically in our backyard, which makes technical support and service aspects very easy.”
At 13,000 square feet andacapacity of 705, Music Box offers just enough space to attract national acts, while maintaining an intimate vibe that allows guests to feel connected and fully immersed in the musical experience. Visually, Music Box features a modern industrial-chic decor comprised of concrete, steel, glass, and wood.
The main floor leads toa30-foot tall open space withaunique and somewhat acoustically challenging 3-level listening area. “With the split room and all the reflective surfaces, we knew that coverage was going to be tricky,” said VUEʼs Technical Sales Manager, Greg Kirkland. “To make it even more challenging,aweight restriction limited the number of elements we could fly above the stage. We eventually came up withacreative way to split the arrays between flown and stage-stacked components. We used an EASE model to verify and tweak our design before proceeding to installation.”
The systemʼs unique split configuration has three al-8 elements flown from either side of the stage covering the top 3rd-level listening area. An additional four elements are installed atopapair of custom shelves placed five feet above stage level directly beneath the flown arrays.
The stacked elements deliver ideal coverage for both the main and mid-level listening areas. Low frequency comes courtesy of four hs-221 ACM subwoofers that are positioned across the front of the stage for maximum impact with minimal visual disruption. “The end result is very even coverage not only in the horizontal but vertical plane, which is quite challenging inaclub with three floors of audience areas,” said Kirkland.
Ancillary support is provided byaselection of VUE h-Class high definition models. VUE h-5 dual 5-inch systems are deployed as front and balcony fill, whileasingle h-208 dual 8-inch low profile system is ceiling mounted for delay fill at the entrance lobby and bar area. Power and processing for the al-8 line array come by way of four rack-mount VUEDrive V6D Series Systems Engines.
The h-5 fill speaker and the h-208 were ordered without the standard onboard VUEDrive electronics to ease weight and infrastructure concerns. Instead,afully optimized rack-mount V4D Systems Engines provide all power and DSP for the two-ancillary h-Class systems.
All five rack-mount VUEDrive Systems Engines and the onboard VUE Drive electronics in the subwoofers can be fully networked, with complete system control and monitoring available via SystemVUE software. The system came online in December 2018, and after just two months of operation, Rinaldi and team couldnʼt be more pleased with their decision.
“Coverage is perfect, and the sound quality is absolutely amazing,” concluded Rinaldi. “We have hadalot of great successes over the years with different name brand systems at many different clubs. So, when we say we love our new VUE system, it really comes from the perspective of having heard it all. Even visiting engineers have commented on the overall impact and versatility. Iʼm not easily surprised, but this system surprises me night after night in all the best ways.”
