Spectera Ends RF Anxiety For Foo Fighters On Tour

Keeping the Foo Fighters' monitor mixes clear amid three roaring guitars and powerhouse drums is no small feat. Long-time monitor engineer Ian Beveridge has adopted Sennheiser's Spectera wideband bidirectional wireless system to remove RF uncertainty on the band's stadium run, while preserving precise stereo imaging for in-ear monitors.

For 37 years Beveridge has been at Dave Grohl's side, starting with Nirvana's European tour for their debut. Seeking to end the constant churn of frequency juggling across regions, he and the crew switched to Spectera, reshaping their workflow and unlocking new spatial clarity. "Traveling all over the world, swapping out narrowband systems for different geographical areas — it becomes a royal pain in the neck," Beveridge says. "When Spectera became available, I pulled the trigger without even hearing it. I'd seen enough evidence to suggest it was going to be great, and it proved to be more than great. It's been utterly rock solid."

Beveridge's route into live sound began when he left a civil engineering track at university for an unpaid studio role, then leapt to touring after a booking agent's call. "He sent me Bleach, the first Nirvana record, on vinyl," Beveridge recalls. "It blew the foam off my cappuccino. I flew to London, met the band, and hit the road. When Nirvana ended, Dave called me up and said, 'Hey, I'm going to start a band, you want to come work for me?' I started with Dave when I was 26 years old, and this year I'll be 63. I think I've done a decent spell."

Despite embracing Spectera's digital backbone for monitors, his vocal chain remains anchored by Sennheiser's MD 431 dynamic mic — for tone and safety. "One of our previous front-of-house engineers wanted to switch to a heavier, boutique brass mic," Beveridge recalls. "I told him, 'Sure, we can change it. But when the boss is running across that stage doing 20 miles an hour, slams into a heavy brass mic, and takes out his front teeth, are you going to be the one to explain that to him?' He said, 'Let's just leave the 431 up there.' As long as I'm the monitor engineer, that will always be the microphone for this band."

Conventional analogue FM IEMs can lose stereo separation as RF conditions worsen, but Spectera's digital transmission maintains a stable image — crucial for a three-guitar band. "With the Foo Fighters being a three-guitar band, the only way to create space so you can actually hear everything is by panning them," explains Beveridge. "If that stereo width collapses, your levels shift, everything steps on each other, and all that mixing just goes to hell. Spectera actually delivers that true separation."

Sennheiser artist relations manager Tim Moore adds that cleaner placement eases listening. "With Spectera's discrete separation, you can place one guitar far left, one far right, and one dead center. You don't have to engage in a volume fight to create definition; the instruments just appear clearly within the soundstage, which drastically reduces ear fatigue."

The system's trial by fire came during a live SNL UK broadcast in London, a notoriously dense RF environment. "The first time we turned it on, the meters were actually showing interference at the base station," Beveridge laughs. "But I just grabbed my bodypack, put my ears in, and walked through corridors, through thick brick walls, and all the way out past the production trucks parked outside. The audio was completely rock solid. From that point on, I stopped worrying."

Spectera's bidirectional control via WebUI simplifies frequency coordination and venue mapping: one bodypack walk-through builds a spectrum picture instantly. It also lets Beveridge tailor audio link modes by role. "You can actually shape and contour the resources of the system to fit the gig," Beveridge says. "For the lead singer, you allocate the absolute lowest latency possible. If it's a tech crew member or management, latency doesn't matter as much. And if a guest musician suddenly walks up right as the band is hitting the stage, we have so much over-spec'd capacity that I can instantly route a guest mix and hand them a pack without a single worry."

If frequencies are compromised mid-show, Spectera's connectivity allows a swift, remote retune without touching packs. "We've actually had to shift frequencies as the band was walking out onto the stage," Beveridge reveals. "With Spectera, you change it in the software, and without anyone touching a single bodypack, they automatically jump to the new TV channel together in about 20 seconds. It completely saves the show."

The footprint of Monitor World has shrunk dramatically as a result. "Our radio world rack went from a massive five-foot cabinet stuffed with gear down to a 2U space," smiles Beveridge. "It's just two base stations and a laptop. It takes up absolutely no room, and yet it manages our entire wireless universe."

For Beveridge, the best technology disappears when the lights go down, leaving the music to lead. "I'm at a point now where I don't even think about the RF," Beveridge reflects, looking out across the empty arena before soundcheck. "I don't have to show up at eight in the morning to fight the airwaves anymore. I come in at four o'clock, I put my white gloves on, I listen to one pack, and I just mix music."

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