Tipped as “one of the greatest Latin artists of all time” by Billboard and “the face of modern Reggaeton” by Pitchfork, Colombian singer J Balvin has sold more than 35 million records worldwide and garnered dozens of accolades from the Latin Grammy Awards, Latin American Music Awards and more. the Medellín-born música urbana performer recently treated fans across North America to his 27-date Back to the Rayo tour in support of his latest studio album, Rayo. For sound reinforcement, an L-Acoustics concert sound system was chosen for the run of shows.
Although Balvin first returned to post-pandemic touring last year with a European and UK run, his latest tour, with its Back to the Future homage promos, marked the artist’s first proper US and Canada trek in six years. PRG served as the audio, lighting, and camera provider for the two-month leg, which kicked off at State Farm Arena in Atlanta and wrapped at Portland’s Moda Center.
“FOH engineer Joe [Spitzer] and I first met JB [production manager, Jean-Baptiste Blot] and the Motion Music team on ODESZA’s A Moment Apart Tour back in 2017 and we’ve had a great working relationship with them ever since,” said system engineer, Eric Rogers. “When we were approached about doing sound for José [Balvin], management’s request was for us to design a PA that would provide ‘the best sounding reggaeton tour in the world.’ After taking L-Acoustics K Series systems out on a couple of ODESZA tours, we were confident it would be the right choice for this artist as well. Nothing beats K1 and its perfect complement, KS28, for sheer horsepower and fidelity.”
For most of the North American Back to the Rayo dates, PRG deployed main L-Acoustics arrays of 12 K1 over eight K2 per side, each backed by a hang of 12 KS28 subs in cardioid mode and flanked by out-fill hangs of 20 K2. To properly accommodate the show’s ample low-end, 18 additional KS28 were end-stacked in cardioid trios across the main stage face – each topped by a Kara II front-fill – plus eight more Kara II surrounding the stage thrust. For rear upper bowl coverage, PRG also flew an LCR setup of three pairs of L2 enclosures for delay. The stage PA was powered by 52 LA12X amplified controllers, with six LA7.16 for the L2 delays, and the entire system was driven off of two L-Acoustics P1 processors plus one DirectOut PRODIGY.MP in a redundant Milan-AVB loop.
“Full system coverage and response was pretty incredible for this tour,” Spitzer shared. “The majority of these rooms were A-market arenas with very tall 300 sections and deep corners that are always hard to cover with traditional arena deployments. Our box count and delay package allowed for a lot of flexibility, and the consistency in this system’s response definitely translated to the crowd, allowing José to connect night after night with all of his fans. It was a sight to see the upper sections jump just as high as the floor, and we all know they wouldn’t be doing so if the audio quality up there wasn’t 100 percent.”