South America - Linkin Park has sold over 100m records worldwide, and after a seven-year break from recording and touring, a new line-up drove the band’s eighth studio album From Zero into a stadium-filling show with audio design, reinforcement, and global support from Sound Image.
"The most important aspect of our production, regarding this artist, is the quality of their audio, and that's why we chose our vendor," begins Joe Skarzynski, Linkin Park's production manager. No stranger to this camp, or advocating for Sound Image's service, Joe has moved up through the ranks to help take the reins in the band's new chapter as part of a production leadership team comprising Linkin Park’s longtime road collaborator, tour director Jim Digby, assistant tour director Fiona Booth, and production coordinator Tori Merrick.
Following the loss of former frontman Chester Bennington, members Mike Shinoda, Brad Delson, Joe Hahn and Dave 'Phoenix' Farrell have been joined by drummer Colin Brittain and co-vocalist Emily Armstrong, who are continuing the legacy and performing their biggest concerts to date.
Helping to develop the audio rig that would handle this major comeback, Sound Image, which had historically supported the band, was engaged once again. "Our number-one priority is establishing a sound that can be replicated in every city and in every stadium for fans across the world," explains Jim. "Furthermore, we need professional crew who are as excited as us to be working on this tour, which is such a special project. We need competency, consistency, and customer value, and Sound Image and Clair Global understand those needs with total professionalism.
"Our artist wants to ensure that the essence of Linkin Park's songwriting skills, the music that is embedded within them, is accurately represented through the PA sound and through the energy of their live shows. We are all tasked with keeping true to their music and making it sound great again today."
With DiGiCo at both ends, Jim operates on a Quantum 852 mixing over 100 inputs. He shares SD-Racks and operates across an Optocore loop in conjunction with the Quantum 338 console in monitor world. Primary inputs are split into Neve RMP-D8 Dante mic preamps and delivered to both consoles via an extensive Dante network with a Prodigy.MX joining to provide 96 to 48k sample rate and format conversion for broadcast applications.
Jim has dual Fourier Audio transform.engine in a main and backup workflow that are connected via another Prodigy.MX that handles changeover between the Quantum 852’s dual engines and Fourier. The same Prodigy.MX also manages the 128ch at 96k into Pro Tools for nightly archival and virtual soundcheck use cases.
"Mike Shinoda, being the band's producer, engineer, writer and singer, listens to the board tape every night," continues Jim. "He has really interesting comments for me and he's making me a better mixer every day. And Bill Chase, our systems engineer, knows exactly how the PA should sound.”
Vocalists Mike and Emily sing through DPA d:facto microphones. "It really suits them both, this capsule doesn't colour the sound in any way, and that's perfect as we have very strong singers. For their older songs, there was a lot of vocal effects that Mike sent me the plug-ins for, but my outboard is the same as I've used for a long time: a Tube Tech CL-1B and a Teletronix LA-2A compressor on my vocal chain that go into a mono bus then into another vocal bus.
“I do have a couple of analogue compressors on drums and bass guitar, a couple of reverbs, but mainly, everything is in the Quantum 852. I love the bright screens as we're working outside so much, and ergonomically, I like the layout of it; it's a very nice desk to operate."
The entire audio system has been built with robust, independent redundancy, designed by FOH, systems & network engineer, Ricki Cook. "We have such a good crew from Sound Image. Ricki is extremely knowledgeable about all the equipment and what happens in the 'engine room', as it were," Jim confirms.
Ricki adds: "I toured with the band from 07-09 and was delighted to be asked to head up the early system design stages. I’ve really enjoyed introducing some new technology into the system as I'm very comfortable with it, especially given the amount of networking on this show. I like to do everything over IP but still have a large amount of MADI and other legacy audio interfaces to accommodate, and my job is made easier with the use of the DirectOut Prodigy series.”
Audio systems engineer Bill Chase is handling a substantial Adamson PA system - over 300 VGts (including delays), VGs, and CS10 speakers are driven via Milan on a separate network also managed by Ricki and driven via Adamson’s network Gateways and a Prodigy.MP loaded with AVB and Dante interfaces. Flown end fire subs and large cardioid ground sub arrays help achieve the desired impact.
The current PA design is one of five variations used throughout the tour. He furthers: “For stadiums, we have a standard large format design. There is a 24-box main hang paired with the flown end-fire sub arrays, and an equally large side hang. These cover most of the stadium floor and side seating, while four 16-box delay towers and a 270 hang of eight more VGt help cover what the main and side cannot reach. The end-fire arrays place 12 VGs in front of another 12 VGs spaced 66-inches apart and angled outward. Using Adamson’s EF66 preset we can get all forward energy with very little to the rear and on stage. This really helps us get the low impact to the farthest seats without crushing the front row.”
A Sound Devices Nexus system is used for wireless test and measurement into a computer running SMAART for precise PA tuning. The Sound Devices & Computers all interface with the Prodigy.MP via Dante.
The PA team is completed by PA techs Tania Lopez Martinez and Robin Blanchard who joined the tour for the US shows this year, and carrying onto the EU for the stadium shows the team was joined by PA techs Joseph Walton and Marc Zedda, delay PA techs, Harry Thatcher, Jack Madden and Rowan Cahill.
Mixing six mixes for the band, monitor engineer Pasi Hara has a further two guest mixes, and another eight crew mixes fed into dedicated combiners and antennas. All IEM are Wisycom with MPR-50 packs. Headphones are JH audio with the new JH Pearl system for all band and select crew members.
"I have a couple of hardwired mixes for stationary crew also but I'm trying to keep things organic, so whatever the band gives me, I clean it a little and give it back to them without over processing it," says Pasi. "By simply using some special vocal effects and distortion they've become accustomed to when making the new album, it allows their in-ear mixes to feel familiar when performing the newer songs live.”
This team are deploying a package of Wisycom MTK982 dual channel IEM transmitters and Shure Axient Digital receivers with RF over fibre. "Almost everyone across the crew is on the Bolero standalone comms system, or Wisycom MPR50 IEMs with the new JH Pearl modification,” begins Katlyn. "We are using around 90 x radios (Motorola XPR3500e), which we also have tied into the Riedel Communications standalone system and over 50 x packs.”
Linkin Park’s From Zero world tour is currently in South America and is set to end in Switzerland on 30 June 2026.