Twenty One Pilots Ride The Waves on World Tour

Knoxville, TN (November 21, 2024)—Renowned for its live show, Twenty One Pilots is currently wrapping up its Australian leg—tonight’s show is Brisbane, thank you very much—and along for the ride is the band’s longtime FOH engineer Kenny Sellars, who ensures the energy on stage hits the audience with full force.

Sellars is no stranger to big arena shows, having worked with Doja Cat and Shania Twain, and he’s mixed Twenty One Pilots for multiple tours as well. That meant when the current world tour began, he knew what to expect—little details, such as that singer Tyler Joseph spends most of the show far in front of the P.A.

“Anyone who has seen Twenty One Pilots live knows that Tyler spends a large portion of the show in the crowd,” he said. “I never imagined I would have to manage a singer who is positioned that much in front of the PA. There are a few songs where he’s intimate and quiet vocally, even while located all the way over there.”

With that and a few dozen other concerns in mind, Sellars elected to integrate a new Waves SuperRack LiveBox to his live setup so that he could run Waves plug-ins and other manufacturers’ VST3 plug-ins as needed. That included the Waves PSE (Primary Source Expander) plug-in, used to manage the challenges of Joseph going deep into the room.

“My go-to plug-in for that situation is the PSE,” said Sellars. “What I love about it, over traditional vocal gates, is that I’ve got the sidechain ability to really dial in his vocal range and keep it from opening up when a cymbal hits, or when there’s a big kick drum hit. The PSE has really been a lifesaver with Tyler going so far out into the crowd so often.”

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The SuperRack LiveBox Dante model, which supports up to 128 channels and features low latency, fit with how the FOH position was set up. “Everything on this tour runs through Dante,” Sellars said, “all operating on a single network. This made it so easy to route any channel directly into the LiveBox, back out, and straight into my console. All the devices started talking to each other instantly. The LiveBox just showed up on the Dante control and I could patch it however I wanted—easy. What’s also helpful is that the software interface of the LiveBox is the Waves SuperRack Performer, which, as a SuperRack user for years, I’m very familiar with.”

When he first tested the LiveBox, Sellars decided to push the system to its limits. “I thought, let’s stress-test it! I set it to the lowest latency possible and a 32-sample buffer size,” he recalls. “Then I started loading it with reverb plug-ins that consume the most resources, along with some Waves F6 Dynamic EQs, distortions and other effects. Even with all that, I only hit about 30% of the buffer capacity. I didn’t feel the need to push it any further because I already had everything I needed.”

Some of the plug-ins in use include the Waves C6 Multiband Compressor; F6 Dynamic EQ, used on various sources; L2 Ultramaximizer and Greg Wells PianoCentric plug-ins. “I use the PianoCentric a lot as a saturation tool,” he explained. “For example, [I have it] on guitars and ukulele, which we have on this show, and sometimes on the bass to add a bit of high-end clarity without bringing out excess finger-string noise. This is one of my little tricks that always makes things a bit more fun and, of course, sound better!”

“My bass plug-in signal chain includes the Waves CLA Bass, followed by a Smack Attack transient shaper. This chain allows my singer/bass player to play as dynamically as he wants, without me having to worry about the signal popping out too much. It’s similar to using a compressor, but it mainly controls the signal to prevent it from being too overbearing.”

“With the Waves LiveBox,” Sellars summarizes, “I have an ecosystem I’m already familiar with, just taken to the next level. I’ve got everything I need to pull off a show like Twenty One Pilots, which is dynamic and versatile—and, if you come to see it, pretty crazy!”