At Liverpool' Bierkeller, the 80 different beers are just a side-line: people come here for the live Oompah Band shows and a uniquely friendly atmosphere. Recently the venue's main hall invested in a new sound system, and loudspeakers from Brighton-based Traction Sound were chosen and installed by ProScreens.
The Bierkeller Entertainment Complex is situated right in the heart of the thriving Liverpool One. The new venue is built in a large concrete room with lots of hard reflective surfaces, creating a difficult acoustic environment. Paul Atherton of RW Salt explains why this made Traction Sound's loudspeakers an ideal choice: "Their SDS range has low vertical dispersion, which is perfect for acoustically difficult venues. You get less energy bouncing off reflective surfaces, meaning better clarity throughout the hall. Also, because of the long throw of Traction Sound's loudspeakers, we were able to get away with less fill speakers, which helped get the project in on budget."
Central to the Bierkeller's brand is the unique atmosphere. Here, everyone is relaxed and just gets along with having fun. Liverpool's Bierkeller were insightful in the role sound quality plays in a venue's atmosphere. Traction Sound's Billy Wood explains: "We often underestimate how much processing our brain does when listening. If we have lots of reverberation and distortion, we have to think harder to unscramble everything. This extra thinking makes us tired and stressed, putting us in a bad mood. Compression drivers inherently distort, due to diaphragm break-up and wave steepening. We use an array of soft dome tweeters instead of a compression driver, giving us less distortion and happier listeners. And after all, happy people are what the Bierkeller is all about."
The front-of-house sound system in the main hall consists of four of Traction Sound's SDS12i 'Kodiak' partnered with four BR18 'Panda' subs. There are also four of their SDS8i 'Gobi' loudspeakers as a delay fill. All loudspeakers are passive and powered by QSC RMX amplifiers. Loudspeaker management is carried out by an Allen & Heath iDR matrix mixer.