Surround Sound

By Grace Clift

Free tickets to Glastonbury. Travelling across the world. Touring with famous bands. These are just some of the perks Tom Tunney has experienced in his years in the sound engineering industry. 

Tom Tunney is the Technical Manager at Skan PA Hire, an audiovisual equipment hire company which has supported PJ Harvey, The National, and countless more tours across the world. The company provides equipment and installation for both tours and festivals, including Glastonbury. Tom describes his role as “anything that’s got a computer in it, got firmware in it, anything like networking”. If it involves mixing desks, amplifiers, or making computers “talk” on a network, Tom can be found. 

“With the building before it leaves the warehouse, it gives me quite a knowledge of how the gigs are put together. So I can fault-find it over the phone if I need to, but most of the time, I only go out [to events] if stuff’s really, really broken with replacement parts. But I can step into any kind of role, really – putting speakers up in the air, making all the amps work, looking after consoles, looking after the stage. Not very good at radio stuff, but I can just about hold my own!” 

Tom has seen some incredible acts across the years – the first he can remember being the legendary Freddie Mercury Tribute Concert, featuring Metallica, Guns N’ Roses, and David Bowie. 

“I think it’s difficult to say what [projects] really stand out, because I’ve been fortunate to work with some really, really cool artists. I mean, Muse has been one of ours for quite a while, and there’s a lot of technicality that goes into making that show work. Whenever I go and visit, [I’m] just sitting back and trying to take it all in, but it is a bit of an assault on the senses.”

Another incredible aspect of sound engineering is the travel. Tom Tunney has toured all across the world with a variety of bands. 

“Australia was cool. There’s a lot of time in between shows, because the gear has to truck across the country. So quite a lot of big beach days and experiences. That was quite nice. South America was quite interesting. From a safety point of view, some electronics weren’t quite as safe as you’d like them, so you had to be careful what you touched, just in case you got an electric shock. Yeah, some cool places.”

It’s not all sunshine and rainbows though – the tour life can be gruelling. 

“Touring is very, very hard on people. It’s long hours, it’s time away from your family, there’s lots of temptations around you, and people do get burnt out very quickly if they’re not looked after. I’m quite fortunate. I don’t have to tour anymore, but I do see it affecting a lot of people. I mean, in the company now, there’s 15 trained Mental Health First Aiders in our building. They go right across all different departments. So we’re not only looking after the staff in the building, we’re looking after friends and colleagues who are out on the road as well, where they need to talk. It’s definitely something that needs addressing.” 

If you’re interested in getting into sound engineering, Tom has some tips. 

“[Try] picking up as a hobby first try and try and find what you want to do – if you want to be a mix engineer for a band, or whether you’re interested in the technical side of it. And I mean, my route was through university, and then I found a band I was working with that got me out on tour. But nowadays I’m finding that even in our company, we have university graduates who are coming in as apprentices. Britannia Row has two intakes of, I think, eight apprentices of the year. So quite a good turnover of new blood coming through.”

Once you’ve started, Tom advises to always ask questions. 

“No questions are going to be a stupid question because you want to learn, you want to better yourself. I find with people that they’re scared to ask because they don’t want to seem to not know what they’re doing, but it’s better to ask and get it right than to do it wrong and then cause an injury or cause some embarrassment or show to be lost as a result.”
For more information on Skan PA Hire, click here: https://www.skanpa.co.uk/.