Find the Best Zed For You

You want to spend your time learning songs and nailing your parts, not worrying about the sound.

The right mixing desk will allow you and your band to always sound your best, whether that’s jamming in the rehearsal room, performing onstage at the venue, livestreaming on social or recording your songs for release to your fans.

And there’s no need to get bogged down in technical jargon, it’s simple to find the right mixer for you (and your bandmates)

The most important decision when choosing a mixer for your band is the channel count.

As a rough guide, you will need one channel for each microphone, DI box or sound source in your band.

Keyboards, synths and laptops may have two outputs for stereo operation, so many mixers will offer dedicated stereo channels with two input sockets.

Drums can take up multiple channels. A small pub gig might only require the kick drum to be put through the mixer, but at a larger venue it is typical to use 6 or more channels on a standard drum kit.

It’s a good idea to choose a mixer that has a few more channels than you need in case you add a new instrument – or band member – in the future!

It goes without saying that you need to be able to hear yourself clearly to perform to your best, whether that’s recording or playing live.

When you’re choosing your mixer, you’ll want to pick something that can deliver the number of musician mixes – often called AUX or Monitor mixes –  that you require to feed your monitor speakers or in-ear-monitors (IEMs)

Singer-songwriters and duos will usually be happy with a single monitor mix, but larger bands generally require more monitor mixes.

Most vocalists want some reverb or delay on their voice, and it’s common to use reverb on other sources like acoustic guitars, drums and percussion to help them sit in the mix.

A ZED with built-in FX will allow the use of a reverb, or other effect type, can be used by multiple channels at once.