Gorillaz crew keeps Shure KSM8 capsules on Albarn's vocals

The audio team on Gorillaz's "The Mountain" world tour runs Shure Axient Digital wireless and Axient Digital PSM in-ear systems, and the crew says the gear has held up from arenas to festival fields. The tour began in March 2026 in support of the band's album of the same name. It includes a three-hour show at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in London.

The guest list changes nightly. Sound engineer Colin Woodward and the crew have to be ready for a single guest vocalist, a seven-piece brass section or a twelve-strong choir.

From SM58 to KSM8

Vocals run on Shure KSM8 capsules. Damon Albarn is on them after decades with an SM58, according to monitor engineer Dave Guerin. Front of house engineer Matt Butcher had tried a KSM8 with another act and pushed to try it with Albarn. "He wasn't expecting it to be any different to the normal SM58, but he loved it," Guerin says. The lack of proximity effect was the main thing, along with a better top end.

The production carries around ten KSM8 capsules and rotates a new one in for Albarn each year. Two AD2 handheld transmitters fitted with KSM8 capsules stand by for him.

A handful of discontinued Shure 527B microphones are also in the rig. They give Albarn's gritty, distorted vocal sound, which Guerin says is used on many Gorillaz recordings. Shure no longer makes the model, so the team watches the second-hand market to keep its small stock.

Fixing the guitar dropouts

Guitarist Jeff's guitars run through Axient Digital AD1 bodypacks. His earlier in-ear system caused interference, including dropouts on the AD1 packs, and a little noise when it was close to the guitar amps. Jeff moves around a lot, so staying clear of the amps was not an option.

For the London stadium show, Woodward moved him to Axient Digital PSM, a receive-only system. The clash went away. "The noise floor is really impressive, to the point where you have to double check it's on when the mix is quiet," Woodward says.

Woodward runs the whole RF picture, third-party wireless included, through Shure Wireless Workbench. He uses an AXT600 spectrum manager and plans to move to the newer AD600. He sends a copy of the monitor screen to the guitar tech over vMix, and the timeline recording helped him trace the dropouts.

Two Shure VP88 stereo microphones work as a percussion overhead and as a targeted ambient mic for Albarn, who moved to in-ear monitors. Crew talk over Shure SM35 headsets, which Guerin says were the only headsets the team tried that stayed intelligible against the d&b M2 wedges and E5 sidefills at show levels.

Source: FOH Online