The only reason a sub should be back there is if the band wants a sub for onstage monitoring. It's not for the audience.
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Get some nice 15" monitors. They can pump plenty of bass. A nice PA with good monitors can provide a nice stage wash.
Agreed, for sure. My brother has a sound company and sometimes the bands will request a sub and they have 15" monitors. I doubt the requests are that often.
FWIW got together with the BL for a bit this PM to discuss our New Year's Eve song list. I brought up the sub issue with him (we just got this last week, practiced with it once - front and center at practice - haven't gigged with it yet) and told him I can't hang with that big ass sub directly behind me on the back line, and that it was a potential feedback and stage volume issue. We agreed it either needs to be front and center or on one side preferably against a wall. He has no problem with my stance so I guess we're good to go. Thanks again to all for the input. As usual lots of good information and knowledge from the TB brain trust.
Addressing a couple of things in the OP
It sounds like your BL has read about time aligning his speakers both with the live sound and each other. It can work, but only for one single place in the room. Physics says that if you change the distances to the individual speakers you're going to change the sound's arrival time. It's usually done with delays in the speaker processors and if you've got lots of resources available such as cash and experienced PA tuners have at it.
Frequency cancellation should not happen between subs and tops wether they be close together or distant. They are outputting different frequencies.
All the stuff you've been told about getting extra bass boost from the floor and corners is true. Get all the free power you can.
What has been written about bass feedback is also true. Placing the PA so it is not coupled to the stage and not dumping more energy into mics will give you a much cleaner signal to work with. That usually means getting the PA in front of the stage.
It sounds like your BL has read about time aligning his speakers both with the live sound and each other. It can work, but only for one single place in the room. Physics says that if you change the distances to the individual speakers you're going to change the sound's arrival time. It's usually done with delays in the speaker processors and if you've got lots of resources available such as cash and experienced PA tuners have at it.
Frequency cancellation should not happen between subs and tops wether they be close together or distant. They are outputting different frequencies.
All the stuff you've been told about getting extra bass boost from the floor and corners is true. Get all the free power you can.
What has been written about bass feedback is also true. Placing the PA so it is not coupled to the stage and not dumping more energy into mics will give you a much cleaner signal to work with. That usually means getting the PA in front of the stage.
That's. Good sub and 1 is all you need. Only run the kick and vocals through the pa and see if you sound better. Clearer. I'm finally getting my guys to do this and we sound better than ever.
Leads to too much stage volume, which is one of several reasons we run everything through the pa. Doesn't work for us. We sound better with everything in my mains. Of course YMMV.
Yeah, for me, it's everybody direct, or as little to the pa as possible in the small and medium gigs I play. You can't beat everybody direct with e drums and iem's for live sound but, usually drummers end up hating the feel of even the best kits and I've never seen one actually keep up with general maintenance.
