07/09/2025
As the 2025 festival season nears a close and the nasty weather starts to settle in, I just wanted to take a moment to talk about what a year we've had.
I'm so proud of the crew we've managed to build - good, honest people who show up on time, do the job to the best of their ability, but most importantly always bring a huge sense of fun along with them! Without you, MAS is nothing. I'm confident we're on track to build the best crew in Sheffield, and it feels like a real family.
It's been a rollercoaster of a year, with us losing nearly all of our equipment from a van break in earlier in the year and not receiving an insurance payout. In a way, this might have been the best thing that happened to me, forcing me to look further afield for work with larger companies, spring boarding me onto much larger gigs where every minute is a learning experience.
Lots of big stuff has happened:
I let go of the first speakers I ever built when I was 14, with the brand new EVO2s watching over the deal behind me. That was a sentimental moment, but what a way to symbolise six years of work!
Another highlight was working at Creamfields this year with 22live. It's quite astonishing to watch 15,000 people having an amazing time on a system you've helped rig, and I had an awesome time meeting one of the best crews I've ever worked in.
Talking about the summer wouldn't be complete without mentioning The Model in Nottingham. We helped this amazing grassroots club out by installing their DIY system - designing custom flyware, overhauling the system processing and installing the lot into a very tricky building. The result is amazing, and it's definitely one of my favourite clubs in the UK. Check them out...
We then had the most amazing time out at Funk in the Forest festival in Wales, where we looked after the second stage, deploying a huge stack of Funktion-One (Official) F121s from our amazing friend Audio Boost along with our EVO2s and an F1201.2 to create an addictively punchy system. It was an amazing week, not least for the being in the company of two legends of the sound game, Bosun Sound and Bass Freight Sound .
Most recently, we've had the amazing opportunity of installing a huge Martin Audio Ltd system into a 3,500 square meter warehouse in Sheffield. The whole project went smoothly, and it feels like this could be the start of many more bigger projects with some luck. It was also a huge pleasure to have a student from Sheffield College with us for a work placement. He absolutely smashed it, and it's such a great feeling to start being able to give back to young up and coming techs. I'd have killed for that a few years ago!
There's been lows, but we're definitely on a high right now. It's an absolute mammoth task to thank everyone who's helped me out over the last year - there are so many of you! Please be rest assured that your generosity never goes unnoticed, and as soon as we're in a position to return that generosity, we will do two fold! Thanks to all the crew and our amazing clients - I love you all so much!!!
Roll on Summer 2026 :)
Ben x
