Nemesis are a relatively new company formed by a handful of ex-Soundcraft personnel. Set up primarily as a manufacturer of high quality custom work, they soon spotted a few gaps in the pro-audio market, one of which was for an affordable multi-channel studio foldback system. Air Studios in London are one studio which has been successfully operating a 'home-made' multi-channel foldback system for some time now, the design of which is crude in comparison to this new device from Nemesis.

The FBS500 Foldback System consists of a single master unit with up to six distribution wallboxes. Each wallbox can then drive a maximum of four 'stations' which are essentially compact eight-channel mixers. The stations sit on a conventional mic stand next to the musicians, who then adjust their headphone balance and level to suit their individual needs. The master unit feeds the stations with up to eight channels of sound as well as talkback and comes in a 2U 19-inch housing. It accepts a total of nine balanced line level inputs, eight of which are individual foldback lines (which could be sent via a console's group outputs or auxiliary outputs) and the ninth input is for the talkback signal.

Each of the eight foldback inputs has its own 10-stage LED meter and level control on the front panel of the master unit. The master unit would usually be in the control-room for the engineer to monitor and adjust the input levels which then get fed to the distribution boxes.

There can be a maximum of six distribution boxes to which the stations connect via a single 14-way multicore cable. The distribution boxes would be mounted around the studio in the same way as mic boxes or conventional headphone outlets, to minimise the need for 40ft headphone leads stretching from one side of the studio area to the other.

The station's controls are quite straight forward, and consist of both a fader and pan control for each of the eight foldback channels, as well as a master level control for each of the two headphone sockets. There is also a three band EQ section — LF, Mid and HF, for altering the overall tone of the foldback mix.

The stations are then plugged into the nearest wallmounted distribution box and can be positioned anywhere in the studio — a drummer might have his station positioned to one side of him for quick alterations in levels of click track, bass guitar or lead vocals, while the vocalist may not want any click in his cans but may instead want a lot of reverb on his voice.

Typically then the eight channels could be divided up by having separate channels for lead vocals, guitar, bass, keyboards, drums and stereo effects, which would still leave a channel remaining for perhaps backing vocals.

A typical Nemesis foldback system for recording, say a four-piece rock band might only require three or four stations — one for the drummer, one for the vocals, and one for the bass and guitar. This would then be able to cope with the majority of balancing problems between musicians.

If, however, you record a large orchestral work, then a single Nemesis foldback system's master unit could drive up to 24 separate stations. Each station has two headphone outputs each with its own gain control, which should be adequate for the largest set-ups.

Although such a system might cost over £9,000, you could actually start a basic one-station foldback system for as little as £900 — the master unit retails for £500, wallboxes are £75 and each station costs £300. Then to expand the system you need only purchase more stations which would be fed from the same master unit. However, even a one or two-way station Nemesis foldback system would provide studios with a much more versatile system than we are used to; which would also, I suspect, be a good deal more popular with the musicians themselves.

The FBS 500 doesn't require any external amplifiers. All that is necessary to get the system up and running is to connect the master unit to the mains supply and to send some audio signals to the foldback inputs. The stations then get their power and signals from the master unit, and they each have their own power amplifiers with a maximum output of 35V RMS. This is the equivalent of a 200 watt amplifier, which should be enough to drive the two headphone outputs through even two or three headphone splitter boxes.

Both the master unit and the stations are well designed. The master unit's front panel controls are straightforward — just a power on/off, master volume and individual volumes for each channel. On its rear panel are eight female XLR fine inputs, an XLR talkback input and the six 14-way distribution outputs.

These use Hirose connectors which are actually glass reinforced and originally designed for video equipment, consequently they appear very rugged and fasten very securely.

Also on the master unit's rear panel is the mains Euroconnector, a 240V/120V selector, fuse and also a mains outlet for powering up a second master unit.

Abbey Road was the first London studio to install the Nemesis foldback system. Their's is actually slightly customised in that each station is wired with stereo inputs hooked up from their new Calrec console. The Townhouse are also trying out the Nemesis foldback system.

In addition to its obvious advantages for recording studios, the FBS500 could be used for PAs, where once again drummers sometimes need to hear click tracks or sequencers in different proportions to the rest of the band. Then there are theatres and concert halls who would also find many uses for a system as versatile and easy to use as the Nemesis FBS500.

Of course, there are times when the last thing that you may want is to let some musicians have any control over their cans mix, but more often than not we are confronted with situations where two or three different headphone mixes could help a great deal in both speeding up the time it takes to set up a recording session as well as to give the artist a balance tailored to the instruments they are playing and their personal tastes.

The FBS 500 is a very well designed and powerful foldback system whose advantages could soon be discovered by most studios.

It's actually rather similar to a microwave oven — if you haven't got one you can't understand what all the fuss is about, but once you've used it you wonder how you ever lived without it.