I play instrumental guitar with BIAB backing tracks.
Everything from dinner jazz to Frank Zappa (a slightly different type of dinner jazz).
I throw in a little Merle Haggard here and there to keep everything honest. 3 chords and the truth.

Most of my backing tracks have drums,bass, and at least one chording instrument comping (B3,Rhodes,Guitar,etc)
I started with stereo mix but have evolved to mono mix only.

I've learned that quality of mix is very important.
Toward that end I make sure to use a limiter and loudness meter in my DAW.
I also use mp3 gain to assure consistent volume across tracks.
These two things (suggested by forum members) have significantly improved the quality of my tracks.

As far as the PA goes, I started with a standard 2 speaker PA with a stereo mix.
It was a bit too much and required 3-4 trips to the car for everything.
From there I went to Bose S1 pro with a guitar amp. That was better but not great.
The sound would get muddy especially the backing tracks.

Now I use a line array (Stick) PA. This is hands down the best so far.
The height of the rig really helps project the mids and highs. The 12" woofer moves some air.
I use the Electro Voice Evolve 50. Its a bit more $$ than the StagePas 1k.
I honestly cant tell you how it compares. The Stagepas does have a similar 12" woofer.
Looks like it may also have a little more capability at the mixer. That might be in the StagePas favor.

The line array setup is much cleaner at the gig. Its all right there where you are. This is important as some of my gigs I don't have a lot of space to spread out. Once or twice i used the Bose S1Pro as a monitor out of the line array. That worked pretty well.

I no longer carry a guitar amp. I use a Tech 21 FlyRig Guitar Processor direct into the EV.
The tracks are on an Ipad I direct to the EV. I use Anytune Pro for playing the tracks.
I also have a BlueBoard bluetooth pedal to the ipad for controlling (next song, previous song, start, stop)
Anytune. On occasion I'll use the bluetooth from the ipad to the EV for the tracks but mostly I use a cable.

I pack it all in/out with 2 trips to the car.

I'm 61 and while I love the sound, the 42lb bass unit is a bit to hump up and down stairs.
I'm considering a 8" or 10" powered speaker setup (QSC 10.2)for small gigs.
It would knock 10 lbs off the carry. It still puts out enough bass for dinner gigs.

Anyway, this forum helped me quite a bit to get where I'm at now. Its got me a quality sound the customers like so I'm getting some gigs (in spite of the Zappa stuff). Hoping to focus on putting together a CD over the winter for next season.

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