Britain's 'indie Oscars', the annual NME awards, were held at the end of February in the IndigO2 nightclub at the O2 (the former Millennium Dome). The awards ceremony showcased some of Britain's best bands using the Harman Pro UK-specified PA and front-of-house desk, a Soundcraft Vi6^TM. It was a good night for Arctic Monkeys, who won best British band, best track and best music video, having already scooped the best band and best album categories at the mainstream music industry bash the Brit awards just over a week earlier. Other post-award-winning performances included Kate Nash and Billy Bragg, and the Manic Street Preachers, who closed the ceremony having won the NME's Godlike Genius award with a seven-minute rendition of their classic 'Motorcycle Emptiness'.

The IndigO2 is equipped with two Soundcraft Vi6 consoles, one for front-of-house duties and one handling the monitor mix, and so Andy Brown of Soundcraft, provided Vi6 training for the event's chief front-of-house and monitor engineers at the company's Potters Bar headquarters the day before the NME Awards. After the event, they commented, "This year's NME awards was the most smooth-running so far... With Andy Brown's excellent teaching skills and remarkable patience, the whole week became an invitation to explore the Vi6, rather than a challenge to overcome it." The intuitive nature of the desk's operation and user interface was also a hit, the chief engineers commenting, "With many of the incoming engineers having never used the console, it was remarkably straightforward to get them up to speed, and the response from each was very positive."