(update at close of article)

I was flipping thru a pile of old DB magazines and the above image caught my eye.   Let’s see here… clockwise from top left we see a U87, an SM58, RE20, MD441, KM8(x), RE16, SM81, MD421, and then…  wtf is that thing?  In this collection of classic 70s mics, I recognized, and in fact often-use, all except that last little fella.  On the table-of-contents page, I was told that this is an Audio Technica 813.  Well, if at least SOMEONE, sometime,  thought that it could stand in that lineup, I had to learn more…

Above: a 1977 advert introducing the AT 813.  From the body copy, it seems like the mic was at least initially aimed at live-concert tapers and other semi-pro and amateur recordists (E.G., “(these mics) look, sound, and act very professional.”  The use of the term ‘professional’ in advertising almost always indicates the contrary).   The 813 is, like the much-more famous Shure SM81, an electret-condensor microphone.  Electrets differ from other condensor mics in that the backplate is semi-permenantly charged rather than polarized via some external DC source (for instance, phantom power).  Electrets are generally cheaper than ‘true’ condensors and therefore tend to get a bad rap, but hey I think we all recognize that SM81 aren’t all that bad…  so they do deserve a look.

…But maybe not this look.  Fast-forward to 1980, and the above-depicted ad SUGGESTS that the AT813 is ‘within a nickel’s worth’ of a Neumann U87.  This… I found a little hard to believe.  So what did I do?  Well, I bought an original circa-’77 AT813 and made a side-by-side comparison with a similar-vintage U87.  I made a quick recording using both mics and now you can judge for yrself.

Above: my much-loved and much-used mid-seventies U87.  This is original version of this classic mic, and it actually can run on either AA batteries or phantom power (I use phantom power).  This gets used on pretty much every session; they are not inexpensive mics but worth every penny.  It’s actually my go-to mic for acoustic steel-string guitar, and I use it on certain vocalists as well.

…And above, my new (to me, that is) circa 77 AT813.  The 813 also runs on a AA battery, a single battery, and the battery serves merely to power the onboard preamp (remember, this is an electret-condensor so the capsule requires no external polarization).  Now, there is a later version of the 813 called the 813a which operates on either the AA or phantom power; I did not have that option here.  (The 813A version apparently has much improved dynamic range when operating from phantom btw)

Above, the test-setup.  You are going to hear a single finger-picked performance of my wonderful new Gibson J45.  Let me digress for a moment here (I imagine that at least some of y’all are gtr plyrs) to report that Gibson’s quality has come a long, long way.  Ten years ago I had an informal sponsorship with Gibson; they loaned me guitars for touring and even gave me a new Firebird V, which I still have… in my closet.  The guitars just weren’t that good.  Fast-forward to 2012,  several of my clients at GCR have new Gibsons acoustics, and I was pretty impressed with them.  So I got this new J45, and it sure wasn’t cheap, but good lord does it sound+play great.  The fit and finish are up there with the best handmade ’boutique’ acoustics that I have seen, and for a lot less money.  Definitely worth a look.

Above: you can see the capsule spacing for the recording here.    This recording was made in my lil home composing studio, an 8×12 plaster room that sounds like…  an 8×12 plaster room.   You have been warned.  Without further ado,  here is the Audio Technica 813!  The budget mic that challenged a Neumann!

LISTEN: AT_813

…and here is the identical performance via the U87:

LISTEN: U87

You are hearing no EQ, no compression, and both audio clips have been normalized so that they peak at -0.1db.  So it’s pretty apples-to-apples.  My $0.02?  They don’t sound very similar.  The U87 sounds much ‘prettier’ and there is less boxiness in the midrange.  The bass seems to extend deeper.  The highs are pretty comparable in terms of frequency extension.  The biggest point in the U87’s favor, though, is the noise floor.  The mic preamps (MBox2, baby!) were at approx the same level, but the U87 track has considerably less noise.  I left a very long tail on the end of the passage so that you can compare the noise floor.

Now, in the 813s favor…  the recording does not sound bad.  Not at all, aside from the noisiness at the fade out (which, for most music sources, would actually not be as much of an issue… we are talkin solo- fingerpicked guitar here, it’s pretty quiet).   Considering that these mics can be had for $50 on eBay,  it’s certainly not a bad deal.  At some point I will probably A/B this 813 with an SM81 and a few of the other SDCs around the studio; that would certainly be a more fair comparison.

Above: part of my LP collection/pile. 

So what’s the point. I read about a cheap, forgotten condensor-mic in an ancient magazine, bought one, and voila! it’s not as good as other mics that I already own.  As I hope y’all have surmised by now, the endless, compulsive digging and searching thru old audio gear and its related literature is not part of some nostalgia trip for me; nor am I one who believes that ‘vintage is better’ when it comes to audio hardware.  The fact is, I wasn’t even alive when most of this stuff was made, and the two pieces of audio equipment that I use the most are Pro Tools and my late-model monitor speakers.  But as someone who’s livelihood depends on putting sounds together, making sounds, and constantly trying to make the sounds fresher+bolder, I need to draw inspiration and techniques from somewhere.  The present moment is full of wonders and technology often creates fantastic new tools that speed workflow and improve quality (Cleartune, anyone?), but the past is a treasure trove as well.  And as a source of ideas + tools, the past does have one distinct advantage, vis-a-vis creating work that stands out.  There is only one present, and we all live here, but there are an unlimited number of pasts.   Pick a past that no one else is mining and you’ve got a pretty unique toolbox.  Which brings me back to the LPs depicted above.  Musicians tend to chuckle when I mention a bunch of songs that no one in the room has ever heard of,  as I am known for being somewhat of an obscurist when it comes to rock music.  But make no mistake: I like the Stones and U2 and Nirvana and (etc etc)  as much as anyone else.  I just don’t think that there is any point whatsoever in drawing inspiration or any kind of sonic blueprint from that material.  It is just way, way, way too overdone.   It’s been picked at and re-examined from every possible angle.  Which is why I spend hundreds of hours per year looking through tens of thousands of dusty old LPs: just to find the ones that no one remembers.  To a working producer like myself, those are the records of value.  They are not necessarily better or worse.  But they do offer many more possibilities in terms of being a springboard into uncharted territory.

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PS: thought I should mention, while on the subject of ye olde Audio Technica: if you have not used their old ATM25 dynamic mics you are missing out…  they recently re-issued these things for $280, and I have not heard the re-issue, so i can’t comment there…  but the original ATM-25s, which I first used almost 20 years ago and I still use today… are pretty unbelievable, esp. for rock bass-guitar speaker cabs and as an inside-kick mic.   Better than a 421 or 441 IMO.   I picked up an ATM25 for around $100 a coupla years ago; they sold a ton of these things so if yr patient you can prolly find a deal. 

update

An interesting comment was inadvertently inserted in a spot that no one would likely find it; I reproduce here for easier access.

“These early At mics were conceived by some ex Electrovoice engineers and salespeople.
Very well targeted and designed.
Regarding the AT813, AT831A and the ATM31 (same mic, different paint) had nearly identical on axis (cardioid) and especially off axis response to the U87. The U87 tended to get very omni at high frequencies so it sounded crisper off axis which is where some of the sound comes from in many cases, lending to it’s unique sound.
I sold many of them over the years and most people were very happy with the result. Remember this was long before cheap Chinese condensers. We also marketed a private label variation which was called a “C87″.”

MY MIC

IF YOU WANNA SING SOME BGVS

FINE, GIT YR OWN GODDAMN MIC

THE BOX STAYS LOCKED WHEN REH IS OVER

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Fairly high-up on the list of ‘unnecessary shit that i prolly shouldn’t have bought‘ is this mint-condition Peavey PVM-38 microphone.   But what an incredible artifact, innit.  Consider what kind of paranoid, uptight culture could have created a shitty low-cost microphone that includes a military-grade locking hard-shell case, thus allowing access to only the key-holder.  Exactly who/what is this case designed to protect/prevent?  If you are concerned about the sanctity of your microphone, perhaps simply take it with you?  It is not so large/heavy as to preclude easy transport?  Rather, I feel like what we have here is the superimposition of two previously unrelated concepts: the microphone, on one hand, and an intense concern with property rights on the other.

I can’t tell you from whence this artifact originates, as there is little information online concerning its heritage, but Peavey Corp does offer this download (PVM_38i) regarding a very similar model; the date of that document is 1993.  I can vaguely recall seeing these mics for sale at the local mom+pop when I was a kid; late 80s, early 90s; and the box made a strong impression: at least to a child, the effect was ‘wow that must be a rad mic if such intense security surrounds it at all moments.’   The semantic chain here is the ever popular Security/indicates/Economic Value/indicates/Quality.   But then what happens when one learns that the object in fact has a low cost, as these mics no doubt did?  Do we still make an easy leap from Security to Quality?  Oh Peavey.  The mysteries you hold.

While the precise semiotic operation of the Peavey PVM38 and its associated flotsam (IE,, case+key) may remain a subject of debate, we can fairly readily assess the object’s quality.  Yup it’s time for yet another SHURE SM57 vs SOME UNPOPULAR OLD MIC test.  Here’s a single acoustic fingerpicked guitar performance; mics are positioned as shown above; levels are matched exactly.  No processing whatsoever was applied, other than digitally increasing the levels to full level.  The Peavey’s output is approximately 2.5 db hotter than the SM57.  Take a listen:

First, the SM57: ShureSM57_ref

..and now the PVM38: Peavey_PVM38

My $0.02: The sound is pretty similar.  The Peavey seems to have less boxiness/low mids, a pretty similar pickup pattern, and a little less accuracy/detail in the very high end.  Overall it has a bit of that ‘budget mic’ sound but the high output is a plus.   I would imagine that the PVM38 would probably make a decent live vocal mic for rock vocals, and probably good for under-snare as well.  Certainly worth the $15 that I paid.

]]> https://www.preservationsound.com/dont-touch/feed/ 4 https://www.preservationsound.com/low-budget-ribbon-mic-listening-session/ https://www.preservationsound.com/low-budget-ribbon-mic-listening-session/#comments Thu, 05 Jan 2012 06:04:29 +0000 http://www.preservationsound.com/?p=3799 In several of my previous posts I have expressed my love for the humble Ribbon Microphone.  Ribbon mics were invented in the early 1920s and they have remained pretty much the same in the majority of cases.  They remain one of the simplest ways that sound pressure can be reliably changed to an electrical signal.  When I started recording music in the early 90s, ribbon mics were not very popular.  Classic models like the RCA 44 and RCA 77 were still often used in major studios, but home recordists and smaller studios with some budget were much more likely to use Neumann and AKG condensers and the classic Shure and Sennheiser dynamic mics.   Aside from the Beyerdynamic ribbons (and the elusive Fostex ribbons) there just weren’t any new ribbon mics readily available.  At some point in the early 2000s this situation changed dramatically and there are now a good variety of new ribbon mics available at all points in the pricing spectrum, from $60 up to several thousands dollars.  I regularly use a variety of mid-and-upper-range ribbons in the studio, and I have also found myself in possession of a few of the cheap ‘budget’ ribbons currently on the market.  In this previous post, I went so far as to replace the output transformer in the $69 MXL R40 with a better ($23) transformer and the results seemed promising.  Anyways…  seemed like it might be a good idea to do a quick test and find out just how the el-cheapo ribbon mics compare with a thousand-dollar unit.  Cos you never know until you try…

In the image above, you can see (CW from upper left): the $1,300 Royer 121, the $59 Nady RSM-4 (n.b.: now $79), the $92 MXL R40 ($69+ $23 for an EDCOR output transformer) and the $220 Shinybox 2.   We set up all four mics on shockmounts in a cluster about 8 feet in front of a drum kit at Gold Coast Recorders.  The kit was a sixites Ludwig 22/16/12 with a 14×5 wood snare; cymbals are dark sixties Zildjians and the heads on the drums were all fresh.

Above: preamp gains required to deliver equal levels off each of the four mics:  Royer is at 6.5, Fathead II is at 7, MXL is at 6, and Nady is at 7.

Each mic went direct into an identical Sytek mic preamp and then right into the Lynx Aurora convertor.  No other processing was used.  Mic preamp gains were set to show the same level in pro tools.  Tim Walsh, a fine drummer and recordist, delivered a compelling drum performance and then we listened to the results.   This is obviously not a scientific test, and you might not even be personally inclined to use a mono ribbon mic as a front mic on a drum kit; that being said, a drum kit produces the most dynamic range and the greatest range of frequencies of any instrument, so it seems like a good way to get a quick handle on what one mic sounds like versus another mic.

Here are the audio files.  They are MP3s, but you can still get a pretty good sense of the sound.  Try to listen with good headphones or a system with real low-end; you will hear tremendous differences.

Royer 121: Royer_121

Fathead II:Fathead_II

MXL R40 with EDCOR Transformer: MXL_R40_w_edcorTrans

Nady RSM4: Nady_RSM4

Out thoughts were as follows:

Royer 121: Sound is tight.  Low end seems understated.  The kick drum barely activated the sub in the GCR control room.  Seems like some low end is not being reproduced.  On the plus side, this mic brought out the body of the snare best.  The snare felt much more three-dimensional.  There was a good overall balance of kick, snare and hat.  The noise floor was very low, barely over the noise floor of the (very quiet) preamp and convertor.

Fathead II: HUGE sub-bass.  Exaggerated, in fact.  The low end that you hear here was not present in the room when we made this recording. That being said, it sounded good.   Somehow this mic is adding a ton of very low end.  The high end is also slightly hyped – the cymbals have more shimmer.  The snare seems to have no body – the snares themselves are prominent but the tone of the shell is missing.  The toms sound much more prominent and present with this mic.  Noise-wise, it is pretty quiet, although there is a very very slight hum – sounds like 60hz.

MXL R40 w/ EDCOR transformer: Much more bass response than the Royer, although this sub-bass is deeper in pitch and less prominent in level than the Fathead II produced.  The kick feels very present and in-your-face; the rest of the kit feels like it’s on a slightly different plane further back.  Noise-wise this mic was the best: it is absolutely dead quiet.

Nady RSM4: This seemed to split the difference between the Royer and the MXL.  The Nady puts the cymbals much more forward then the other mics.  Noise-wise this mic was by far the worst, with a prominent 180 hz hum present.

Listen closely and draw your own conclusions.  My takeaway: the modded MXL R40 is gaining a permanent place in the studio mic locker, along side ribbons costing as much as 20x its modest price.  And I am not going to be putting the Royer on any source that needs to deliver real low-end in a mix.

You can buy all of these mics online at a variety of retailers.  I purchased my Royer at Vintage King, the Fathead II came from Sonic Circus, the Nady and the MXL were both purchased from Musician’s Friend.  FYI I have no idea if these places offer the lowest price or not.

UPDATE: since this article seems to get an enormous number of pageviews, I thought I should mention that we did in fact carry-out the intended shoot-out of the mod’d R40 versus a range of other similar ribbons (with a Royer R121 as the ‘control’ sample.  CLICK HERE to listen to some apples-to-apples action.

I love the sound of ribbon mics.  Friends and clients will often ask me why, or ‘what’s the difference’ (b/w a ribbon and other forms of mics) and I generally reply that good ribbon mics seem, to my ears/brain, to reproduce sound in a way that more closely resembles the actual event.  To my ears, a good condenser like my U87 or U47 FET sound fantastic – more spectacular than the actual sonic event, in many cases – and a good dynamic mic like a 441 or an SM7 can really improve the sound of an electric guitar speaker – but there are ways that they do seem distorted, especially on material with complex, aggressive high-frequency content, such as cymbals played with a heavy touch.  Ribbon mics also seem to respond better to additive EQ, and on bass instruments they also seem to create the impression of bigger, fuller bass without actually taking up as many DBs in the mix as you might expect.  Anyhow, I keep writing ‘seem’ because all of this is, necessarily, subjective.  That being said, these are opinions that more and more recordists and musicians have come to share since ribbon mics came back into vogue a decade or so ago.

FOLLOW THE LINK BELOW TO READ-ON AND LEARN HOW TO MAKE YRSELF A REAL-NICE SOUNDING RIBBON MIC IN 45 MINUTES FOR UNDER $100…

Although condenser microphones were actually invented a few years before the first ribbon mics, ribbon mics are interesting in that they really haven’t changed in design since the 1920s.  Whereas today’s garden-variety condenser mics are much more sophisticated and hi-fi than their 1920s ancestors. A standard ribbon mic consists of a physical body or shell, a thin metal ribbon suspended in a metal frame alongside a magnets, an output transformer and output jack.  That’s really it in most cases.  And with these very few elements, sound can be turned into electricity with incredible realism.

Royer Labs claims to have been responsible for starting the uptick in popularity that ribbons have seen since the millenium; their R-121 was introduced in 1998 and sure enough it’s a great microphone.  I’ve owned one for years and yeah I use it on pretty much every session.  It sounds great, it has a lot of output, it’s very small, and it has survived a few 4-ft drops onto the oak with no ill effects.  It’s a very good product, if a little overpriced IMO (check out the Shinybox 46MXL for a mic that’s 98% as good for 40% the price of the Royer; I’ve used my 46MXL on sessions with my Royer for years).   Also shockingly good: the Cascade Fathead Two.  I bought one of these a few years back just to see what the fuss was all about, and while it’s not going to replace my Royer, or my vintage Beyer, Shure, and RCA ribbons anytime soon, it’s really pretty remarkable for a $200 microphone.  One caveat: with no apparent cause, my Fathead II has developed a slight slack ribbon which causes an audible rattle if the mic stand is bumped hard.  Now, realistically, if a mic stand gets bumped, you prolly have a bigger sound-problem than a rattle -40db below program level but it’s important to mention. 

Ok but let’s say you don’t have even $200 to spend on a microphone.  I sure didn’t when I started taking recording-studio classes in college.  There are a number of cheaper alternatives to the Fathead II, and I’ve tried many of them over the years, driven mainly by curiosity.  Mics in this category that I cannot recommend: The Nady RSM4.  Chalky, low output.   The Oktava ML52 (expensive now, but these were intially as cheap as $150 at GC): just awful.  So when I got some sort of promo-mailer from Musician’s Friend touting the “MXL R40 Ribbon Mic $59.99” (still avail for $69.99).  I figured: what the hell.  Worst case scenario, I’m buying a sixty dollar shockmount.

So the mic came and it didn’t suck.  The output level was not so good but the sound was cool in a midrange-y, vintage-LP sorta way.  Way, way better then the Nady.  But not a very modern-sounding mic, so application would be limited.  You read some other folks’ assessment of the stock R40 at this link.

I remembered that EDCOR made a 1:37 ribbon mic transformer that only cost $23 and promised perfect frequency response.  I ordered one along with some other bits and bobs that I needed from America’s premier manufacturer of low-cost audio transformers, and a month later it arrived: the RMX1  (see here for spec sheet: RMX1).

EDCOR makes some great products, and some not so great.  Search for EDCOR on this site and you can see many, many opinions of mine regarding their various wares.  That being said, I am a big supporter of theirs, because the products are all made in America, carefully packaged, well supported, and really an incredible bargain if you use them correctly.  As for the RMX-1: I am giving this product the full two thumbs up.  WOW what a difference it makes in the MXL R40.  Here’s how I did it:

With 8 turns-of-the-wrist the R40 opens up to reveal a 4-point terminal board positioned above a transformer housing.  Above, two wires extend from the head (these be the two ends of the ribbon, I imagine…) into the body cavity.

Here’s the reverse view.  This is the original factory transformer.  It has two primary wires and two secondary wires.  The EDCOR RMX1 is EXACTLY the same size and fit in pretty easily once I removed some of the shrink-tubing that EDCOR used to protect the exiting wires.  Other than removing some of the shrink tubing and re-securing the wires with electrical tape there was no mechanical work to be done.  Simple.

The wire color-codes on the EDCOR don’t match the colors on the stock transformer, so I drew the above schematics in my super-embarassing ten-yr-old-boy handwriting.  Feel free to laugh at my apparent total lack of fine motor control.  ANYway, that’s about it.  Sub the new trans in for the old, solder the wires to the correct places on the terminal board, and yr done.

Here’s how it sounds, recorded right into ye olde MBOX2.  You are hearing a solo finger-picked acoustic-guitar performance of a gospel classic.  Put on some decent headphones and take a listen.  First, the original transformer, with 4.6 db of gain digitally added (no other processing whatsoever):

LISTEN TO ORIG TRANS WITH 4.6 DB ADDED: MXL R40 Original Transformer plus4pt6db

…and after I did the modification, which took 45 minutes…  here I am with a 2nd performance, same mic position, same input level on the MBOX, etc…  but with no gain added:

LISTEN TO EDCOR TRANS: MXL R40 Edcor Transformer

Was this test scientific?  No.  I could have been a little off-position for the 2nd take.  I could have played a little harder.  Sure.  But this is a dramatic difference.   It feels like there is a whole additional octave both top and bottom with the EDCOR;  it also sounds smoother and more polished.  Plus I had to add 4.6 db of gain to get the original transformer take at the same average program level.  That means that the mic’s output with the EDCOR is around 50% louder in volume.   These are substantial improvements for an easy-to-install $23 part.

If I ever get the chance, I will do some sort of listening-test in the studio with this modded MXL, the Fathead II, the Shinybox, and the Royer.  Don’t hold yr breath on that one tho…

Further Reading

Michael Joly (ribbon microphone upgrade service-for-hire) ***

DIY Ribbon Mic Kits and Plans ***

Ribbon Mic Rennaisanse coverage in the popular press (c/o WIRED)

( *** n.b: I have no experience with these companies/services, but it’s interesting reading at the least)

PREVIOUS RIBBON MIC COVERAGE ON PRESERVATIONSOUND DOT COM:

Vintage RCA Ribbon Mics (the standard in professional American ribbon mics)

The American R331 (an obscure American ribbon mic from circa ’50)

Altec made a great number of different microphone models in the 1950s and 1960s.  A certain few of these are still widely used in recording studios today: most notably the 639 ‘Birdcage’ dual-element microphone (see here and here) and their various small diaphragm ‘Laboratory’ condensers (see here, here, and here).

During this period Altec also made a variety of conventional-looking dynamic microphones, some of which have quite good specs on paper.  Today we’ll be having a listen to the Altec 682, 683, and 684.

I’ve prepared three stereo audio tracks which all document an identical solo guitar performance which we tracked in the big room at Gold Coast Recorders.   In each of the three tracks, you will hear a new-ish Shure SM57 in the left speaker, and the selected Altec mic in the right speaker.  I chose an SM57 as a reference because it is a microphone that most of us are very familiar with and it is often used to mic electric guitar amps.  I placed the mics a big further back than I would generally use a dynamic-mic on a guitar amp in order to minimize any differences that might result from the slight variation in mic placement in relation to the amplifier.  All signals were taken from the microphone into identical Sytek mic preamps and then directly into Aurora Lynx convertors and into Protools.  No processing whatsoever was used other than minimal Digidesign MAXIM on the bounce-buss to ensure strong playback level; it was taking off 0.3db at most.

Levels were matched initially by running a 1K tone into the guitar amplifier and then fine-tuned on playback to within the tightest possible margin.  The 684 Omni required 30% more gain to reach an equal level; the other three mics were within 5% or so of each other in terms of output.

Alright now that you’ve seen the setup, here is the audio:

SM57 vs Altec 682: SM57L_682R

SM57 vs Altec 683: SM57L_683R

SM57 vs Altec 684: SM57L_684R

Have a listen and draw your own conclusions.  My quick assessment: the 682 sounds pretty similar to the 57, but IMO a lot prettier, a lot more detailed, and just more presentable in general.  The 683 sounds thinner than the 57; bass is notably lacking and there is an aggressive character to the mids.   Not sure that I would ever select this mic for anything.  The 684 sounds like… an omni mic, so it’s not a valid comparison to a 57, but it does sound pretty decent as an omni.  Might make a good under-snare microphone.

All of these forgotten Altecs are available cheaply on eBay from time to time.  I’ve never come across one at a flea market or swap meet, though, so I don’t think they are very common.  From what I can tell from my limited sample-pool, the ‘A’ designation after the model-number indicates that the mic uses an XLR5 (rather than the current standard XLR3) connector.  If you get one of these ‘A’ designated mics, you will need to find an XLR 5 female jack.  Wire an adapter to XLR 3 as follows: (XLR5:XLR3) 1:1, 2:3, 4:2.   The ‘B’ designated mics seem to have our current-standard XLR3 jacks.  Again, I am not 100% about this distinction, so check closely before buying if you don’t wanna be soldering adapters.

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