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Hi mates! Thank you for this very useful forum. I need some help about choosing a mic. I need a tube mic for that warm deeper sound , with fuller picture and less highs. I record rap music with rap artists. But I hear that many of the so called 'tube mics" are not tube because the tube does not affect the sound due to low voltage. Could you suggest some REAL tube mics that I should prefer ?
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I think the mic PREAMP is far more important than having a tube mic. Any good 1" condenser can be improved with a little harmonic saturation. -
Welcome to the forum.
I've had a fair few SE Gemini tube mics through my hands and these have their own dedicated high-voltage supply and are really well-built and have a good guarantee (at least in the UK). A tube doesn't affect the sound as much as you might expect (it's the circuitry either side of the tube and the capsule etc., plus the preamp that influences the sound most), but running at high voltage does improve linearity and headroom, and improves dynamic range.
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xtian, Mick Bailey, Thank you so much for the helpful answers guys! Well I will definitely stress no some good tube preamp. I don't own an tube preamp right now. I did not know that it is so important for the tube sound. Thanks!
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A good preamp makes a big difference. I had a customer with an SSL desk, one of the best around. One of the engineers got hold of an Ampex all-tube tape preamp, which was one of the last 50 made and re branded Accurate Sound. He asked if I could convert it to a mic preamp - not easy because it had all the tape electronics in there and no phantom power. Anyhow, I got it done and they were astonished by how good it sounded and ending up using this as their favourite vocal preamp into that desk, which beforehand nobody thought could be improved on.
Whilst a lot can be done with eq, some preamps have a character of their own and distort in a particular way. An average mic into a good preamp will always beat a good mic into an average preamp.
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