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Post by notneeson on Nov 28, 2017 12:04:08 GMT -6
I started on KM84s and always loved them. Then we closed our shop and joined up with a bigger studio that has KM184s and I started using them when I needed a matched pair. I can make 'em work on lots of stuff.
Then, another place I track got a pair of the Lulu Fets. Have not used them a ton yet, but great first impressions. I see Beesneez has a tube version now— would love to try it.
Now this Soyuz is highly recommended, and the 3u's seem very intriguing. Man, I don't really need more SDCs, but I'm tempted anyway!
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Post by johneppstein on Nov 28, 2017 15:01:59 GMT -6
<facepalm> Seriously, man - 184s are pretty horrible microphones. How Neumann managed to screw that one up nobody seems to know. If you want I can PM you where to reach Klaus and you can ask him. Thats your opinion I know a lot of AE who like the 184.... Seriously to say they screwed it thats BS talk. You dont like it, thats something diffrent. "A lot of AEs" OK. Sure. I believe you. I know a number of AEs who like it, too. It's kinda like SM57s. Or MD421s. A deeply flawed microphone that is nonetheless extremely popular. (I suspect that most of those AEs have not had an opportunity to experience the real thing... The question isn't "how many" AEs. The question is "Who ARE the AEs?" - and the "opinion" is reflected by one very important person in the microphone world who is NOT an AE, in the person of Mr. Klaus Heyne, who is one of the greatest living experts on Neumann microphones. I'll take Klaus's word on pretty much anything related to high end condenser mics over nearly anybody's - but that isn't likely to happen because I've never encountered a situation where anyone on my short list of people whose advice I pay a lot of attention to about microphones has ever really differed much from Klaus. "You dont like it, thats something diffrent." That's a fallacy, the one that says that all "opinions are equal." In this case the 184 is measureably inferior to the 84. There are millions and millions of people whose favorite lunch is a Big Mac. That doesn't make a Big Mac good cuisine or even something good for you to eat. (Disclaimer: I, too, am guilty of consuming the occasional Big Mac - but I don't try to pretend that it's good food. Hey, nobody's perfect.)
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Post by johneppstein on Nov 28, 2017 15:16:32 GMT -6
I started on KM84s and always loved them. Then we closed our shop and joined up with a bigger studio that has KM184s and I started using them when I needed a matched pair. I can make 'em work on lots of stuff. Then, another place I track got a pair of the Lulu Fets. Have not used them a ton yet, but great first impressions. I see Beesneez has a tube version now— would love to try it. Now this Soyuz is highly recommended, and the 3u's seem very intriguing. Man, I don't really need more SDCs, but I'm tempted anyway! Yeah, you can usually make 184s work, they're not THAT bad, but they're not great. The usual joke is that a 184 is just like an 84 but without all the things that make 84s special. It's not the capsule. Capsule's the same. I can usually make Oktava 012s work, too. I'm very intrigued by the Soyuz SDCs, and am waiting to find out what any of my "reference ears" have to say about them compared to the 84. There's a thread running over at Terry Manning's place concerned with SDCs and I made a point of asking - have not seen an answer yet.
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Post by mrholmes on Nov 28, 2017 15:49:16 GMT -6
Hermetech, th Soyuz 0-13 is $600, $1195 for a pair. The 184 sounds fine, it's just disappointing if you have a KM84 to compare though. The low end's missing something in comparison. Thats why GOD invented the EQ...
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Post by Martin John Butler on Nov 28, 2017 18:32:03 GMT -6
Sure, that can help, but it's not quite the same. I thought the KM184 sounds good, just not as good as the original.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 29, 2017 1:56:15 GMT -6
Yeah, I don't think all tonal or textual variations in the sound of different mics can be fixed with EQ, that often just brings more problems to the table, phase etc.
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Post by matt@IAA on Nov 29, 2017 7:45:01 GMT -6
I'm very intrigued by the Soyuz SDCs, and am waiting to find out what any of my "reference ears" have to say about them compared to the 84. There's a thread running over at Terry Manning's place concerned with SDCs and I made a point of asking - have not seen an answer yet. The Su-011 is pretty incredible, especially on acoustic guitar.
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Post by robertg on Nov 29, 2017 8:12:54 GMT -6
The Warbler 127s with the flat cardioid are about as close as you can get to a KM-84 as I have heard on close mic acoustic guitar (both finger pick and flat pick). Myself and another very good engineer couldn’t hear any difference on a good set of monitors. We tried to hear a difference but couldn’t. Distance micing might be a different story.
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Post by Martin John Butler on Nov 29, 2017 8:44:23 GMT -6
Welcome to the forum dodgers and robertg!
I just happened to have a pair of Soyuz-0-13's at the same time I had a mint pair of KM84's here on loan. I've used the 84's on every track of my upcoming album, so I'm very familiar with them. Rather than extoll their many virtues, I'll just say the 0-13 was my preference. It had much more clean gain, and when comparing side by side, it sounded better to me. The 84's have a great quality of sitting in tracks beautifully, especially on very strummy songs, and the 0-13 did too.
At the Soyuz shootout I attended, I preferred the FET 0-13 to their lovely 0-11 SDC's with a tube, but that's just me.
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Post by ragan on Nov 29, 2017 10:08:07 GMT -6
The Warbler 127s with the flat cardioid are about as close as you can get to a KM-84 as I have heard on close mic acoustic guitar (both finger pick and flat pick). Myself and another very good engineer couldn’t hear any difference on a good set of monitors. We tried to hear a difference but couldn’t. Distance micing might be a different story. Very cool, Robert. I remember you describing this when you first got them.
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Post by matt@IAA on Nov 29, 2017 11:33:57 GMT -6
The 127 C flats are kinda halfway between a 184 and 84 if you strictly judge by frequency response. Their low end is almost identical to an 84, but have a bit of a mid lift around 900 and a dip at 2k that is unique to them. In the 7k range they are closer to the 184, but the top is more like the 84.
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Post by johneppstein on Nov 29, 2017 12:55:51 GMT -6
The 127 C flats are kinda halfway between a 184 and 84 if you strictly judge by frequency response. Their low end is almost identical to an 84, but have a bit of a mid lift around 900 and a dip at 2k that is unique to them. In the 7k range they are closer to the 184, but the top is more like the 84. Well, that rules that out.
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Post by stormymondays on Nov 29, 2017 12:56:16 GMT -6
I don't own an 84 yet, but I wish there was a mic that absolutely nailed its low end on an acoustic guitar. I'm only familiar with it via online demos and shootouts, but I can only define it as "glorious". I'm always rooting for the underdog/clone to win, but alas, no luck. For "close enough" I already have my Joly-modded Oktava 012. I guess one day I'll have to bite the bullet and get the real thing...
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Post by johneppstein on Nov 29, 2017 13:06:20 GMT -6
What I'm interested in is a mic that has perfect off-axis response and works well on everything. What I'm not interested in is "modern" voicing, hyped top end, or any of that stuff. I've seen a lot of testimonials about the Soyuz on this site but not anywhere else that I really pay attention to. Most of what I've seen here relates to acoustic guitar, which is nice as far as it goes, but doesn't go far enough. Has anyone tried them for orchestral use, for example? String quartets? Acoustic (traditional) bluegrass? Dixieland jazz?
And yes, distance micing is pretty important, as these days I try to avoid (typical) close micing on most things that aren't guitar amps.
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Post by ragan on Nov 29, 2017 13:23:18 GMT -6
What I'm interested in is a mic that has perfect off-axis response and works well on everything. What I'm not interested in is "modern" voicing, hyped top end, or any of that stuff. I've seen a lot of testimonials about the Soyuz on this site but not anywhere else that I really pay attention to. Most of what I've seen here relates to acoustic guitar, which is nice as far as it goes, but doesn't go far enough. Has anyone tried them for orchestral use, for example? String quartets? Acoustic (traditional) bluegrass? Dixieland jazz? And yes, distance micing is pretty important, as these days I try to avoid (typical) close micing on most things that aren't guitar amps. Well you should definitely make sure your rigid dogma stays intact and prevents you from trying nice, new mics from solid new designers whenever someone on the internet includes the numbers 1, 8 and 4 in a random post.
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Post by Martin John Butler on Nov 29, 2017 13:43:05 GMT -6
What I'm interested in is a mic that has perfect off-axis response and works well on everything. What I'm not interested in is "modern" voicing, hyped top end, or any of that stuff. I've seen a lot of testimonials about the Soyuz on this site but not anywhere else that I really pay attention to. Most of what I've seen here relates to acoustic guitar, which is nice as far as it goes, but doesn't go far enough. Has anyone tried them for orchestral use, for example? String quartets? Acoustic (traditional) bluegrass? Dixieland jazz? And yes, distance micing is pretty important, as these days I try to avoid (typical) close micing on most things that aren't guitar amps. I think you need to try the Chandler REDD mic, it fits your description perfectly. It has the best off-axis response I've ever heard, and it sounds better from further away than any mic I've used. If it's in your budget, it sells itself when you use it.
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Post by johneppstein on Nov 29, 2017 14:04:42 GMT -6
What I'm interested in is a mic that has perfect off-axis response and works well on everything. What I'm not interested in is "modern" voicing, hyped top end, or any of that stuff. I've seen a lot of testimonials about the Soyuz on this site but not anywhere else that I really pay attention to. Most of what I've seen here relates to acoustic guitar, which is nice as far as it goes, but doesn't go far enough. Has anyone tried them for orchestral use, for example? String quartets? Acoustic (traditional) bluegrass? Dixieland jazz? And yes, distance micing is pretty important, as these days I try to avoid (typical) close micing on most things that aren't guitar amps. Well you should definitely make sure your rigid dogma stays intact and prevents you from trying nice, new mics from solid new designers whenever someone on the internet includes the numbers 1, 8 and 4 in a random post. Rigid dogma? Really? What I need is a mic (couple of mics) that do what I need them to do. I don't really need more mics that don't do what I need them to do. I already have dozens of those. A lot of them are good for one thing or another. Some of them really aren't. Some are great one trick ponys. Right now I cannot afford to run out and buy any mic that catches my eye - I wish I could, but I can't. And these days I'm interested in quality when it comes to mics. Is this so difficult to understand? I'm looking for something with specific charactertistics. It would be nice to find something with those characteristics that's a current model. I am not currently looking for mics that DON'T have those characteristics. There are other mics that have other specific chacteristics that I'm interested in, but right now they're out of my reach financially. And I'm a self-admitted mic snob. I have drawers FULL of mics that "do the job" but which are not stellar. I'm looking for stellar. I'm also very sensitive to characteristics in the upper midrange and treble. Aberrations in that range tend to drive me up a tree. Which means that I don't like "modern voiced", bright mics as a general rule. They're like fingernails on a blackboard or rubbing a balloon to me. If I need to add brightness I have plenty of knobs for that, I don't want it baked into the mic. I'm perfectly happy to try out nice new mics. I generally expect a tryout period of a couple of weeks to a month to evaluate the purchase. If I find that I like the mic enough to not want to send it back I'll figure out some way to pay for it, even if it means paying off a card for months or a year. I'm not interested in buying a mic, trying it for a couple months, and selling it at a loss. (As a general rule I don't sell microphones, even if I'm not fond of them.) But right now there are specific things I'm interested in. Is that OK with you?
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Post by johneppstein on Nov 29, 2017 14:08:48 GMT -6
What I'm interested in is a mic that has perfect off-axis response and works well on everything. What I'm not interested in is "modern" voicing, hyped top end, or any of that stuff. I've seen a lot of testimonials about the Soyuz on this site but not anywhere else that I really pay attention to. Most of what I've seen here relates to acoustic guitar, which is nice as far as it goes, but doesn't go far enough. Has anyone tried them for orchestral use, for example? String quartets? Acoustic (traditional) bluegrass? Dixieland jazz? And yes, distance micing is pretty important, as these days I try to avoid (typical) close micing on most things that aren't guitar amps. I think you need to try the Chandler REDD mic, it fits your description perfectly. It has the best off-axis response I've ever heard, and it sounds better from further away than any mic I've used. If it's in your budget, it sells itself when you use it. Yes, the Redd is another thing I'm very interested in, but for different purposes. The problem with the Redd is that I'd be paying off a credit card for a long time. And there's no way I could afford more than one. If my financial situation improves it's pretty high on my list.
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Post by ragan on Nov 29, 2017 14:28:56 GMT -6
Well you should definitely make sure your rigid dogma stays intact and prevents you from trying nice, new mics from solid new designers whenever someone on the internet includes the numbers 1, 8 and 4 in a random post. Rigid dogma? Really? What I need is a mic (couple of mics) that do what I need them to do. I don't really need more mics that don't do what I need them to do. I already have dozens of those. A lot of them are good for one thing or another. Some of them really aren't. Some are great one trick ponys. Right now I cannot afford to run out and buy any mic that catches my eye - I wish I could, but I can't. And these days I'm interested in quality when it comes to mics. Is this so difficult to understand? I'm looking for something with specific charactertistics. It would be nice to find something with those characteristics that's a current model. I am not currently looking for mics that DON'T have those characteristics. There are other mics that have other specific chacteristics that I'm interested in, but right now they're out of my reach financially. And I'm a self-admitted mic snob. I have drawers FULL of mics that "do the job" but which are not stellar. I'm looking for stellar. I'm also very sensitive to characteristics in the upper midrange and treble. Aberrations in that range tend to drive me up a tree. Which means that I don't like "modern voiced", bright mics as a general rule. They're like fingernails on a blackboard or rubbing a balloon to me. If I need to add brightness I have plenty of knobs for that, I don't want it baked into the mic. I'm perfectly happy to try out nice new mics. I generally expect a tryout period of a couple of weeks to a month to evaluate the purchase. If I find that I like the mic enough to not want to send it back I'll figure out some way to pay for it, even if it means paying off a card for months or a year. I'm not interested in buying a mic, trying it for a couple months, and selling it at a loss. (As a general rule I don't sell microphones, even if I'm not fond of them.) But right now there are specific things I'm interested in. Is that OK with you? You bet, knock yourself out. But when you write off mics you’ve never heard because someone randomly associated some portion of their frequency response with some mic you’ve got a loud, personal vendetta against, I might flip ya a little shit for it. That’s all
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Post by Martin John Butler on Nov 29, 2017 15:00:05 GMT -6
notneeson, I heard the Beezneez Lulu in a good studio shootout agains the Soyuz 0-11 and the 0-13. It was no contest, the 0-13 was the pick of twenty pros blind.
The Lulu had an incredibly interesting highly colored sound though, very dark. That said, if you wanted that sound, it was incredibly unique. I could imagine it on a John Cale or Leonard Cohen record or better yet, Nick Cave.
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Post by malkit on Nov 29, 2017 15:11:38 GMT -6
Friends,
FWIW, I've had an ongoing session with a tabla (indian percussion) and sitar player, and the 3u 127 mics have been really shining. I've tried a host of mics and combos in the past, but this surpasses- by a good stretch- both in sound and simplicity of setup
The tabla is actually two drums- a treble and a bass. My best configuration used to be an oktava mk12 on treble and a good ldc on bass. Now, I find that the 127s in parallel or xy mode capture the full picture- velvety bass and highs.
The artists aren't ready to share the recordings, but once we're further along- I'll post up a few small clips for taste. They are really happy with the sounds we've been getting.
I'll report back more as I continue to use these.
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Post by matt@IAA on Nov 29, 2017 15:45:28 GMT -6
The 127 C flats are kinda halfway between a 184 and 84 if you strictly judge by frequency response. Their low end is almost identical to an 84, but have a bit of a mid lift around 900 and a dip at 2k that is unique to them. In the 7k range they are closer to the 184, but the top is more like the 84. Well, that rules that out. For what it's worth when you phase cancel them with an 84 you get almost null. The differences are very slight. I haven't done this with a 184. All I know is they're my new favorite drum overheads.
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Post by johneppstein on Nov 29, 2017 16:17:10 GMT -6
But when you write off mics you’ve never heard because someone randomly associated some portion of their frequency response with some mic you’ve got a loud, personal vendetta against, I might flip ya a little shit for it. That’s all He didn't just say "It reminds me of a 184". He gave a semi-detailed evaluation that went somewhat beyond that and it's obvious that it just is not what I'm looking for, which is a mic that's as close to a KM84 as possible. I need off axis response that is the same as on axis. I don't want a "sculpted" or hyped frequency response and he described in some detail how the response is indeed sculpted and somewhat hyped. Ergo, it's not what I'm looking for. When I'm not so strapped for cash sometimes I've been known to impulse buy mics. Unfortunately right now I AM really strapped for cash and can't afford to just go around buying mics I don't KNOW without either a loaner period or some very solid recommendations from a short list of people whose word I've come to trust. I just can't afford it. As a general rule I don't sell microphones, even ones I'm not deeply enamored of. You never know, it might be useful for something, sometime. For a mic to be so bad I'd want to get rid of it I probably wouldn't be willing to sell it because I'd feel guilty for taking advantage of the poor sucker I'd stuck with it.
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Post by johneppstein on Nov 29, 2017 16:35:18 GMT -6
notneeson, I heard the Beezneez Lulu in a good studio shootout agains the Soyuz 0-11 and the 0-13. It was no contest, the 0-13 was the pick of twenty pros blind. The Lulu had an incredibly interesting highly colored sound though, very dark. That said, if you wanted that sound, it was incredibly unique. I could imagine it on a John Cale or Leonard Cohen record or better yet, Nick Cave. Well, it's not something that's high on my list right now, but it sure does sound interesting! Thanks!
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Post by ragan on Nov 29, 2017 18:26:00 GMT -6
But when you write off mics you’ve never heard because someone randomly associated some portion of their frequency response with some mic you’ve got a loud, personal vendetta against, I might flip ya a little shit for it. That’s all He didn't just say "It reminds me of a 184". He gave a semi-detailed evaluation that went somewhat beyond that and it's obvious that it just is not what I'm looking for, which is a mic that's as close to a KM84 as possible. I need off axis response that is the same as on axis. I don't want a "sculpted" or hyped frequency response and he described in some detail how the response is indeed sculpted and somewhat hyped. Ergo, it's not what I'm looking for. When I'm not so strapped for cash sometimes I've been known to impulse buy mics. Unfortunately right now I AM really strapped for cash and can't afford to just go around buying mics I don't KNOW without either a loaner period or some very solid recommendations from a short list of people whose word I've come to trust. I just can't afford it. As a general rule I don't sell microphones, even ones I'm not deeply enamored of. You never know, it might be useful for something, sometime. For a mic to be so bad I'd want to get rid of it I probably wouldn't be willing to sell it because I'd feel guilty for taking advantage of the poor sucker I'd stuck with it. For whatever it's worth, you've also got a couple of people here saying their Warbler 127s are nearly indistinguishable from the KM84s you love. Granted I have no interest in whether or not you like/buy/hate 3U mics. I'm just responding to your stated criteria. Also, Guosheng will always take a mic back if you don't like it. His customer service is ridiculously good. I was once having a weird issue with a Warbler IV where it was distorting when tracking tambourine. Turned out to be just an issue with that one mic, but in the hunt for it, Guosheng bought the exact model of tambourine I was using so he could try it out there at the factory. Again, try, don't try. I've no skin in the game. I just find 3U to offer an exceptionally good product for an exceptionally low price. Across the board thus far, and I've got eight 3U mics in my room.
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