Using Vintage Microphones. Pros and cons of using vintage mics in your recordings....

Vintage Microphones- are they worthwhile?

Pictured: WEBCOR crystal Microphone.

The short answer is yes!

The long answer is obviously longer... so here goes...

Considerations:

1.  Does the microphone function properly?

          If not, fix it!  Or, sell it!  It may be worth a few bucks!

2.  How does the microphone sound?

          Warm, bright, nasally, honky?       

3.  How will the microphone best suit your track?

          Maybe you need a bright/honky sound to cut through a mix!

 It may take some trial and error, but that's the fun part about learning the ins-and-outs of new(old) gear.

Vintage microphones that we come across on a daily basis are by and large either dynamic microphones, with a plastic element(very similar to todays mics) or they are crystal microphones, which have a crystal (ceramic) element.  Other microphones you may run into might be condenser mics or ribbon mics.  The former usually has a gold sputtered plastic diaphram which picks up vibrations from the air and the latter has a thin ribbon of pure aluminum to do the task.  We'll come back to dynamics, condensers and ribbons.  Today let's talk about crystal mics.  

Crystal mics are possibly the most unique, since they are no longer made (realistically)! In the 1960's, as dynamic mics became the standard, crystal mics basically ceased production.  Also, it's important to note that crystal mics have a really high impedance(generally), so they were often used to feed the first stage of  a tube mic preamp- often found on consumer tape recorders and industrial public address systems.  As such, crystal mics may not be "plug and play" with your computer sound card, but if you have a small mixer or other modern preamp with a guitar line in, then you have something to work with.

Crystal mics are now sought after mainly by harp players, since they capture the essential "Vocal range" of the instrument.  These players are generally also mating these mics to tube guitar amps of the same era, which is a natural choice.

I think they can sound really cool on other instruments, and vocals as well!  Of course, you should do thorough testing by using the mic and carefully listening to the results.

Here are a few videos of some mics that I've recorded with, and had great results!

 

 

That is a recording of a Yamaha FG160 dreadnaught guitar, and as you can see I pointed it near the 12th-15th frets of the guitar.  I think it picks up the guitar beautifully.  The bass isn't booming, the string noise isn't overwhelming.  The essence and tone of the guitar are brought forward.  For this application, the mic works!  Mic preamp is a modern "botique" all-in-one-chip style and the mic is plugged into the "Hi-Z/Guitar" input.

And The classic Shure Slim X 777:

The mic is pointed slightly off axis near/toward the cone.  The speaker is a vintage 30 watt alnico.  The amplifier is an all tube 5e3 deluxe clone.  Guitar is a single coil strat type.  This is a relatively quiet demonstration, but that was the tone I was after.  Clean, thick and creamy. So again, for this application- the mic works!  

I'm not sure I would crank this speaker to full clip and record with this vintage (now pricey!)Shure crystal mic pressed against the grill, but I won't hesitate to pull this mic back a bit and pick up a fuller room sound.  Plugged into mic preamp through the hi-z/guitar input.

The same goes for drums.  I think Crystal mics make great room mics to add ambiance to a one or two mic setup.

So, in summary, use those old mics!  Come up with a sound and commit it to tape(or digital)!  It might be exactly what your track needs!

Ampex Reel to Reel, Recording a song to tape RTR

Record a song with a reel to reel recorder...a little bit of how to...

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This is a mix of a song that I recorded using an Ampex Reel to reel tape recorder.   Each take is recorded to one side of the tape machine and subsequently recorded onto my DAW.  Then, all four tracks are bounced back to this stereo tape recorder.  Drums are recorded to one side, rhythm guitar to the other side, and bass guitar and solo are in the center of the stereo image.


This is a fully tube operated unit, and the sound quality is second to none.  It happens to have a mix of vintage tubes, including some Telefunken 12AT7's in the preamps(from my personal stash).

The format is 1/4" half track ,7.5 ips.

This rtr recording was made using direct guitars and bass.

The machine pictured above is a Roberts 192 Ft (which stands for Full Track), 1/4" tape machine.  Like many of the Akai/Roberts tape recorders of the 1960's, this was modeled after the Ampex 600/601 portable recorder.

Though the Akai/Roberts units were popular, they never achieved the reputation as broadcast standard recorders that the Ampex units did.  This model was intended to change that!

The roberts recorder was fitted with full track (mono) erase, record, and playback heads.  Though running at 7.5ips, the fidelity is great.

However, Ampex was committed to quality and through the 50's and 60's, nothing about their tape machines was budget quality.  This changed many year later as they produced consumer format tape machines, but they still offered studio and high end consumer tape recorders in a variety of formats.

Here is one such high end consumer machine, made by the Ampex Professional division!


I love, collect, and use vintage tape recorders...

UPDATE:  Here's a record I made with analog tape as well as some vintage and modern gear, including a stereo tape recorder...Click Below to check it out!

Bandcamp

Here's a great sounding multitrack recorder:

https://www.zzounds.com/a--3960122/item--TASDP006 

Enjoy!

Tascam 414 MkII Portastudio 4 Track Cassette Tape Recorder!

  Four Track Cassette tape recorders!

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Cassette four track recorders, such as the Tascam Portastudio 414 mkII, are still a popular way to record music masters at home (or anywhere!)  This is a multi-track tape recorder, which will record to one of four different channels or "tracks."  After recording guitar, vocals, bass and drums to tape (with your own microphone) you have control over the volume of each track- or mix.  Yamaha, Fostex, and Vestax all made their own versions of multi-track recorders, as well.  I'm not sure there is a "best" one, but maybe there's one with a lot of features you like. 
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Although they are popular for demos or songwriting ideas, in the right hands these machines can produce mixes suitable for widespread release. (Don't forget about the Tascam 424MKii....)

These are sophisticated multitrack devices. They allow you to record one track onto the tape, and then record 3 additional tracks as you monitor back the original track(s).  You can do this one track at a time, or you can do it all at once.  This allows you the ability to control the volume of each source you've recorded.  So, if you record guitar and vocals at once, each to it's own track- you now have the ability to control the volume of each with the track volume faders.

Once you have all four tracks filled, and have mixed them to their approximate volume levels, there is a master volume fader which controls the overall output of the machine.

Here's a video demonstrating the concept, and giving some tutorial about how to basically use the machine.  In the video, an acoustic guitar is recorded to tape using only a cascade ribbon mic.  DBX is on and the tape used is a high bias type, Maxell XLII.  Contrary to popular belief, condensers are not always needed to record acoustic guitar...

This unit features 2 suitable microphone preamps, they are fine- but not great.  Better results can be had with newer, quieter preamps.  It's important to note, however that the mic preamps on this machine are not phantom powered.  So, it will work fine with newer ribbon mics(Cascade or Royer) and dynamic mics (like the shure sm57 or sm58) but it will not power a condenser mic(like the MXL 990 or v67G).  To use a condenser mic with this unit, you'll need to use a preamp/mixer with a phantom power supply, or an inline phantom power supply.

Also, 2 band eq, which comes in handy.  It also features 2 effect sends, which are available on each channel.  So, you could hook up a delay and a reverb and then dial in as much(or as little) as you need.

This recorder also has DBX noise reduction as an option, which nearly eliminates tape hiss on the tracks.  If you find it changes the feel of the tone, you can switch it off for future takes.  One note about dbx on this machine, though.  If it's on, it affects all 4 channels.  So if you record a take and want to turn it off, you have to redo the take, or you'll be left with the weirdness of the dbx encoding on that track.  If you continue to record, you'll have one track that has obvious "effect" and the rest will sound "normal."

My experience with this device is that it is a great tool for singer/songwriters, or small ensembles. This is a narrow track format, and I feel that four tracks on cassette tape at 3.5ips (inches per second) is right at the limit of "great sounding" fidelity (feel free to argue here).  Eight track cassette machines cross the line into "acceptable sounding" fidelity(my opinion!)  That's not to say I don't think they are worth using.  I have heard compelling music come from these machines.  I just prefer the four track fidelity for my work.

That said,  I feel that using four tracks on this format requires some compromises for a large band.  For example, guitar, bass and drums will occupy 3 tracks(or 4, if you give the kick drum it's own mic).  Bouncing that to 1 or 2 tracks means you've lost the ability to mix the instruments independently with the vocals and you will have lost a bit of sound quality from the bounce...

Here's how to get all 4 tracks out of the 414 in one pass:



Less sophisticated versions of this type of machine also exist, such as the Tascam Porta 02 (I think it runs at 1 & 7/8 ips, which is really suited to bare-bones sketchpad-style demos.  But the tapes are really handy to have stored for future listening if you've run out of ideas....

Enjoy your portastudio! 

You can check out more of my music at www.frankolson.com

Welcome to Vintage Music Tech.!

This is a place where we'll be talking about vintage music gear and it's place in the vast music making landscape of today.

Tube gear, reel to reel tape recorders, microphones, preamplifiers- these important bits of gear and how to get the most from them.

In general I shoot demonstration videos, but I'm always happy to talk gear with any interested party!

So here is one to kick it off!


This video is of a microphone preamp that I modified from an old tube reel to reel machine (Roberts 720 or 990, as I recall).

 Also featured in the video is a popular microphone and line mixer- the Mackie 802VLZ3.

This video gives just a quick example of the differences between tube mic preamps, and solid state preamps.  I would say they are approximately equally priced "for their time."

The tube preamp is 100 percent all tube path, including the recctifier tube/ power supply.
Tubes are 12AX7, EF86, and 6x4 (rectifier).

To be honest, I'm not sure about the opamp/chips that the Mackie uses, but it performs well and it has mixer features that the tube preamp doesn't have.

I suggest listening a few times over speakers as well as in headphones to really catch the subtle (and not so subtle) sonic differences of each instance.

The microphone is a Shure SM57.

Enjoy!