Sessions With Slau

I’ve used a few different vocal mics on George Hrab over the years. Most often, I’ve turned to the Audio-Technica AT4033/SE. Now that we’re in the middle of recording his sixth album, I figured I’d do a little vocal mic shootout and thought it might be fun to get some opinions of the listeners. Now, of course, in this mp3 of the podcast, the differences between the mics will be less pronounced but, for those who wish to download and import files into their DAW, 24-bit WAV files can be downloaded below. They’re all in sync so one can just line them up and A-B. In alphabetical order, the mics featured are: AKG C-1000S, medium diaphragm condenser Apex 460, large diaphragm tube condenser (modified) Audio-technica AT4033/SE, large diaphragm condenser Cascade C-77, ribbon Heil PR-40, large element moving coil Mojave Audio MA-200, large diaphragm tube condenser Neumann TLM-103, large diaphragm condenser Oktava MK-219, large diaphragm condenser (modified by Oktavamod) If you’d like to play along at home, the individual WAV files are available on this page: We’ll tally up the results of listeners’ preferences and announce them on next week’s Geologic Podcast. In the meantime, if you’d like to know the identities of each microphone, I’ll post a comment revealing them in the next few days.

The Nady RSM-3 is a ribbon microphone sort of, kind of, almost resembling, well, very much resembling the legendary Royer R-121 ribbon microphone. It's now discontinued but, while it was on the market, Royer was compelled to send Nady a "cease & desist" letter due to its uncanny resemblance to the R-121 and its incorporation of the R-121's asymmetrical polar pattern response. I found a pair of RSM-3s on EBay for around $99 each and decided to have them modified by Michael Joly at Oktavamod (http://www.oktavamod.com). He re-tensioned the sagging ribbons and swapped out the stock transformers for Lundahl 2912s. The results were quite impressive. I mentioned the fact that it's sometimes possible to hear a sagging ribbon touching the mesh in a damaged microphone. I neglected to say that this is true only when wearing headphones. To test a microphone for such a symptom, plug the mic in and turn up the preamp gain. While monitoring through headphones, gently sway the mic back and forth on axis. Normally, you should hear nothing more than a low-level rumble from air movement. If you hear a metallic clanging, chances are you have a sagging ribbon. It is, of course, possible to remove the grill and protective material to examine the ribbon visually. Of course, one should be extra careful when undertaking such an inspection. Take extra care to avoid the slightest blast of air and keep the ribbon motor and magnets clear of any surfaces that might contain dust or iron particles. BTW, although the RSM-3 is no longer available from Nady, they can certainly still be found on EBay. The original RSM-3 with the offset ribbon (yielding the asymmetrical frequency response) came in a wooden box. Nady later changed the design to be symmetrical and shipped in a plastic box. Currently, the RSM-5, which is the same as the RSM-3 but with a different body, is still available from Nady. Oktavamod offers a modification for the RSM-5 as well. Keep in mind, Royer offers an extraordinary warranty on their products which come at a premium but, nevertheless, they are phenomenally great microphones. With Nady, well, let's just say that one should check the product immediately to verify that it works. Yeah, it's pretty much hit or miss some of the time. I believe Nady has a policy of replacing defective microphones within a limited time (possibly 90 days or so). In my opinion, however, if the intention is to obtain a Nady ribbon mic and have it modified by Michael Joly, well then, a sagging ribbon need not be of concern. If you can afford an R-121, by all means, go for it. If you're on a tight budget, a modified ribbon microphone might just be the ticket for you. The RSM-3 product page from Nady: http://www.nady.com/RSM3_mics_pg.html The R-121 product page from Royer: http://www.royerlabs.com/R-121.html

I tore myself away from Twitter long enough to put this one together... (tweet, tweet) My dear friend, George Hrab, called me to book a quick session to record a song called, "Far." This was an expanded version of a jingle that he had been asked to write for the 365 Days of Astronomy Podcast. We banged the whole thing out in a few hours and he subsequently made a video of the tune which you can find either on YouTube at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dF2HG1PVZok or on Blip.TV at: http://blip.tv/file/1768264 Belated special thanks to a few people on the show: Donna Mugavero of Sheerbrick Studio (a.k.a. Ms. Information) for designing the Sessions With Slau banner and for insisting that the site be neat and clean. You can find her on Twitter at @MsInformation or check out her blog David Jackson of Cooler Websites for helping me put together the podcast through his Podcast Fast Pass program which allows me to concentrate on just creating the content and slowly get my feet wet with the whole WordPress and RSS universe. Tony Corso for his voice-over on the podcast intro. We recorded a bunch of stuff so I'm sure you'll hear more of him in the future. Audrey Farolino (my lovely wife) for doing the "Sessions With Slau.com" tag at the end. She insisted that I let her do another take but, I swear, her first take was perfect. Thanks so much for the comments and e-mails. You can always reach me at: slau { at } sessionswithslau { dot } com and you can often find me tweeting by following @slaubesharp http://www.sessionswithslau.com Watch the George Hrab Video "Far"

I was looking around for a new vocal microphone for myself. Of course, anything I'd buy for my own purposes would undoubtedly benefit my clients as an extra option when acheter cialis recording them. I always wondered whether it would be worth a $10,000 investment to find a used Neumann U 47 or something in that class of mics. Would it be impressive? Without question, it most certainly would be. Would it sound better than what I already had at my disposal? Hmm... I guess you'll have to listen to the episode to get an idea. I booked some time at Legacy Recording (which has since closed its 37th Street location). We recorded 7 mics into a Pro Tools HD system through a Millennia Media HV3D. The tracks were unlabeled and I had the engineer make a list of the tracks and their respective mics on a piece of paper. I didn't know the results of the shootout until having heard the tracks at the end of the session. Back at BeSharp, I added a few mics to the shootout using the same accompaniment track and recorded the additional mics through an Hv3D. So, the second round of mics weren't recorded in the same room (actually, a bigger room than at Legacy) but it was all done in relatively close proximity in cardioid mode on all mics. The lineup: Neumann U 47 Neumann U 87 http://www.neumann.com Sony C-800G http://www.sony.com AKG C-12VR http://www.akg.com Rode Classic II http://www.rodemicrophones.com Audio-technica AT 4047 http://www.audio-technica.com Mojave Audio MA-200 http://www.mojaveaudio.com Rode K2 http://www.rodemicrophones.com Apex Electronics 460 http://www.apexelectronics.com Studio Projects T3 http://www.studioprojects.com Cascade Microphones Elroy http://www.cascademicrophones.com Yeah, it's a little "apples & oranges" but I was just curious how a $1,000 mic would stack up against something ten times the price. Very interesting... Hey, believe it or not, I'm finally on Twitter. If you'd like to follow me, search for slaubesharp I promise I won't tweet too much -- just studio and audio-releated stuff.

Jordan Potter (originally from Texas) had recorded at BeSharp a few years ago with his two Sisters, Lauren and Leigh. He was referred to me by the John Marshall family and I guess he was a satisfied customer because I got a call from him again, , booking some time to do two albums in just one week. He was bringing his friend, Matthew Conrad, a trumpet player from Baltimore. Matthew and Jordan would each do their own solo albums with Jordan accompanying Matthew on his album and Matthew making a guest appearance on Jordan's solo piano album. I had a pair of Neumann TLM-103s on the piano (which I had used on Jordan's previous project. For Matthew, I set up four mics and we did a quick shootout while soundchecking. I set up a Mojave Audio MA200 (large diaphragm tube condenser), an upgraded Cascade Fat Head (ribbon), an Apex 205 (ribbon) and a Heil PR-40 (large element moving coil). Without telling Matthew which one I preferred, I soloed each trumpet mic and he picked the Fat Head (my choice as well -- surprise, surprise). We actually managed to get through all of the material in just over four days. I was practically editing as they were walking out the door but we did complete the project on time. I mixed it and uploaded files for them to approve before mastering both CDs. Jordan released "Jesus Paid It All" and Matthew released "Send the Light" independently. I've seen it around on a few online retailers like Sacred Music http://www.sacredmusic.com and Hyles Publications http://www.hylespublications.com Unfortunately, neither Jordan nor Matthew maintain web sites that I know of. For more information about them and their projects, write to: pianopraises [ at ] gmail [ dot ] com

Taking a break from the insanity of the Winter NAMM show, George Hrab and I sat outside the Anaheim Convention Center one afternoon and pondered the event, the music industry, being a musician, the gear, the booth babes... National Association of Music Merchants: http://www.namm.org George Hrab's sites: http://www.georgehrab.com The Geologic Podcast http://www.geologicpodcast.com The Philadelphia Funk Authority http://www.phillyfunk.com The Musicians Cooler: http://www.musicianscooler.com The Paul Green School of Rock Music: http://www.schoolofrock.com Who in the world were we immitating with those silly Lawrence Welkian voices? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Last_Polka Sessions With Slau http://www.sessionswithslau.com

I had the pleasure of meeting up with many friends and acquaintances at this year's winter NAMM show. Here are a bunch of interviews with some of them. In order of appearance: Bob Heil, Heil Sound http://www.heilsound.com Bob is an absolute legend in the audio business. What an incredibly passionate and dedicated man. He has a ton of great stories to tell and I could just listen all day. He was very generous with his time and I cut a bunch of stuff out of the interview just to make it a little shorter. Extremely nice new drum mic kits from Heil. Check 'em out. Lonya Nenashev, fDW Worldwide (Nievaton) http://www.nevaton-microphones.com I finally had a chance to meet Lonya Nenashev (formerly of Red Square Audio) in person and check out some of the offerings from Nevaton, a Russian microphone manufacturer. This is one of those cases where I wish I had a quiet room in which to audition these impressive looking large diaphragm condensers. I've always been intrigued by Russian-made microphones and these look enticing. They're not very well known in the States... yet. Jed, DPA Microphones http://www.dpamicrophones.com Not surprisingly, DPA wasn't showing their excellent line of studio microphones but rather their new series of mics designed primarily for live instrument miking at a considerably more affordable price point. Doc, Avant Electronics http://www.avantelectronics.com There's something about Avant products that I really like. Everything that I've seen from them so far has been really nice. I just recently purchased a pair of Mix Cubes for the studio and find them to be quite nice. Doc talks about some soon-to-be-released microphone offerings. What kind of a name is Doc? Well, he got that nickname because he was a medic in the Navy. Cool! Dusty Wakeman, Mojave Audio http://www.mojaveaudio.com As a big fan of the Mojave MA-200, I was excited to see a prototype for a stereo version of the LDC called the Ma-202ST which should be out in the next couple of months. For years, I've been trying to track down an earlier LDC tube mic designed by David Royer known as the 747. I've told Dusty that, if Mojave were to put out a new multi-pattern, large diaphragm  condenser, I'd probably buy it sight unseen or, well, unheard. David Royer, Mojave/Royer Labs David seems to me like a cross between a hippie and a scientist. He apparently has a sketchbook filled with ideas and designs. Oh, how I'd love to take a little peek... John Jennings, Royer Labs http://www.royerlabs.com John showed me Royer's new SF-24V stereo tube ribbon mic. Man, if I only had an extra $7,000 laying around. Hmm... Well, for now, I grabbed their much more affordable (actually, free) new demo CD which features clips from multitrack sessions featuring Royer ribbons -- right up my alley! Can't wait to sit down and give a close listen. Paul Erlandson, Lynx Studio Technology, Inc. http://www.lynxstudio.com Paul and I have been missing each other at a few NAMM and AES shows. Well, we finally did catch up and I was really impressed with their interfaces. Maybe we'll manage to get one into the studio to shoot out against some other converters. Gary, Audio-Technica http://www.audio-technica.com

I've only just begun and I already have a "lost episode!" This one was supposed to be in the 100th episode of PSN but... Two of my clients have the same name and couldn't be more different. The John Marshall Family: http://www.johnmarshallfamily.com Unfortunately, the other John Marshall's band, it seems, no longer has a web site. You'll probably see a message saying it's temporarily disabled but, for what it's worth: http://www.wilmaband.com

Welcome to the first episode of "Sessions With Slau." It's a little "getting to know you" session. I talk about how I got into music and audio recording. I don't get too geeky because, well, I'll save that for future installments. Oh, believe me -- I'll get really geeky soon enough. My own personal (very static) web site: http://www.slau.net Unfortunately, there is no web site for Darka & Slavko so, here's a wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darka_%26_Slavko My first (and only -- so far) article in "Sound On Sound" magazine: http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/1995_articles/jan95/datlevels.html?print=yes Sessions With Slau www.sessionswithslau.com Other website mentioned George Hrab Geologic Podcast at http://www.geologicpodcast.com/

Welcome to Episode 0 of sessions with Slau. In this episode you hear the concept of the new podcast as we get ready for the official launch coming shortly. Subscribe via iTunes or standard RSS using the icons on the right.