llllllllllllllllllll wrote: Tue Apr 16, 2024 8:49 pm Bought an Electro Voicr 658L mic on a whim for very cheap. Anyone familiar?

Ok, the seller can’t find that one so it was canceled.

Got an EV 665 w/ a return policy coming instead

llllllllllllllllllll wrote: Tue Apr 23, 2024 11:08 am

llllllllllllllllllll wrote: Tue Apr 16, 2024 8:49 pm Bought an Electro Voicr 658L mic on a whim for very cheap. Anyone familiar?

Ok, the seller can’t find that one so it was canceled.

Got an EV 665 w/ a return policy coming instead

I had an EV 676 that I loved for vocals. It was kinda thin but rejected monitors very good. We shared a rehearsal space with some industrial band in Chicago and it was one of the many things that "just came up missing". It had a weird cable connector.

llllllllllllllllllll wrote: Mon Apr 15, 2024 7:12 pm

losthighway wrote: Mon Apr 15, 2024 5:56 pm Beesneez B67 (Neumann U67 tube mic clone)

I'm a long way from Australia, but I'm looking forward to this one arriving.

Report back! I’m very interested in those mics

Did some initial explorations after receiving this thing. Little more than a week from Australia to Colorado is pretty damn good customer service.

I've hit a point with mic collection where I have the workhorses pretty well covered so a mic that might actually make a mark in my closet is a big financial stretch. Like it might be the only real gear purchase for a year or more. So I get nervous to find out if these things are worth it.

I put the B67 up against my nicest/most used vocal mic for a few years the Pearlman U47 clone. They're both tube condensers following the Neumann legacy. They're both mics that I've never even gotten to try out what they're replicas of, and will never spend the five figures to own. It will never be worth it to me. But as some shootout nerds have pointed out if any of these popular clones are not quite an exact replica of a classic but it sounds phenomenal, who cares?

The B67 at first glance is flattering. Very smooth, fairly rich and kind of dark sounding. No sibilance problems. Not dark like the treble is rolled of, but like it's articulate without being way forward in the mix. It makes the Pearlman sound slightly strident in the high mids. Like the Pearlman might pop in the mix a little more but also expose some of the slightly annoying qualities of my voice a little more.

Laying into the B67 with some more strident, belted parts you can hear the tube squish, gain sound a little more. I like how some mics react like a tube guitar amp when you push. Not really breaking up as a distortion but just saturating slightly. The B67 does that nicely, the extra grain sounds kind of rich, slightly lower in the mids than the Pearlman which again is ever so slightly tinnier (but still really nice).

The only thing I'll watch out for is the big mids on the Beesneez might be ever so slightly boxy on my voice. Like maybe getting microscope, surgical eq I might cut just a sliver of something in the 200-400hz range.

I'll be really curious to see how this thing sounds on some other singers. It's hard to imagine it sounding bad on anyone.

losthighway wrote: Wed Apr 24, 2024 8:41 pm B67

Thank you! I agree exact vintage specs don’t matter, but it is helpful that your description of the b67 jives with the older Neumann 67 models - that ‘dark’, midrange sort of thing. Plus they are famously used on all sorts of instruments. You have to figure the utility extends elsewhere, but I guess only the only thing that matters is the sound in front of you and the mics you actually have.

I’ve posted this from Phill Brown’s Tape Op excerpt before, but Glyn Johns put them on pretty much everybody on Beggars Banquet! I like that Mick Jagger got the cheapest mics out of everyone though. I wonder if they were taped together for bleed?

Solid

I love that in a forest of Neumann, Jagger is on the dynamic mic.

But I think I'm starting to see what you've described here. It's not exactly clinically flat, it has a smoothness that is a real character. But there are no peaks anywhere that would conflict with something. It's like the Coles 4038 thing where it takes eq well so you can leave it dark or just add a high shelf that would give another mic a migraine. Except it doesn't have the boom the 4038 does and it doesn't get overwhelmed as easily. Pushing a 4038 sounds like mechanical failure, a U67 just gradually gets more saturated.

llllllllllllllllllll wrote: Fri Apr 26, 2024 10:33 ammuch everybody on Beggars Banquet! I like that Mick Jagger got the cheapest mics out of everyone though.

I wonder if that 57 was always intended to be a scratch vocal mic with the idea he would re-record vocals at a later date? Maybe not. I do think it is hilarious when I see these plots of studios that have a ton of U67's because almost nothing else ever gets used. Shaker... U67, Banjo... U67, Girlfriends coke mirror solo mic... U67, Jagger... 57.

Kniferide wrote: Tue Apr 30, 2024 11:03 am

llllllllllllllllllll wrote: Fri Apr 26, 2024 10:33 ammuch everybody on Beggars Banquet! I like that Mick Jagger got the cheapest mics out of everyone though.

I wonder if that 57 was always intended to be a scratch vocal mic with the idea he would re-record vocals at a later date? Maybe not. I do think it is hilarious when I see these plots of studios that have a ton of U67's because almost nothing else ever gets used. Shaker... U67, Banjo... U67, Girlfriends coke mirror solo mic... U67, Jagger... 57.

My inner blockhead strongly suspects that it is spitting the difference between that and having the largest amount of isolation if that vocal wound up being the keeper.

Doesn't Bono famously use a handheld SM58 in the studio?

Zack de la Rocha also did all his vocals live through a 58 on the first RATM album.

Photography, not music, but I just ordered a Gossen Luna-Pro SBC Light Meter, with an attachment for metering at narrow angles. My phone’s metering app has generally worked well, but when it does fail, it’s annoying.