Pencil Mic Suggestions

Posted: Wed Dec 06, 2006 10:24 am

I'm looking to buy a stereo pair of pencil mics for acoustic guitars and drum overheads. My budget is around $1600. I've been looking at the Neumann km184s as well as the lower end Earthworks. Thoughts?

Thanks,
Benny
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Posted: Thu Dec 07, 2006 2:34 pm

For drum OH and AC guitars you can't lose with Shure SM-81's and they absolutely excel as great mics for re-amping ANYTHING (incl. piano) in a large room or reverb chamber. They have an amazing ability to handle high SPL's.

The ever popular Oktava MK-012's are a fantastic choice also, and particularly those you find through The Sound Room (the only vendor I buy Oktava stuff from other than oktavamod.com). Sound Room usually gets first choice on alot of Oktava mic's and capsules. I love the 012 w/omni cap's as overheads, on AC guitars and male vocals.

Posted: Sat Dec 09, 2006 6:52 pm

I would highly recommend the Gefell M300's a matched pair of these are awesome! I use them for acoustic guitar all the time, and sometimes I even use them for vocals and they are superb for that as well.

Posted: Sun Dec 10, 2006 3:18 am

i like the earthworks... almost too accurate for some people...

Posted: Thu Dec 14, 2006 1:04 pm

I'd skip the KM184's and go with either the Gefell M300 or the Beyerdynamic MC930.

Having used all three I can say without question that the MG's and the Beyers smoke the Neumanns.

My personal preference these days is the Beyerdynamics (sold my Gefells to buy more Beyers...call me crazy!) but you can't go wrong with either choice.

The best part about the Beyers is you can buy 4 of them for the price of a pair of Gefells!

Posted: Thu Dec 14, 2006 5:27 pm

I have used and often like the KM184's, but about 90% of the time I have never needed anything more than my pair of AKG 452's or pair of SM81's for any duty requiring a pencil mic. The Earthworks are great mic's, but I don't prefer them in most cases.

Posted: Wed Dec 27, 2006 7:27 am

I have been using Josephson C42s (matched set) for years, and find them quite good on a lot of things...but I do have a set of Pelusos )P28s)on order, as they have come highly recommended from some people who's opinions I trust.

Posted: Sat Jan 13, 2007 10:49 am

This is an old post, but I can't help it. Anytime someone asks me about pencil mics, I ask them why they want to mic pencils? Then I show them what the frequncy response of a pencil is, and I recommend a 57. It is one of the odd, if not stupid things I do, because those mics are WAAAAY bigger than any pencil I have ever used.

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