Mic Preamps - Do They Make a Difference

hello everybody my name is Barry Johns and this is Studio talk and today I'm going to talk about our mic prims when I say mic prem's external mic prems like upgraded ones like a Neve or an API or particularly a clone of one of those particular microphones are they really going to make that much of a difference in your recording and when should you consider buying one or should you just consider skipping them all together now I get asked this question a lot I'm asked a lot what mic preamps do I recommend you know and why and what's advantages over one versus the other and and and those are relatively easy easy questions to answer but I think before that we've really got to touch base on the fact that you're you're sitting most likely you're sitting at home in your project studio and you're trying to figure out where to invest your money next okay and where are you gonna get your Roi your return on your investment of of spending that money and how much of a difference is it going to make so let me get one thing and entered out of the gate and some people who were passionate about their mic preamps are probably going to say what is this guy talking about but I've been doing this a long time and I'm just going to share my particular perspective on it our upgraded mic preamps okay are they going to transform your music are they going to take it to the next level and the simple answer to that question is no they're not they're not are they going to make a difference answer to that question is it depends okay so let's start with that depends on what before we get to that let's kind of get a little bit of a grasp of the history of this okay the majority of music that many people came to know and love and even kiss today all my kids today still go back and listen to music from the 70s 80s and 90s right and if you're working in a major Studio during those times they didn't bring external microphone preamps into the studio for the most part and if they did it was an exception okay they pretty much decided okay what console sound do I want to go with do I want to go with an API do I want to go with a Neve do I want to go with an SSL which one is best suited for me and they're making that decision on many factors and most of it predominantly is going to be in the EQ of it the overall sound of the board okay and of course the preamps make a difference there okay it's an all-in-one package and so that's how these names became so revered and justifiably so all three of the brands that I just mentioned have a have a long story history of producing outstanding products that we have learned to all grow and love to this day so you know as it involved external mic preamps really didn't start to really come into the fold until really the mid to late 2000s okay and then throughout today that's when the home studio Market began to expand tremendously uh because of the Advent of digital recording and so obviously your average home user was not going to go out and buy a Neve console right so they wanted to have some of these things and that's when you saw a lot of these things start to come about and then later on API developed a lunch box it was slow to take off and has now exploded with many many many wonderful wonderful options okay and so it's important to get a perspective on that because I think a lot of people misunderstand really what a mic preamp is going to ultimately do them do for them so let's talk about the characteristics of probably the two most popular names when it comes to my preamps you have API and you have Neve okay API is known for a mid-range bump okay a more aggressive Style with a great on drums okay uh great on electric guitar great on bass in certain settings okay and so when you want that up front right there kind of tone you're going to get that mid-range bump for an API whereas a Neve is known for that warm nice uh bottom low end you know that's what we call many of us call like a smoothness right to it and they bring that particular character but keep in mind keep in mind um to get the most out of a mic preamp you're going to really need a good microphone if if I had to pick between the two between a good mic preamp and a great microphone hands down without question I'm going with the microphone first first and foremost because a great microphone will make a difference in cheaper less expensive preamps that we find in interfaces now let's talk about interfaces for a second and then I'll come back to that when it comes to interfaces when this whole thing home recording started to explode it was really all about conversion that was a number one priority for every manufacturer of of of of recording interfaces for the home studio Market um and so they were all chasing that next conversion getting up there the microphone preamps that came in the majority of those interfaces were subpared to say the least they were not very good okay and so because of that they chased the whole converter thing and we saw Leaps and Bounds every couple of years in quality of conversion well today you're really splitting hairs between conversion and don't let anybody tell you any difference I'm talking about the differences going to make a difference to the end user not to you and your ears in your studio your end user is not going to hear what you hear in your studio they're going to hear it on different devices across many different environments okay so ultimately you know converters have gotten so good these days that simply what what high-end interfaces before like when you're searching for the difference between a mid-level interface and a high level interface today is not as much about conversion as it is the analog circuit to within and you can get some very very very good crisp clean microphone preamps uh and and more expensive interfaces today because they can spend more money whereas the Lesser expensive interfaces they have to make cost cutting uh measures somewhere that's I mean we can all should be able to understand that you know to expect something that's going to cost you 500 that is going to perform overall looking at the big picture of it with something that's going to cost you fifteen hundred or two thousand dollars is simply not realistic so those are the differences making yes is conversion continuing to get better it is okay but that's not about what we're talking about today we're talking about microphone preamps but it's important to put that all into perspect the book of many young people didn't go through that and they don't know kind of what got us to where we are which really opens up the discussion a lot now a good microphone print will make a difference there's no question I've got numerous uh combination of a a API and Neve uh microphone preamps here in my studio and I use them for for the various reasons that I talked about before but but if you take a a you know take you you take one of those microphone preamps and you pair it with an inexpensive or lower quality microphone maybe a large diaphragm condenser um it's not going to yield you the same difference as it would you're not going to be able to really get the feeling the vibe of that microphone preamp as much as you are with a better quality a more higher end I'm not suggesting you have to go to the moon for that but but but you know when you get a three or four hundred dollar microphone that's what you can expect to get we've all been there we've all had budgets that we have to to fall within and we make do and get by with the best that we can but we should understand there is better out there and those are things that will make a difference you know what you could argue well Barry you just talked about guitar and drums aren't when you're talking about Mike and guitar amp isn't the number one mic used on that in sm57 yes typically along with a royal 121 or something along those lines there are other options to choose as well and then what about the snare drum wouldn't you argue Barry that the snare drum is the mo one of the most important tracks in any any particular recording yes I would argue that your snare and your vocal are probably your two most important and aren't they mined with sm57s yes okay but that's an area where you're not looking for warmth you're not looking for depth you're looking for Sharp attack and that's where an API comes in great for that really great for that okay and so but overall the majority of your recordings are not recorded with those uh lesser expensive microphones you know they're recorded with much nicer microphones and I said before the number one track on any particular song is going to be your lead vocal that's going to be your number one that's where you're going to invest your most money get the very best mic that you can get and the very best mic preamp paired with it for the style of music that you're recording but at the end of the day I'm upgrading your mic preamps in your project Studio they'll make a difference but it all depends on if all the components are lined up but no matter what let me explain this to you no matter what they will never ever ever make a huge difference it's all incremental things that you gain by doing these things there's no one magic pill out there that's just going to go wow man my recordings are at the professional level right away that's just not how these things work so understand if you're going out there and investing 600 to a thousand dollars on one channel mic preamp and you get it and you start listening to it first you're going to get the placebo effect in hearing things that really aren't there everybody's guilty of it including me but you're going to get that initially but after the dust starts settling in you realize this really isn't making that much of a difference because you know I've kind of got my 300 microphone I'm running through it and I just don't really hear the difference and you know what you're probably right you're probably right you're not hearing that big of a difference and even if you go get a four thousand dollar microphone and run it through that print it's still going to be subtle increments it's not going to be this massive thing that's just gonna blow things is up right you know I argue many times more that if you've got a solid interface with really good mic preamps built into it which inquires an investment if you've got that you're better off probably if you want to invest in external hardware investing is some really good quality compressors where that's really probably going to make a bigger difference in your recordings overall but then again you don't really need any of that you can do everything in the box and create wonderful wonderful sounding recordings so if you have an expectation that if you're going to go out and spend the money on a mic Prem is it going to make a huge difference the bottom line as I've described before it's not going to make a difference it's not going to make a huge difference I'm sorry is it going to make a difference yes if every other component in line is in play right but you change out one of those things and put a subpar component in there well then that's going to affect um the it's going to affect the differences between being able to capitalize on what that mic preamp because at the end of the day the purpose of a mic preamp is to get it to the proper level to match all other devices that it's going to be connected to that's the number one goal of a microamp it's called a mic preamp free amplify that signal get it to the right level in a good quality microphone premium is going to do that it's going to do it extremely well and it's going to be clear and transparent and then also depending on the mic preamp give you some character to it a little Vibe going on little Mojo that happens but again that vibe in that Mojo is subtle it's not going to rock the house so if you like the things I talk about on this channel do me a favor hit that like subscribe notification Bell you know all that stuff out there most importantly hit that subscribe button Help Me Grow the channel uh leave me some comments down below tell me what you think I'm sure some people are going to go in there and probably say my my preamps have changed my world if they have then I'm so I'm so happy for you I'm so happy for you but but in my experience that hasn't been the case are they worth the investment like I said it depends obviously I think so because I own them right and I have no intentions of selling them right but could I get by today with the interface that I have what happens to be a an rme interface could I get by with the microphone preamps in there you better freaking believe I can because they're very good microphone preamps they don't have the character we're talking about but they have the pristine Clarity and they certainly amplify the microphone the way I needed to okay so uh like I said leave some comments down below but until next time hope every one of you have a great day bye-bye

Channel: Barry Johns Studio Talk

Views: 21,813

Keywords: avid, protools, protools hdx, protools ultimate, hdx, avid omni, avid hdx, avid hybrid engine, avid carbon, avid hdx hybrid engine, cubase, logic pro, studio one, universal audio, daw, studio, recording, recording studio, home recording, post production, avid.com, avid DUC, duc, Digidesign DUC, presonus, uad, control surface, plugin, plugins, compressor, delay, reverb, uc1, ssl, solid state logic, neve, microphone, preamp, eq, equalizer, 500 series, a designs, warm audio, cable, cables

Id: RhH95VuEiLc

Length: 13min 9sec (789 seconds)

Published: Thu Apr 13 2023