Uploaded October 2024 | Updated September 2026, 2 days ago
Among the things I collect are microphones. What you're hearing right now is THIS microphone, the one I've been using for awhile now to record my video's narrations. Today we're going to look at--and hear--other vintage microphones and hear how different they sound.
This one I've been using is the RCA 77-DX and it was made in the United States beginning in 1954. The similar 77-D model was introduced in 1948. These are called "pill" mikes, as I understand it, because they look like large medicine capsules, or pills. This is a ribbon microphone. Later in the video, we'll look inside one of these and see what "ribbon" means and how this microphone works. The audio you're hearing at this moment was recorded separately from the video you're seeing (at this moment). Otherwise, we'd just be hearing handling noises. But you ARE hearing the same microphone you are seeing here, the 77-DX. And that's going to be true of all the mikes we're looking at today. Here's an acoustic guitar.. just to give a quick example of how this mike records something other than voice. [guitar chord]
This is the microphone you're hearing now, and it's pretty tinny-sounding, I'll bet. This is an Astatic N-30 crystal microphone. I started collecting microphones back when I was a kid. And this was one of the first I found. Mikes like this you'd find in a thrift stores or junk shops for a dollar or so. They'd be cast-offs from cheap public address systems, or from Shortwave or CB radio operators who had upgraded their gear. Dispatchers would use these kinds of mikes. Or you'd see them used in a store for announcements--blue light specials and 'clean up on aisle 4' and all that. The frequency range of this mike is quite limited as it's designed mainly for voice, not really for any kind of music recording. Crystal microphones are perhaps the cheapest category of microphones. Let's hear how this one sounds. [guitar chord] Well, it's a thin sound, but quite crisp.
And here's a mike with a similar story to the one we just looked at. But this one has no name, and no room for a nameplate. I think it's a crystal mike, and American made but I can't say for sure. [guitar chord]
I started recording my own music when I was 14 and put out a record when I was 15, in 1969. There was no way I could afford professional microphones, so I used the mikes I had, like this one, and this one. These are indeed my original microphones from those days. My best mike then was this Elecro-Voice 664, but it was still only a public address mike made primarily for public speaking, not music recording. We'll hear that one later. So with nothing but cheap mikes, I hit upon the idea of making records that were deliberately tinny and sounded old-fashioned. I just embraced what I had to work with. AND,..there had been a recent hit record at the time, in 1967, Winchester Cathedral, that had an old-fashioned 1930s kind of sound too. So that validated for me that what I was doing was an OK thing to do. Here's a snippet of.. my first record. And here's another, even tinnier recording from 1969, made using my cheap mikes. Now if this sounds to you like a really stupid idea, making old-timey records in the 1960s, let me point out that the 1967 Grammy Award for "Best Rock & Roll Recording" went that year.. not to runners up Good Vibrations by the Beach Boys, or Cherish by the Association, or Last Train To Clarksville by the Monkees. No. The winner for "Best Rock & Roll Recording" that year was... this... ...Winchester Cathedral.
Now here's that Electro-Voice 664. This mike was the standard public address microphone in that era. Schools had them, churches had them. They were everywhere. It was said of them that you could drive nails with one if you had misplaced your hammer. The ones I managed to get ahold of were used, of course, and they looked like someone had tested out that hammer theory. They don't look so bad now. I swear they must have healed somehow over the years. Though still basically a public address microphone, this one's frequency response was much better than my cheapie microphones, with the suggestion that they would be better for music. As to the actual sound of it, well... [guitar chord] The design of this mike is said to have been based on Electro-Voice's professional model 666. So let's hear what that one sounds like.
[guitar chord] OK, that.. and this narration..is the Electro-Voice 666. This example was cast off from KNX Radio in Los Angeles, the CBS affiliate. They really marked their property. I got this one from a swap meet held at a radio club meeting. It should sound better than the 664, but these sound tests are not going to give a full picture of any mike's potential, by the way. What you're hearing is going to tell you what this particular mike sounds...
RCA 77-DX
Astatic N-30
Unknown, crystal?
Electro-Voice 664
Electro-Voice 666
Shure 330
Shure 55C (Shure 55SH)
Lafayette "studio" crystal
Astatic 600S Conneaut
Shure ball mike 565SD
RCA 44-BX
Among the things I collect are microphones. What you're hearing right now is THIS microphone, the one I've been using for awhile now to record my video's narrations. Today we're going to look at--and hear--other vintage microphones and hear how different they sound.
This one I've been using is the RCA 77-DX and it was made in the United States beginning in 1954. The similar 77-D model was introduced in 1948. These are called "pill" mikes, as I understand it, because they look like large medicine capsules, or pills. This is a ribbon microphone. Later in the video, we'll look inside one of these and see what "ribbon" means and how this microphone works. The audio you're hearing at this moment was recorded separately from the video you're seeing (at this moment). Otherwise, we'd just be hearing handling noises. But you ARE hearing the same microphone you are seeing here, the 77-DX. And that's going to be true of all the mikes we're looking at today. Here's an acoustic guitar.. just to give a quick example of how this mike records something other than voice. [guitar chord]
This is the microphone you're hearing now, and it's pretty tinny-sounding, I'll bet. This is an Astatic N-30 crystal microphone. I started collecting microphones back when I was a kid. And this was one of the first I found. Mikes like this you'd find in a thrift stores or junk shops for a dollar or so. They'd be cast-offs from cheap public address systems, or from Shortwave or CB radio operators who had upgraded their gear. Dispatchers would use these kinds of mikes. Or you'd see them used in a store for announcements--blue light specials and 'clean up on aisle 4' and all that. The frequency range of this mike is quite limited as it's designed mainly for voice, not really for any kind of music recording. Crystal microphones are perhaps the cheapest category of microphones. Let's hear how this one sounds. [guitar chord] Well, it's a thin sound, but quite crisp.
And here's a mike with a similar story to the one we just looked at. But this one has no name, and no room for a nameplate. I think it's a crystal mike, and American made but I can't say for sure. [guitar chord]
I started recording my own music when I was 14 and put out a record when I was 15, in 1969. There was no way I could afford professional microphones, so I used the mikes I had, like this one, and this one. These are indeed my original microphones from those days. My best mike then was this Elecro-Voice 664, but it was still only a public address mike made primarily for public speaking, not music recording. We'll hear that one later. So with nothing but cheap mikes, I hit upon the idea of making records that were deliberately tinny and sounded old-fashioned. I just embraced what I had to work with. AND,..there had been a recent hit record at the time, in 1967, Winchester Cathedral, that had an old-fashioned 1930s kind of sound too. So that validated for me that what I was doing was an OK thing to do. Here's a snippet of.. my first record. And here's another, even tinnier recording from 1969, made using my cheap mikes. Now if this sounds to you like a really stupid idea, making old-timey records in the 1960s, let me point out that the 1967 Grammy Award for "Best Rock & Roll Recording" went that year.. not to runners up Good Vibrations by the Beach Boys, or Cherish by the Association, or Last Train To Clarksville by the Monkees. No. The winner for "Best Rock & Roll Recording" that year was... this... ...Winchester Cathedral.
Now here's that Electro-Voice 664. This mike was the standard public address microphone in that era. Schools had them, churches had them. They were everywhere. It was said of them that you could drive nails with one if you had misplaced your hammer. The ones I managed to get ahold of were used, of course, and they looked like someone had tested out that hammer theory. They don't look so bad now. I swear they must have healed somehow over the years. Though still basically a public address microphone, this one's frequency response was much better than my cheapie microphones, with the suggestion that they would be better for music. As to the actual sound of it, well... [guitar chord] The design of this mike is said to have been based on Electro-Voice's professional model 666. So let's hear what that one sounds like.
[guitar chord] OK, that.. and this narration..is the Electro-Voice 666. This example was cast off from KNX Radio in Los Angeles, the CBS affiliate. They really marked their property. I got this one from a swap meet held at a radio club meeting. It should sound better than the 664, but these sound tests are not going to give a full picture of any mike's potential, by the way. What you're hearing is going to tell you what this particular mike sounds...
RCA 77-DX
Astatic N-30
Unknown, crystal?
Electro-Voice 664
Electro-Voice 666
Shure 330
Shure 55C (Shure 55SH)
Lafayette "studio" crystal
Astatic 600S Conneaut
Shure ball mike 565SD
RCA 44-BX
