ADK SL Pro

Making music 15 years - mostly studio based
Recording into Nuendo/Sonar via RME HDSP stereo card. Monitoring on Genelc 8030. Room a little bass heavy, needs traping.

Chinese LDC. Cardioid. It exhibits that typical Chinese brightness. A bit too much for me. I've only been able to use it for airy female pop vocals a la Kylie Minogue. I also noticed a real lacking below 500 Hz. Thought it could be the room or pre as other mics are ok.

So to be fair I wonder if the mic is faulty? It's not been dropped or smoked on though...

Been doing studio recordings for over 10 years. Lots of project studio experience and now starting to go to entry level pro studios.

Have worked with all sorts of music and all sorts of artists.

These days I work in DAW (Cubase and Sonar mostly) so lots of VSTi's but still record vocals.

Monitoring via Echo Mia MIDI to Genelsc 8030's. Room not too bad.

This is a condenser mic with a fixed cardiod pattern pickup.

I was looking for a nice neutral mic for pop vocals. I have an AKG C3000B but it's a very bright mic that lacks body and has inadequate detail to my taste. Not having Neumann money, I originally thought to replace it with an AT 4040. The SL however, very closely matches the 4040 sonically but is a little bit fuller, which I liked for female vocals. Maybe that's why it costs a bit more than the 4040.

The SL is wonderfully neutral (which is its stated design brief). It's also quite sensitive so you need to condition your room (duvets etc). Because the mic is just accurate as opposed to coloured, you don't have to mess about with EQ scoops or adding air if you don't want to (though bass rolloff is always a good idea). On the other hand its easy to process the vocals in your DAW any way you want - its up to you.

I pass the SL through a TLA 5051 valve pre-amp and the two go together well. If you don't drive the tubes too hard you get the pop sound I was after wonderfully.

I'd recommend this mic to anyone looking to get clean and accurate recordings. The mic does what its supposed to really well.

I give it a 9 because it isn't a u87 and you'll hear that, but only side by side. If you use it properly, nobody is going to worry its not a #1500 mic. Even if they could tell.