Audio-Technica ATM27HE

Home recording since '89, with many years spent using truly substandard equipment. Graduated to Roland VS-840 in '98 and recently put out a solo album recorded with it. Spent all my money on guitars, basses and drums so never had much left for good mics - thus, sonic revelations every time I'd spring for one.

This mic has never been used at home. I've never recorded it through my songmaking setup, but it's a veteran of the bar wars through the band's Yamaha PA system. I spent many a night harmonizing, belting, crooning, gibbering and channeling into this mic, all amplified and fed back to me by some modest but reliable Yamaha floor monitors.

There are two reasons I'll say the ATM27HE is similar to a Shure SM-58.

1) It's a similarly sized and shaped dynamic mic with a female XLR connector at one end and the iconic globular windscreen "cage" at the other. It also seems to have a midrange boost to add intelligibility to most human voices.

2) When my bandmate and I bought our ATM27HEs at Thoroughbred Music in Tampa (R.I.P.), we actually showed up to buy the industry standard SM-58, a model which I had borrowed and recorded with before. There must have been a commission incentive for Audio-Technica products that month, because the salesman wouldn't think of ringing the SM58s up until we heard an A/B comparison.

He connected one of the SM58s and spoke boomily into an impressive PA setup. We agreed that it sounded fine. Then he muted the channel, replaced the SM58 with an ATM27HE and spoke/sung again. The ATM27HE was half again as intelligible - in fact its clarity was amazing to our ears - and sold for only $20 or so more. We bit the bullet and used the mics for five years of music and profit. Mine is still in once piece, and while I haven't tried it since leaving the band, I have no doubt that it would perform right now if I plugged it in.

We used these mics specifically for lead/harmony vocals on small/medium stages and at medium/loud backline volumes. We spoke and sung directly into the mics, often eating the metal on quieter parts. I'd characterize its sensitivity as "medium/high for a dynamic mic in this class." I have a particularly soft-edged voice even when belting rock, and only medium natural volume, so I had some difficulty being heard over my much louder friend. Live recordings and many memories reveal that our vocal sound was fairly detailed and dynamic, however - these mics do transmit usable detail.

They were kept with the drum mics in a molded case and held up perfectly during five years of abuse and zero maintenance. Come to think of it, we rarely had backup mics with us because the thought of these failing never occurred.

I'd be interested in recording a vocal track with this and contrasting that sound with what I get from my R0DE NT2 condenser (see review). I might find that the mic is not as gain-y or detailed-sounding as I've come to believe, but that's an apples and oranges mic matchup, too. Plus, the contrast in sounds would no doubt have creative applications.

I give it an 8 for at least decent (and sometimes inspiring) sound quality along with ironclad reliability.