A new secondary vocal chain for the studio

This week I added a couple new items to the studio. I’ve been happy with both my Shure SM7b and Grace Design m101, but GAS got the best of me a few weeks ago and I went looking for another vocal chain, if for nothing than to try something else out. It would also work as a secondary chain for doubles and background vocals.

The two items I picked up were an MXL V67g mic and an M-Audio DMP3 two-channel preamp (see below). First impressions of both are solid. They’re both made well, especially considering the cost, and I don’t see them falling apart on me anytime soon. They both also have a retro look to them that works well. But since we’re talking about studio equipment, all that comes secondary to how they sound.

In my few tests I noticed that the DMP3 provides plenty of clean gain, especially for the V67g. It’s not as clean or detailed as my Grace m101, and I doubt it’ll power the SM7b, but then again the Grace is about 3x the price of the DMP3. No fuss here. The DMP3 is a solid preamp that sounds great for $160. With the DMP3 you also get two channels (for cheaper than many decent one-channel preamps), phantom power, low cut switches (to avoid overloading when your mic doesn’t have a low-cut), and even a couple cool-looking VU meters. The bad news about the meters is that they operate more like peak meters and the range is fairly wide so they’re less useful than they could be.

I was even more impressed with the MXL V67g, especially since cheap mics often sound, well, cheap. But at $120 the V67g sounds better than pretty much all other budget condensers I’ve heard. Many of the cheaper condensers under about $400 or $500 tend to sound brittle, harsh and tinny, but the V67g has a smoothness that its competitors lack. It’s not as detailed or as rich as my SM7b with the windscreen off and presence boost on, but it definitely holds its own. What the SM7b clearly ran away with, though, is sounding great as recorded. I could tell that the V67g would require a bit of work to get it to both sit and cut through in the mix. Then again, the SM7 is famous for that.

Excluding the shock mount that I also picked up, the V67g into the DMP3 will run you under $300. It’s not the greatest vocal chain in the world, but you could do a lot worse spending quite a bit more.