Topic: Sennheiser 421's - still rockin' live recordings

[SmokinJoe]

Very few mics are designed with concert tapers in mind.  Maybe Chris Church and Jon, but that's about it.  The rest are designed for studio or stage, typically close micing.  Out of the bazillion mics out there, a relatively small number just happen to work well for taping a room full of blasting PA at a distance.  Before everyone had portable decks with phantom powering, that number was probably smaller than it is today... and most of those from that era have fallen by the wayside, with Naks and Senns being a couple of "the survivors".  Fast forward to today where phantom power is readily available.  A new set of 421's costs about $750.  For our purpose there are a lot of condensers out at least as good for that same money, so that's what most people go for.  Now that most of those "old school" 421's are 20+ years old, the ravages of time has caught up with a lot of them, and if a good used 421 goes to Ebay, they are more highly prized by studio folks than they are by us.

One of our locals (Bill Dix) has been running 421's for years, directly into a D8, then into an R09.  Last year he decided to buy all "modern" gear.  He said he thought maybe the ravages of time was catching up with the 421's, but I think it was mainly because the rest of us a shiny new toys and he wanted some too.

[newplanet7]

Everything I know about the 441's is consistant with what Newplanet has reported. I am not aware of any revisions of substance that has occurred over over the production run with the 441's.

Word! Thanks for confirming brother.

There was a cheaper BF 541 version which removed the bass roll-off switch and only had an XLR on the end - this version was all black.

I think they used to be nick named Black Fire BF541

[John Willett]

There was a cheaper BF 541 version which removed the bass roll-off switch and only had an XLR on the end - this version was all black.

I think they used to be nick named Black Fire BF541

This was not a nickname - Sennheiser had the short-lived "Black Fire" range of microphones before they produced the evolution range.

All Black Fire microphones had the prefix "BF" and a number that started with a "5".  Both the MD 421 and MD 521 had a Black Fire alternative that kept the price down by removing the bass roll-off switch = MF521 and BF 541.  There were also a number of new microphones in the range.

It was not successful, though, and was discontinued to make way for the excellent evolution series that came in the late 1990s.

[Hypnocracy]

FTR as far as Dynamic Microphones go...Sennheiser 441's sound almost like a condenser to me...and I patched into a set early on in my Taping career from the OTS when touring with the Dead...I have a set of Europe Tour cassettes with 441's...very pleased with the results.

In a bar I once patched to some Shure SM57's on a lark (I came prepared to  ) and it turned out to be a Open Taping show...I thought the vocals sounded as natural on that recording as any I've ever made...