I have just one show on LMA with the CK-1s. It was the only time I ran them hyper at this venue (experimenting), so less of a sense of "air." But it gives you a general sense of the sound. Carbon Leaf had a lot of high-frequency energy at this show.
https://archive.org/details/cl2012-06-08.carbleaf2012-06-08Here's an old thread on them:
http://taperssection.com/index.php?topic=80536.0;allAlthough the Avantones are Chinese pencil mics, they are designed stateside and they are QC'd after they arrive in the US from the factory. They have a five-year warranty and include some nice shock mounts too. Cost differential:
New Oktava pair with six caps (omni, card, hyper): $800 + $240 for Joly mod = $1040.
Avantone pair with six caps (omni, card, hyper): $300 (and if you decide to add the Busman mod, you're in for a total of $450).
If you bought the Avantones and didn't like them, you could probably sell them for close to what you paid on Ebay.
What I like most about the CK-1's is that they don't have that shrill, peaky high end that most cheap pencil mics have. They sound pretty smooth and full-bodied. Schoeps? No. But they don't call attention to themselves, and generally "get out of the way" to allow for musical enjoyment.
The Line Audio mics get almost universal raves on Gearslutz and I doubt you'd go wrong with those, even if they are only one polar pattern. (If I remember correctly, they're billed as cards but they're sort of wide-cards?)