Top Picks: Desert Island Mics of the Pros

As engineers, producers, and musicians, we love our tools. Some would say we love our “toys.” But the truth is that the tools in our toolbox not only make us sound better, and get great sounds faster, but they just make our jobs easier and make us look better. As pros, we have no desire to give up the tools that helped us achieve success. But which tools are the most valuable? The premise goes, “If you were shipwrecked and stranded on a desert island and only had one mic to use for everything, which mic would it be?” We won’t bother with whether there is electricity, or preamps, cables or mic stands, or even talent to record on the island. We just wanted to know which tool(s) in your toolbox you would never want to be without. We reached out to a bunch of our friends to get their takes.

Al Schmitt

I’ve said it many times before — my favorite all-time mic is the Neumann U67. I could do a session with nothing but that mic. It works on vocals, bass, drums, guitars, violins, and all strings! Great on trumpet and sax and trombones. I love that mic and it sounds exceptional in omni.

No one in the history of recorded music has won more Grammy Awards for Engineering than Al Schmitt — 22 of them now. Plus, he has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame and a Trustees Grammy for Lifetime Achievement. His credits include Ray Charles, Frank Sinatra, Diana Krall, Miles Davis, Sam Cooke, Bob Dylan, Henry Mancini, Michael Jackson, Barbra Streisand, Madonna, Natalie Cole, and lots more. When someone like Al, who has engineered 160 Gold and Platinum records, tells you something about recording, you listen closely. His favorite mic?

Ken Scott

This is such an easy answer for me, always assuming the desert island has electricity available. Any of my students or anyone that has seen me in action knows that I use Neumann U67s or U87s on almost everything. This microphone was introduced just four years before I started working in studios and was one of the few mics I (professionally) grew up with. If I’m lucky enough to have a second microphone, it would have to be a ribbon of some kind, preferably a Coles 4038 or a Beyer M 160, just for the smoothness that a condenser sometimes lacks. And last but not least, I’d have to have someone on the island like Abbey Road’s microphone maestro Lester Smith to keep them working perfectly.

British producer and recording engineer Ken Scott is recognized for his production work for David Bowie, Supertramp, Devo, and Ronnie Montrose. He also engineered for the Beatles, Pink Floyd, George Harrison, Duran Duran, and Elton John. His amazing work can be heard on influential jazz recordings by Mahavishnu Orchestra, Billy Cobham, Stanley Clarke, Dixie Dregs, and Jeff Beck.

Sylvia Massy

My desert island mic is the carbon button in the handset of a dial phone. I often wire up the handsets to use in the studio for vocal effects. And if I leave it intact, maybe I can call someone to pick me up off the desert island!!! Other than the telephone, there’s a favorite that I can barely live without and that’s the Mojave MA-200 — an excellent, high-end tube mic.
I guess the real ultimate desert island mic would have to be a Shure SM58. It’s the best all-around mic available, and it’s rugged enough to use as an all-purpose hammer, which is important when stranded on a desert island.

Sylvia Massy is a music producer, mixer, engineer, writer, and artist. Massy is perhaps best recognized for her work on 1993’s Undertow, the full-length double-platinum-selling debut for Los Angeles rock band Tool and her work with System of a Down, Johnny Cash, and Red Hot Chili Peppers.

Jeff Sandstrom

So if I had to choose one mic for everything, it would probably be a Shure SM57. It’s a dynamic mic, so there’s no need for phantom power. It can handle very high SPL, so it’s perfect for a loud guitar cabinet or drum. A good engineer should be able to make anything sound good with it. It can work well on guitars, drums, bass, vocals — just about anything. And if it’s your only mic on a desert island, when you realize you don’t have power, a PA, or a hammer, you can use the 57 to build your shelter!

Independent music producer/engineer Jeff Sandstrom has been in the industry for over 20 years and produced the Dove Award-winning series Shout Praises Kids for Integrity Music. Jeff specializes in producing, arranging, and recording worship music projects. From 2007–2016, he was the front of house audio engineer for Chris Tomlin and led the production of live concert sound for Chris and for Passion Conferences. He is the founder of Sonnet House, a company designed to provide churches with tools to raise the bar for production through technical training.

Chuck Ainlay

Okay, by now you are probably tired of the typical answer, a Shure SM57. Yeah, it’s a great microphone that can go for a swim or hammer a nail in and would still work and sound fine on almost everything you put it on, but high-resolution recording and delivery to the consumer is a reality now, so maybe it’s time to upgrade to a better toolbox.
With that in mind, I would have to say the DPA 4011 would be the one mic I could get by with if that’s the only mic I had. I actually have used it for almost everything. It’s great on piano, acoustic guitar, overheads, hi-hat, snare top and bottom, violin (fiddle), cello, upright bass, and Sting uses it for his vocal mic. My backup mic would have to be the new Audio-Technica 5045, but only because it doesn’t have a pad. Saying that, it can handle high SPLs very capably, but the hot output can overload some preamps. Again, this mic shines on everything and the price tag is very reasonable. Just get two, as you’ll want them for stereo pairs. Now after opening with a ‘dis’ on the 57, I probably have never made a record that I didn’t use a 57 on, so Hi Res or not, I’m going to sneak one onto the island, especially if I have a Royer 121 alongside it if for nothing other than recording an electric guitar.

Chuck Ainlay has recorded and/or mixed over 300 albums, including albums for George Strait, Dire Straits, Mark Knopfler, Taylor Swift, Miranda Lambert, and Dixie Chicks. He’s won four Grammy Awards, two Country Music Association Awards, and 10 Academy of Country Music Awards.

Russ Long

I’m stuck on a desert island with only one mic? Not an easy decision, but I’d have to go with the Audio-Technica AT 4050ST. It’s one of the most versatile mics I’ve ever owned, and it sounds absolutely amazing. I originally bought mine to use as an overhead mic, but I’ve used it to record everything from piano and acoustic guitar to backing vocals and choirs, and it never fails to impress. Its built-in M-S decoding matrix provides either a 90° or 127° stereo image. Alternatively, you can record the discrete mid and side signals for later manipulation. I love capturing isolated mid and side signals when using the mic to capture drum ambience. This allows me to automate the M-S decoding during the mix process, making the drums smaller and more intimate in the verses and wider and more bombastic in the choruses. If I don’t want to record in stereo, I can simply record the mid channel and the 4050ST operates (and sounds) like a standard 4050 (without selectable polar patterns). The built-in 10dB pad makes it usable on loud sound sources like drums and electric guitars and the 80Hz, 12dB/octave roll-off allows me to eliminate low-frequency build-up (the ocean’s low-frequency rumble always makes desert island recording a challenge!). Okay, I’m starting to wonder why I only own one of these things.

Since moving to Nashville in the mid-’80s, engineer Russ Long has worked on the hits “Kiss Me” and “There She Goes” by Sixpence None The Richer, along with recording and mixing albums by Wilco, Newsboys, Over the Rhine, Relient K, Dolly Parton, Jim Brickman, Amy Grant, and Steven Curtis Chapman. His film credits include the soundtracks to The Sapphires, Girl Interrupted, Here on Earth, How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days, The Pirates Who Don’t Do Anything, Hannah Montana: The Movie, and She’s All That. Russ has spent 13 years as the FOH engineer for Steven Curtis Chapman and 12 years as Amy Grant’s FOH engineer.

Shawn Dealey

My desert island mic would be a trusty AEA R88. I’m cheating because it is a stereo mic, but I love it on so many sources — drum overheads, rooms, B3/Leslie, piano, plus vocals and guitars through one side of it always sound natural and full of character. I’ve even recorded a full band with just this mic! My runner-ups would be the dynamic Telefunken M81 or Neumann U47 FET.

Shawn has been a longtime front of house and studio engineer for Counting Crows, spending the last 10 years on the road and in the studio with them. Shawn has produced albums in Winnipeg, Canada, with artists from all genres (from Doc Walker to KEN mode) and has worked on engineering projects with industry heavyweights such as Gavin Brown, Rob Cavallo, Rob Wells, Steve Albini, and Brian Deck. Shawn now works at Sweetwater as a producer/engineer and the Technical Director for the Sweetwater Pavilion performance venue.

Jeff Barnett

My desert island mic would be the SM27 (formerly called the KSM27) by Shure. It’s a large-diaphragm condenser originally designed for studio use, but it’s one of the most versatile live sound mics I’ve ever had the pleasure of using. It works well for everything from vocals to acoustic instruments, but its high SPL handling makes it a good choice for electric guitar cabinets and brass instruments too. And even though it was designed as a studio mic, it’s built to the same standards as the rest of the legendary Shure SM line. It’s one of the only large-diaphragm mics that I don’t worry about getting dropped or knocked over onstage.

Jeff Barnett is a live sound engineer, a recording engineer, a system designer, an installer, a teacher, and a performing musician. He’s also Sweetwater’s director of House of Worship Sales and an instructor in Sweetwater’s Academy of Music and Technology.
He loves singing and sings with an a cappella/vocal jazz group called Smooth Edge 2.

IsRael Foster

The Neumann U 87 is probably the most used hip-hop mic in history, and for that reason any rapper using it will instantly recognize the sound from their favorite records. It’s been used on more records than I can count, and I know it will work 99.99 percent of the time. The 87 is an instantly recognizable look and sound and can be positioned to use on drums or cabs just as easily as vocals. It captures aggression really well, keeping the rawness of the performance intact. Some mics tend to dull out the transients or sound harsh or ess-y, but the U 87 keeps chugging.

IsRael Foster is a music producer and engineer as well as being a Sweetwater Sales Engineer. He’s scored several top 10 gospel Billboard charting albums and received his first Stellar Award in 2012. You can hear his work on projects by Trip Lee, Andy Mineo, the Ambassador, Da’Truth, and Thi’sl.

Lynn Fuston

If I was forced to pick just one mic (which is about as fair as asking me to pick my favorite child from among my five kids), I would probably reach for the DPA 4006A. It comes stock as an omni, but with interchangeable heads, it can achieve seven different polar patterns. It’s amazingly quiet, crazy flat, and represents the sound of any source put in front of it without any coloration. I owned a pair of them for years and used them for recording piano, drums, acoustic guitar, strings, brass, almost everything — all with exceptional results. And if there was room in the suitcase for one more mic, I’d pick the AEA R84. I love the sound of this ribbon when coupled with a quiet, high-quality preamp like my Millennia Media HV-3R or Great River MP-2NV. It sounds great on drums, guitars, vocals, and percussion, absolutely rocks on brass of any kind, and as stereo overheads on strings, it’s as close as you can get to a huge, lush, Hollywood scoring stage sound without $50,000 worth of Neumann M50s and a Decca tree. Not that you’d likely encounter a 50-piece orchestra on that desert island. But just in case, you’d be ready.
If my studio caught on fire (since we’re way down Hypothetical Avenue), and I only had time to grab one microphone, my pick would be my custom Bock Audio 251. It’s probably my favorite vocal mic of all time, is a home run on nearly every singer that steps up to it, and is truly one of my most prized pieces of gear.

Leave a message 

Message List