Default on the road with Rode Microphones

[Glawfindle]

Are there any Default fans?
Below is on the Rode website....www.rodemic.com

TVT Records Platinum Recording Artists DEFAULT on the road with RODE MICROPHONES

DEFAULT

Quotes from Russ Giroux (FOH/Tour Manager) and Rick Delphi (Monitors)
Band: DEFAULT
Date: Sept. 6 at the California Speedway in Fontana, Calif
Performing with: Nickelback; Billy Idol; STP

Russ Giroux: DEFAULT has been using RODE mics on the road for the past year, with great success! The great thing about these mics are the versatility. I have used the NT1000 on everything from drum overheads, to LOUD guitar amps, to quiet acoustic guitars in studio settings. The results have always been stellar! Right now I am using it exclusively on Jeremy's distorted guitar, the large diaphram and smooth response are perfectly suited for DEFAULT's sound. The NT1000s are some of the best mics I have ever used, and they look cool too!

DEFAULT's Front-Of-House mixer and Tour Manager Russ Giroux

Russ Giroux: The NT3 is another really versatile mic, the high end response in particular makes cymbals, and acoustic instruments shine!! The NT3’s are also excellent on guitars for that smooth rock sound, and on Hi Hats.

We were really fortunate to aquire the NT4 recently, and I was thoroughly impressed with the stereo imaging and phase coherency. Danny, DEFAULT's drummer, loves the overheads to be predominent in his monitor mix, the imagery we have achieved with the NT4 paints a nice stereo "picture" for him.

RODE NT4 on Drum Overheads

DEFAULT's Danny Craig

Russ Giroux: For those small intimate Acoustic performances, the NTK is unrivalled on vocals, providing me with that classic warm sound not found in most microphones in the marketplace today.

With DEFAULT being on the road for 18 months on "The Fallout", it was important to do some writing while we were out. The NTK worked great for us on the bus while we were demoing songs. Normally we would use a tube pre on Dallas' voice to warm things up a bit, utilizing the NTK we achieved that warmth, and got some great performances as a result. Plus it is a beautiful, classic looking mic!!!

I would highly recommend Rode microphones to any audio engineer for live sound and studio applications!!

Quotes from DEFAULT Monitor Mixer Rick Delphi

DEFAULT's Monitor Mixer Rick Delphi

Rick Delphi: "I really liked the NT4 on drum overheads. It had lots of low-end and I could incorporate it with the close mics and the toms and really get a full attack with no phase problems."


RODE NT4 on Drum Overheads

Regarding using the NT4 and the NT5 for the first time/

"With the NT5 on the hi-hat I didn't even cue it, I just pulled some low end off with a high pass on there and it sounded like a hi-hat perfectly. I was really happy with it in the ears and the band seemed really happy with it. I'm definitely going to keep using these in the future - I'm sold."

RODE NT5 on hi-hat

DEFAULT's Danny Craig

Quotes from Rick Delphi

Regarding the NT1000s:

"For the NT1000s we were originally using them on the overheads and they were working great and picking up the whole kit but at the time I wasn't really putting in a lot of overheads in anybody's mix and it has a large diaphragm which I thought would be great for close mic’ing the guitars so I slapped them on the guitars. For the ears it gave me a total full-range guitar sound and everybody was really diggin' it. As soon as I put the guitars in the house, Russ our Tour Manager came over and was like 'no way man, I like them out here,' he loved them from the get-go.


DEFAULT's Dallas Smith (vocals)

Regarding the NT3s:

"We had the NT3s on the amps and they were happy too, but with that large diaphragm it moves a lot of air and they can really feel it. The NT3s are also what we've been previously using on the overheads and I've had no problems with them and have liked them completely, and now we have the NT4 and I'm even happier."



DEFAULT's Jeremy Hora (guitar)
Regarding the NTK:

"Russ and the band have been using it almost every night in the bus and have been really happy with it. The band's been using it with acoustic guitar. Dave and Jeremy, (bass player and guitar player) they both have pods so they'll go direct with electric guitar and electric bass and they also have their acoustic guitar and acoustic bass. Danny the drummer does drum machine and percussion stuff and Dallas will use the NTK to get his vocals down."

DEFAULT's Dave Benedict (bass)

Reflecting on the day's performance with rode mics:

"We had a great show today. It was a radio show and I just threw them up and everything sounded awesome. Under these circumstances, where things are unpredictable, if I can get something that I've never tried before and throw it up and not even really touch any cue on it -- which was the thing that I really noticed, especially with the hi-hat where I didn't even touch it -- just sort of bypassed it and it was like 'Wow, there it is. That's the hi-hat and it's perfect.' And it didn't even have that phasing stuff where you end up having to chop that out and start getting really hollow sounding hi hats which I didn't have to do that with the NT5 – that was really cool."


DEFAULT's Monitor Mixer Rick Delphi
with RODE Microphones Director/CEO Mark Ludmer

Photos by Natalie Baret

For more information on Default visit www.tvtrecords.com

 

[bleyrad]

great, so rode gives them a bunch of free mics in return for their nice words. nothing so special about this, other than a nice marketing trick.


despite what this write-up makes it seem like, rode mics are not the best mics in the world. they are good at sounding good for the price you pay for them. very occasionally, they may be better to use on a very particular source with a very particular preamp than an uber-high-end mic.

that is all.


edit - BTW - i should note that Default's Wasting My Time is one of the tightest-sounding rock recordings i've ever heard. done in a bigtime place near me, Greenhouse Studios.
that said, i don't like the band at all.

 

[Glawfindle]

great, so rode gives them a bunch of free mics in return for their nice words. nothing so special about this, other than a nice marketing trick.


despite what this write-up makes it seem like, rode mics are not the best mics in the world. they are good at sounding good for the price you pay for them. very occasionally, they may be better to use on a very particular source with a very particular preamp than an uber-high-end mic.

that is all.


edit - BTW - i should note that Default's Wasting My Time is one of the tightest-sounding rock recordings i've ever heard. done in a bigtime place near me, Greenhouse Studios.
that said, i don't like the band at all.

Thank you for your constructive reply Bleyrad. Is there such a thing as 'best mic in the world?' Which one or which brand? Do you think it may be possible that Default do actually like the sound of Rode mics? Do you think that there are many reasonably well known bands who would still say a particular brand is better than another brand if they were given free products - even when they can probably afford the most expensive or what is perceived to be the best anyway? Do you think that many people by 'big brand name mics' (ie. some German ones come to mind) just to fill their ego or show their mate the badge? I think Rode mics sound better than what you call 'uber-high-end mics' much more than often only occasionally. I think so anyway...what is 'uber-high-end' ...is this a description for expensive mics, mics of a particular brand or place? Please explain.

 

[bleyrad]

listen, my point was that, for any specific application, it is extremely likely that there is a better mic out there than a rode. in fact, there's probably far more than one better mic out there. and some of them may even be in the same price range - but that aside the point, because these guys were talking about rodes like they were the most amazing-sounding things since the phonograph.

i'm not disputing that rodes sound good, what i am disputing is:

a) the motivations behind the claims made, and

b) the apparent implied attitude that there is nothing better than rode



I own an NT1. I've rented and used an NT1000 for a month, and I've heard an NTK, NT5's, NT2, and NT3.

But, unlike many people here, I've also used KM184's and C414's.

My NT1 is good for the money. I don't regret owning it. However, I don't have any delusions of it stacking up to a U87.

I was initially very impressed with the NT1000. It has a very expensive-sounding top end. However, over my month of using it, I came to realize that this top-end gets hard on the ears after a while, and I don't really LIKE listening to it over long periods of time (similar to my NT1)... it sounds like Rode goes for an initial "wow factor" over a truly smooth mic. With vocals, it also didn't fit in the mix as well as the NT1, which was extremely surprising. My overall conclusion of the NT1000 was that it was exactly what you pay for. It has since come down in price, so I'd probably consider it a decently good deal now.
NTK sounded better on vocals than the NT1000. I would consider using it in an album if looking for a warm, cheap vocal mic. Again though, with so many good/decent mics in the under-$1000 range these days, I feel the NTK is worth precisely what you pay for it. No more. Really though, it's the same with almost any mic (with perhaps the exception of good cheap small condensors like MXL603s... the sound different between them and high-end SD's is pretty minimal).
NT5's were decent, but I wouldn't use them over my MXL603's on anything but instruments that need to sound full and warm. Certainly not as overheads. Too dark-yet-harsh sounding.
NT2 sounded pretty good. No real complaints about it, no real compliments. I didn't get to hear it for that long unfortunatly.
I was not a fan of the NT3 at all. The recordings I heard done with it had an extremely harsh edge to them (it was used on hi-hat). This could of course be a matter of taste.

So there's my take on the Rode lineup, or at least what I've heard of it. They are not exceptional mics. They are exceptional at sounding expensive the first time you hear them, then showing their rather large shortcomings over time.
This is something that U87s, U47s and C414 do not do. They stand up, because there is nothing remotely gimmicky about their sound. They do not strive to impress, but rather to provide a good well-rounded sound that just works.

As always though, there are better mics out there

 

[ausrock]

Glawf,

I know that for some inexplicable reason you display a propensity towards Rodes, but surely even you must have some doubts about the authenticity and originality of those comments