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Review of Cascade X-15 Stereo Ribbon Microphone - Salt Lake City Recording Studio Review
For sometime I have not been super satisfied with the electric guitar sound that I have been getting. My recording studio, Studio 5.1 in Salt Lake City, has been targeted at acoustic oriented bands. Heavy Distorted guitars, rap music, these are things that I record, but not because I have felt the strongest with these genre's. For that reason I have felt that there is a need for some improvements in these areas. While not terrible, the sound is missing the aggressive but not abrasive, smooth without being muddy, and open without sounding hyped in the higher frequencies sound that I hear in other recordings. I used a Royer r-121 to record a Hammond B-3 on Chantelle Riches jazz pop album April Fooled and loved the way it sounded. In fact it was perfect. I fell in love with ribbon mics from there on out, maybe not on all sources, but certainly on most.
However, the Royer is a bit out of my price range at the moment. After researching other alternatives including the BLUE Woodpecker, the new Shure Ribbons (not any cheaper than the Royers), and some of the of the lower cost alternatives like Cascade, I decided it was high time to get a ribbon mic. But which one, and what price, and in what applications would I use these mics?
After visiting Cascade Microphone's site and being fond of stereo micing, I checked out the X-15 as an option. While the site claims the X-15 to be good for guitar cabinet micing I was not finding anyone else on the internet who had used the microphones this way. Most of the use that was demo'd on the site were for horns, and acoustic guitar samples. When I heard the Disney Jazz group samples they have on their I was instantly sold for that application. In fact I am not sure what you could even do to improve on it. I thought, for $399 with the stock transformer, this mic was worth it just for horn recording. But I don't do much with horns right now so there was no immediate need for that.
After trying the X-15 on acoustic guitar I felt that while the tone was good, this is one of the sources that having a good high gain pre-amp would be needed. I had to crank my Trident s-20 to max and still didn't get the volume I wanted, but I did get some predictable pre-amp his as a side effect. However, the tone was really good. Which made me think that with the right pre-amp this mic would sing!
Then I tried it on a clean electric guitar. I used my Supro S6625 100 watt tube head going through my home made 2 X 12 cab using Celestion Vintage 30's. The guitar player played on a fender jaguar and I loved the clean tones this mic picked up. Again, practically perfect in my opinion. It was exactly what the tone needed and should have been and it sit just right in the mix without and additional eq'ing.
Distorted electric Gguitar has been a slightly different story. While the Cascade x-15 sounds okay, it is missing something still. I think I am going to blame it on my pre-amp at this point and not the mic but it still could be the mic to some degree. The reason being is that the tones are pretty close to what I hear from he amp, however, some of the harsh characteristics I didn't want are starting to come through some. Additionally, there is a presence that this mic seems to be lacking when used on electric guitars. The openness I was experiencing with other recordings seemed to be missing. Perhaps I need to play with positioning some more and with different cabs and set ups. But beyond over driving or vintage distortion tones, the modern heavy, scooped mids type of guitar tones that we hear so much in today's recordings... it just wasn't there for me. Perhaps with the right pre-amp this would be fixed. Time and experimenting will tell.
On drums I was surprised how much I liked this. I placed the mic about 4-5 feet in front of the drum set aimed at the rack tons and it picked up just the right amount of room sound and drum tone. Even the kick drum took on a really nice punch to the sound. I think this has become a permanent part of my drum micing as a result. I still use overheads (earthworks drum kit system is my preferred set up) I like having it even if I don't end up using it because the tones can be mixed in as needed after the fact just in case.
Overall, the X-15 has really pleased some of my recording clients, and in 85% of the applications that I have used it on, the mic has done amazing. While I hate using this phrase, for the price, I am extremely happy with the Cascade X-15. This mic has now become one of my few go-to first mics as a result. I look forward to trying it out with choirs and other organic instruments to take in a more honest sound. Just make sure that if you are using it on anything other than drums, or amplified instruments, you want to have a pre amp with some good headroom on it.
About the Author
Nick Galieti is the owner, engineer and producer at Studio 5.1, a recording studio in Salt Lake City, UT. Specializing in acoustic, indie, LDS, jazz, and pop music recording.
Tube Amps 3: Preamp And Power Tubes