DAN AGOSTO: Hello there gear fans. My name is Dan, and in this video going to be listening to a kick drum recorded with the Beta52 microphone from Shure. It's a pretty good kick drum mic. It's not as pronounced as the mic we used in our last video which was the N/D868 from Electro-Voice but I think it fits more with some mellower music like for example it's a pretty good jazz kick drum mic or for folk, and this song is kind of folky so I'm guessing I might be happy with this Beta52 as long as it can cut through the mix. I do have quite a few instruments going on in this mix. So, let's listen to our sound soloed.

[DAN PLAYS TRACK MIC'ED WITH THE SHURE BETA52]

So, it's got a lot of low end in it, much I believe low end is more pronounced than with the N/D868. It does have a good of like high flak or slap kind of it sounds a bit like a wetter sound like a splash I think I could more describe the attack sound, and there's less bleed as well. And so let's listen to what this sounds like in our mix.

[DAN PLAYS ENTIRE MIX]

It is quieter than our N/D868 but it's there. We have to give it a little more oomph to kind of push it through the other instruments but I do think it fits with the music style.

[DAN STOPS PLAYING MIX]

So, what I'm going to do is, let's see. Let's zero out, or not zero out but match up the two microphones in volume. As you can see, everything is exactly the same. Both of them pans slightly left to get away from the bass a little bit. It trims at 7.8 so everything is pretty much exactly the same. Notice this note: I put these through the same exact preamp, and that's a Focusrite ISA model, and they all come in the same rack, and luckily for us they have detented gain switches. I just kept to the -- there's fine gain knobs, gain pot that's continuous but I kept that at zero and just used that detented switch to make sure that the gain was even all the way throughout.

So, let's listen to our kick drums soloed, and what I'm going to do is I'm not actually going to click on the mute switches. I'm using my TASCAM US-2400 control surface to switch between them without any problems. So let's hear what these two sound like soloed.

[DAN PLAYS TRACK MIC'ED WITH THE SHURE BETA52] And that's our Beta52, and keep your eye on the mute switches as soon as you hear them -- or as soon as you see them switched, you'll hear the other mic, the Electro-Voice

[DAN SWITCHES TO TRACK MIC'ED WITH THE ELECTRO-VOICE N/D868 THEN SWITCHES BACK TO THE SHURE BETA52].

So as you can hear, the N/D868 actually has a little bit more bleed but overall, it is a louder mic and has a bit more of a curve to it. That being the case, I feel that this mic is much more suited for punchier kick drum sounds, and a lot of people want that, prefer that especially in dense mixes or heavy music, but it also causes it to not be a very good mic for other things. Fore example, the Beta52 I'll often use on a bass cabinet; it's just my kind of go-to amp for that -- go-to mic for that.

So now having heard them soloed out of the mix. Let's listen to them back in, and I'm going to have to raise the Beta52's volume just a little bit to match the volume of the N/D868. So let's start playing the music again and again watch the mute switches. When this is muted, you're going to hear the N/D868 when you see this yellow light go on, and this one go off you're going to hear the Beta52. Alright, let's listen to them again.

[DAN PLAYS ENTIRE MIX WITH KICK DRUM MIC'ED WITH THE SHURE BETA52]

I'm just going to adjust the volume a little bit too, just to get them to match a little bit more. Maybe bring them out a little bit.

[DAN SWITCHES OVER TO THE KICK DRUM MIC'ED WITH THE ELECTRO-VOICE N/D868]

And I'm going to switch.

[DAN SWITCHES BACK TO THE KICK DRUM MIC'ED WITH THE SHURE BETA58]

And that last switch there was back to the N/D868. So I'm kind of on the fence right now about which I'm going to use for this mix but I hope you got to hear a little bit of what these two different mics are about and the different flavors they offer. So thanks for checking out the video.