All hail the Sennheiser 421

[puffpastry]

Definitely one of my favorite dynamics. It has a warm smooth sound that seems to roll off around 15k I'd say, with just a bit of an edge about 500hz or so. Judging from the sound of it, the "edge" is most likely a low-order harmonic distortion introduced by that output transformer, and it's very low-level, just enough to add a sweet pleasantness to the sound. I've used them on toms, vox, kick, snare, bass, and guitar--just about everything.

[dagosto]

A "go-to" mic steup for heavy guitar is a SM57 and MD421 each on it's own speaker.

Oh yeah it's great on tenor and bar sax as well. And Eddie Murphy sings into it in the "(My Girl Wants to) Party All the Time" video.

[GearJunkie]

dagosto: that's hilarious you brought up eddie murphy, because everytime I see that mic, that's the first thing I think of.

[lukedavo]

I love them, a great guitar and tom mic, never used it with speech function, only (M). As stated before great smoothness for tenor sax, and also preety darn good on bone.
A little side note...

The prime minister of Australia uses these for radio appearences.

Only better dynamic is the SM7, IMO.

[johnS]

Is there any difference between the original 421 and the newer version, the 421-II? Same response pattern? Same basic sound?

[dagosto]

I have heard that the original 421's don't have the boost around 7kHtz that the -II's have.

[smopo24]

i agree with the previous posts about usage....not sold on the sound of it on trumpet though.