Indie band Death Cab For Cutie has embraced TELEFUNKEN microphones for both their recordings and their worldwide touring. Death Cab’s North American tour kicked off March 23 in Toronto, Canada.
DCFC drummer Jason McGerr commented, “Telefunken is making incredible microphones these days. I’ve been using a pair of M60 FET’s as my overheads, M80-SH on snare, M81-SH on toms, with an M82 on the kick. The live kit has never sounded better to my ears, both behind the drums and out at front of house. I’ve also been tracking in the studio with the same setup, but I use an AR-70 as my overhead instead of the M60’s. The larger diaphragms and stereo pattern flexibility give a really big, beautiful image of the drums.”
McGerr’s Telefunken DD5 drum pack contains three unique voices of the TEC Award-winning Dynamic Series microphone line, in combination with two matched small diaphragm FET condensers, packaged for drum recording and live performance applications.
Death Cab for Cutie’s music is distinctive for its use of unconventional hard-driving instrumentation, as well as bandleader/guitarist/keyboardist Ben Gibbard’s distinctive voice and adventuresome lyrical style. Since their formation, the band has released eight full-length studio albums, four EPs, two live EPs, one live album, and one demo album. Their newest album, “Kintsugi,” is the first to feature an outside producer, Rich Costey. The album was nominated for a Best Rock Album Grammy Award.
Will Markwell, front of house mixer for Death Cab, commented, “I’ve used Telefunken’s M80 dynamic mic on snare drums for the last three years. It really captures what I want to get out of the drum. And the M60 FET condenser is a wonderful mic that is very true to the source—but not sterile. They replaced some very expensive vintage microphones and I couldn’t be happier with the job they are doing. “
