From Russia with love
The Russian word soyuz means “alliance,” and it signifies the partnership that is the driving force behind Soyuz Microphones. In 2013, American vocalist David Arthur Brown and Russian entrepreneur Pavel Bazdyrev teamed up and launched a company to build world-class microphones in Russia. Soyuz now has 20 full-time employees, and Soyuz microphones are being used by top engineers and producers and are favored by artists such as Coldplay, Radiohead, the Lumineers, and Paramore.
What’s in your mic locker?
Among the most cherished assets of any world-class recording studio are its microphones. Take a peek in the mic locker, and you will almost certainly find vintage European tube and FET models made in the 1950s, ’60s, or ’70s. The “human-touch” manufacturing methods and discrete handwired circuitry of that era yielded microphones with sonic characteristics that are distinctly different from modern computer-assisted designs. Soyuz’s original tube and FET microphone designs — while not clones of vintage models — are produced in the old-school way, using manual lathes and drill presses and leveraging the former Soviet Union’s rich technological legacy as a foundation. So what’s in your mic locker? The answer will determine the sound of your recordings.