Originally designed as a person-mounted mic for the recording of speech, the mic is provided with a clasp and tie pin for mounting the mic on collars and... well, ties. A good length of cable (nearly three meters) is supplied, and a small in-line box holds the 5V battery. A back-electret design, the mic offers a frequency response of 50Hz-15kHz, and has an impedance of 800 Ohms. It's small size makes it a friendly and unobtrusive mic for recording speech of any kind.

Applications are varied: I tried the mic out on acoustic guitar, which was successful with a small amount of EQ. The only problem here is finding the right location - as with anything to do with miking a guitar - and actually holding the mic in place. I found a small piece of cloth held in the teeth of the mic's grip was a good compromise, allowing no damage to the guitar, and not rustling in sympathy or springing away unexpectedly. A variety of different tonal effects is possible, depending on whether the mic is mounted inside or outside the soundhole, or above or below the strings. To be honest, the raw sound needs work, being boomy, but patience and a little cut on the lower mid EQ gets rid of the boominess. The mic could also be gaffa taped to the sound board.

Other uses include many instruments, and I have heard of small string orchestras being miked up with them, and a specialist folk studio uses them on brass, even going to the extent of gaffa taping the mic inside the bell of a tuba with a worthwhile result. It's also good for recording samples of odd objects.

Experimentation is again the name of the game, but taping the mike to whatever you intend to hit, scrape or blow across will give a good sample with no ambient noise.

The main thing to watch out for when using this particular tie clip mic a lot is to keep tabs on the battery — as soon as it starts running down, the available headroom and frequency response will also shrink. It also starts to crackle and break up on transients. I have heard of modifications being done to both balance and provide phantom power to the mic, but this shouldn't even be thought about unless you're quite sure of what you're up to. In any case, for the vast majority of applications, fresh batteries provide quite enough in the way of level and headroom.

And should you be recording any speech, the tie clip is one of the most unobtrusive ways of getting the voice onto tape. Experimentation is again necessary, with the critical factors being rustling clothing and the proximity of the throat, with its multitude of distracting noises.

This is another surprise from Tandy, and is a mic to join the famed PZM, which is another solid, budget performer. If you think you'd like to give the tie clip mic a go, then pop down to your local Tandy — there's not much in the line of recording that's actually useful for this sort of price.

Further Information
Tandy Tie Clip Mic £13.95.

Any Tandy shop — see your local telephone directory.