I have a pair of Lauten Audio LA-220 V2s above my drum kit, and I’ve previously reviewed the Lauten Snare Mic [Tape Op #159], Tom Mic [#163], and Rim Mount [#164], so of course I was eager to check out their Kick Mic too! If you haven’t been following along, these Lauten drum mics are all condenser mics. Specifically, the Kick Mic is an end-address pressure gradient FET condenser. Like the other Lauten drum mics, this one has its own swivel mount, with a metal lever that helps lock it in place once positioned. It’s not a huge mic – about the same diameter as a dynamic vocal mic but about 40 percent shorter. There are two miniature switches for low-pass and high-pass filters (LPF at 5 kHz or 12 kHz, HPF at 80 Hz or 140 Hz). The mic also comes with a Cordura zip bag for storage and an aramid fiber “impact patch” sticker for your bass drum (to place where the pedal impacts the head).
I frequently use a condenser on the outside of a bass drum but have always relied on a dynamic mic inside. For the Kick Mic, I started with both filters flat, then eventually engaged the LPF at 12 kHz (to reduce cymbal leakage). I can see where the other settings may be useful in a live sound situation, when combining with another mic, or just for creative purposes, but I preferred the HPF set flat. Lauten strongly recommends sticking this mic all the way into a port on the front head of the kick, so that’s what I did. The port on my drum is at four o’clock, so the mic was angled up slightly toward where the beater impacts the head and… Boom! I mean that literally! Maybe it’s because it was a little farther inside the drum, but compared to my other mic, the Kick Mic sounded almost like it had a slight gate on it. It was picking up all the good sounds and none of the muddy or weird, ringy overtones that I might otherwise EQ or gate out. There was almost no bleed from the rest of the kit. I’ll be honest, I didn’t have to work hard to find a sweet spot. It immediately delivered a warm thump with plenty of bottom and just enough attack for some definition. Output level-wise, it was pretty darn close to the dynamic mic I had been using. Other than engaging +48V phantom power, I didn’t even change the settings on my preamp.