An upgrade of the legendary C535, which is now discontinued, it lets you bring studio quality vocals to the stage.

It also works on almost any instrument and vocals! Whilst we are on the subject of AKG mics, I am also using the new AKG C636 and it is as clear as crystal. The AKG C12 is a remarkable mic, the combination of diaphragm and tube create an incredible, real sound. The 3 mics i go to a lot are our iFet7 Soundelux, our Neumann M149 Tube Condenser and our AKG C12 VR. More recently I’ve found it useful to setup a couple of mics which blend well, both head on and then have a room mic setup about a couple of feet from the guitar. I used to play around with Blumlein and X&Y configurations but never found that they sound better to what I achieve now. We have a great room at the studio and often when recording guitar, I’ll just put up 1 condenser and experiment until the guitar is sounding nice and warm and full and off we go. It is often different for different instruments but once you hit that instruments' sweet spots you’ve nailed it. Having good quality microphones and knowing how to position them is the key. Could you share with us some of your microphone techniques? My roots are very much a continual source of inspiration, you can take the lad out of Ireland but you can’t take Ireland out of the lad!īoth your and Kate’s albums feature many traditional folk instruments. The Telegraph described my last album as ‘Folk-Pop that is Irish music for the 21st Century.’ I really liked this. I can appreciate the good in most genres of music and my last couple of albums have been very symbolic of my childhood and my eclectic tastes in music. I got into House music, I loved some indie music. As well as growing up with Irish traditional music in the house, I was soaking up all kinds of music. Over my last 3 solo records I have chosen a lot of material from the north of Ireland, the Ulster region in particular – where I come from - and I’ve put my own spin on these old songs. My home/Irish roots became very important to me and music was a great way of expressing this.

I moved to England in 2001 to study and have been here ever since. How important is your background and upbringing in Northern Ireland to the music you create? Are these ‘roots’ a continual source of inspiration?

Teen suicide band pedals