If you’re looking for an inexpensive way to get some analog warmth in your signal chain (whether recording direct in instruments or with a microphone) then the ART MPA Gold Tube Preamp is definitely worth checking out. It’s street price is just about $300 which is about as cheap as you’re going to be able to find a real tube preamp like this.

And while the vacuum tubes that come with it are pretty cheap, you can always replace them with more expensive higher quality tubes if you want to get an improvement in sound. This is what I did, although I was reasonably impressed with the sound of the tubes that it comes with too (at least in comparison to the preamp I was using that came with my audio interface.)

One really cool thing about this preamp is how it has two channels so if you put two different tubes in it, you can have two different “colors” to work with. This is exactly what I’ve done with mine. If you want to replace the tubes to see what kind of different sounds you can get with it you should know that you will should be looking for 12AX7 vacuum tubes.

I use it for direct in guitars and bass guitars (and I think it works really well with both of those in conjunction with Waves GTR3 Amp Sim) I also use it with my Shure KSM44 Condenser Mic and I’m very happy with the sound I get recording vocals and acoustic guitar with that mic (and that’s an excellent microphone, so that has a lot to do with it) through the MPA Gold Tube Preamp.

Analog, Preamp, Home Recording

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