One of the most common vintage microphones on Ebay is the Electro-Voice Slimair 636. You can usually get it for less than $100, which is a good bargain for those starting a collection. My guess is that since there’s quite a few being sold out there and it doesn’t quite have the 50’s look, people don’t really pay much attention to it. The EV 636 actually has the slim design that became so popular in the 60’s, and is still being used today.
I’m kind of a kid when I buy vintage microphones. I like to open them and look at all the parts inside. So when a mic offers such an easy access to the element, you can bet that I’m going to check it out. Compared to other vintage microphones, the element is pretty small. And it does look like it’s quite fragile. But it has a nice, crisp sound to it. I’d also have to guess that it’s pretty reliable, since all the EV 636’s I have, work. Besides, if the likes of Chuck Berry, Gene Vincent, and Billie Holiday used this model in the past, it certainly can’t be a bad mic.
Gene Vincent
You can download the spec sheet for the EV 636 here.
It’s hard to imagine a 60’s hit starting out with “I was working in my lab, late one night…”. Let alone a song that sounded like it was made for a Halloween party. But then again, when Michael Jackson’s Thriller came out, I don’t think many people could imagine themselves dancing to it. All that would come to your mind was the music video and Vincent Price’s laughter at the end. Nevertheless, just like Thriller, Bobby Pickett’s Monster Mash had what it took to make kids of all ages dance to it.
The year was 1962. Bobby Pickett, who wanted to be an actor, ended up in a vocal group called The Cordials. They would sing hits like Little Darlin’, with Bobby exercising his acting abilities by emulating Boris Karloff’s voice (a famous horror movie actor) during the monologue in the middle of the song. At the time, The Twist and the Mashed Potato Time were hot tunes on the radio, and they wanted something that would fit right in. One day, with fellow group member Leonard Capizzi at the piano, they started talking about how audiences loved Bobby’s rendition of Karloff. It was Leonard who suggested, “maybe the Frankenstein monster should start a dance craze”.
You’d think it would be all downhill from there, but they had some trouble releasing it. No record label wanted it. It was not until they showed it to Gary Paxton, who changed the group name to Bobby “Boris” Pickett and the Crypt-Kickers, that it really started getting noticed. Paxton produced the song and distributed about 1,000 singles to radio stations. Monster Mash (name inspired by Dee Dee Sharp’s hit) got on the fast track to becoming a #1 Billboard hit.
Just for fun, I found the video below on YouTube, of a family that puts on a light show every Halloween. I’d like to see it as an extremely well done tribute to Bobby.
