Golden Era Rare Stam “Red Badge” SA 87 / U87 Close serial # Pair ! Pre Braingasm , Classic Neumann tone

Some here may know of Stam‘s glorious Red Badge era mics made from 2018-2020. If so, then you know how sought after and unique these particular mics are.

And to find two as a pair of the same revision, quite rare indeed.

As you can see from the photos, these are in like new condition, offering cardioid, omni and fig 8 patterns as well as a low cut and -10dB pad from a dual plate high end capsule hand selected by Josh Stam directly.

They come with original silver case, shock mount, leather protective pouch and 5/8” thread adaptor. Everything thats included new is included here, and I always baby my gear and use pop filters and never push em to their limits. You can see the capsules are incredibly clean.

The mics have had no modifications, and all parts are original and hand assembled by Stam himself using first pick on components before he went all global supply chain w Braingasm / ROMA which supplies OEM parts to like dozens of mid tier companies.

I am a 20+ year veteran engineer who has worked on many platinum selling and Grammy winning records, and have used this mic to record artists such as Busta Rhymes, Keri Hilson, Drake, Rickey Medlocke, and many others when a Neumann was not available and many of those records have comped vocals with a Neumann, and nobody could tell I was comping between two different mics. Outside of those anda few times as drum overheads, they remained in my personal AC and humidity controlled studio and as I entered mixing over tracking, my need for microphones diminished over time. Now I’d like to pass these rare gems on to someone who will put them to proper use.

If you don’t need to hear a full explanation of why the ‘red badge’ versions are coveted so much higher, just know that I collect rare and unique gear of all kinds, I have hundreds of sales thru Reverb and I ship usually within 24hrs of purchase via UPS insured and I’m always happy to answer questions and am open to reasonable offers.

These are no longer in production and considered Stam’s finest era of mic building. I have owned his red badge 47, 67, and 251 and have used several Neumann’s, Telefunken’s, and dozens of other clones of all four of these staple and historic mics. I have also owned his most modern ‘black label‘ Sowter transformer with Braingasm capsule mic, and that‘s a decent mic closer to the modern U87Ai, but not quite.

As I also teach audio at the local university, I do intend on going into heavy detail about these two mics in particular cause I like people know the mechanisms of why gear sounds like they do. Knowing your circuits helps you reach for the right gear on the first try.

So;

This is a listing for a close serial / same batch pair of the most famous U87 sound. Stam SA87 of this era was before the shift to the global supply chain that his business began relying on after Covid. These feature the Lundhall custom recreation of the exact transfomer used in the original Neumann.

A proper 220pF deemphasis capacitor was used to give it the original top end smoothness of the darker (compared to the Ai) more signature initial Neumann design.

That deviates from the newer model and the emphasis circuit is one of the main elements that give an 87 its tonal vibe. Where as a U47 is highly dependent on capsule, tube, and transformer interaction, the 67 and 87 rely more on the negative feedback network which most clone builders don’t use and favor a more built in eq or impedance shift style solution. These are built with the bias trim and the full feedback network to maintain faithfulness to the original. The U67 is very much like a U87, but uses negative feedback in a very extreme way for a mic to tame the natural brightness and tighten the low end in the k-87 capsule design. That‘s what gives the U67 it’s signature midrange, and why that’s not a common mic to clone.

Back when Stam first began selling microphones from his home shop in Chile, He was a small operation making some of the best recreations of the most classic Neumann / Telefunken mics around. He was making U47’s, U67’s, U87’s, and Elam 251’s using the finest components and sourcing custom tuned capsules from legendary capsule makers like Tim Campbell, Eric Heisermann, and Dany Buchard.

Wima, Vishney, Nichion, film capacitors throughout, polystyrene-style parts, 220pF-range de-emphasis capacitors, with Lundhall providing the custom spec recreation of the original transformer. The Lundhall tends to have a very fast response, and tho these were wound to stam’s specs, I find the Lundhall provides a better sense of detail, and space due to their fast non transient smearing design. You still get the inherent hysteresis of any transformer where low freq signal passes slower than high frequency thru the transformer which is why transformers tend to thicken up the low end, and articulate the high end in more complex harmonic ways than transformerless mics like the TLM series etc.

One thing I noticed is the first time I took it out of the case, the weight of the mic felt like a Neumann. I could tell from muscle memory… it’s a hefty build.

The 87 lineage is historic, first really debuted towards the tail end of the Beatles on their final recording days. The lower noise floor and higher SPL tolerance let them get a cleaner signal to tape and since the beatles were always overdubbing tape onto tape onto more tape, getting that noise floor lower at the start was a big deal for them.

Since then, I don’t think there’s a more all purpose mic made since. Sound good on anything from vox to guitars to horns, strings, synths… it’s just that right blend of the neumann richness (which stam nails w these), and has the pattern and pad flexibility to get creative and get loud. The pad itself is unique in that it’s not just an output pad, it’s between the capsule and the internal amp and doesn’t color or phase shift like typical pads. Stam nails it there too.

Well, not much more to say. These are what I call pegasus mics, cause pegasus’ are flying unicorns, so it’s more than a unicorn find.

Let me know if you have any questions, and feel free to message before buying, maybe I can adjust the price based on distance etc.

Now grab a pair while they’re still around and I’ll see ya at the Grammy’s.

Cheers, thanks and so forth.