Is EQ the answer to your recording and mixing issues? We reviewed the brand new Tegeler MythEQ 500: a 500 series EQ that looks and feels great, and we dived in to hear how it sounds!
The MythEQ 500 is a transformer-based, 4-band EQ 500 series unit. It’s got a low and high shelf and two adjustable fixed Q frequency bands — all with 15dB of boost or cut. It’ll be a welcome guest in your 500 series home, with its mythical design and sleek sound.
Tegeler is an audio company out of Tegel (in the North of Berlin, Germany) founded by Michale Krusch, who’ve been focussing on producing high-quality audio hardware for the past 12 years. The MythEQ 500 is a great example of his industrious work.
They’re particularly revered for their Vari Mu compressor, the Schwerkraftmaschine, and their Creme combined EQ and Compressor channel – both are thick and rich units used worldwide in recordings and over mix busses and masters.
The MythEQ 500 features two custom UK-built Vigortronix transformers and quality Wima box capacitors throughout and is a direct reaction to their tube-based EQP-1 Pultec-style EQ unit. It takes the opposite direction from the Pultec sound, imparting a cleaner tone without losing warmth, whilst still capable of an aggressive and biting sound if required.
We’ve popped it in our 500 series rack unit — which has never seen an EQ — so we were very excited to try this out and we’re sure it’ll feature on our future Live from Happy recording sessions.
To see what the unit can do, we sent mono drums to it that we recorded when we reviewed the Mojave MA-37 microphone. The flat mono overhead response recorded was a perfect source to see if we could make the kick/bass drum bigger and the cymbals and hi-hat shine more.
Starting off with a low shelf at about 63Hz, the aim was to give some low energy to the drum kit, what came with that move was blooming toms, which honestly was very welcome.
Next up was to get those hi-hats — which gave the groove its subdivision — to sparkle. What better way to sparkle than to crank it up to 10 (kHz) and boost a shelf of that. Along with the hi-hats getting a welcome bump, the cymbals shined too— without being brittle!
When we review gear, we like to work it out and tweak it more than you might so you can hear it working — sometimes we go beyond tasteful, but what struck me when giving the low end a 9dB boost and the high end a 6dB boost was that the MythEQ 500 still sounded great!
This unit sounds great, has stepped knobs (recalls!) and feels solid to operate. And it also comes in this incredible wooden box that will surely get some use around your studio for those things that need a home without adding clutter.
The Tegeler MythEQ 500 comes in at $1,298 Australian Dollars, ships with a 24 month warranty, and you can find out more on their site Tegeler.com
