Review: Sennheiser MD 421 Kompakt

The Sennheiser MD 421 is a remarkably famous microphone. It would be a heavy task to find a studio without a handful of them, both the older, vintage models with a cream coloured body and silver grille, as well as the all-black models more commonly found, and still available, in 2024.

The MD 421 is not a small microphone, and while not as boisterous as a huge tube microphone, the MD 421’s body is filled with additional circuitry to switch between ‘M’ and ‘S’ settings, being ‘Music’ and ‘Speech’ respectively. The ‘M’ setting has a more full sound, while the ‘S’ setting rolls off some mud for better sound for broadcast applications. So how can you improve on something so widely accepted as a great choice for a variety of applications? Well, by making it more compact of course!

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2024 sees the introduction of the Sennheiser MD 421 Kompakt. For all intents and purposes, this is the classic sound and design of the famed MD 421.

The MD 421 Kompakt is a multipurpose dynamic cardioid microphone. Designed for exceptionally high sound levels, the Kompakt makes a great choice for blistering rock guitars, drums and horns, all sources with high SPL and/or a lot of transient information. The cardioid pickup pattern and feedback rejection reduce unwanted bleed and noise, being supremely focused on the source that it’s pointed at.

While the Kompakt is physically more compact than its predecessors, the addition of an internal bass tube allows for full-bodied sound and accurate low end. Doing away with the aforementioned ‘M’ and ‘S’ switch helps to reduce body size as well, advances in technology allowing us to do more digital processing in the box, so it’s not always necessary to filter out that sound on the way in. The switching on the mic, while helpful, hails from a time where broadcast was live and analogue, and recording was to tape.

The MD 421 Kompakt also features a newly designed mic clip, with two options. There’s a standard mic stand clip that allows you to screw the mic onto a stand, while Sennheiser also offer a drum clip intended to clip onto the hoops of a drum shell, making it a perfect option for recording things like toms and snare drums. The full range sound of the MD 421 Kompakt will help you to capture all the nuance you need from fills, ghost notes and snare wire snuffle.

Featuring a three-pin, gold XLR connection, the MD 421 Kompakt is built for long term, consistent use, and you’ll find yourself going back to it time and again. It features a frequency response from 30Hz to 17kHz, the diaphragm being protected by a stainless-steel basket, the internals protected by an internal chassis to prevent dust and humidity. All of this to say that the MD 421 Kompakt is built for the studio, the stage and road.

In use, it’s difficult not to compare the MD 421 Kompakt to the original MD 421, but here I am doing it! The MD 421 has consistently been relegated to the go-to option for capturing crucial mid range in sources like guitars, bass and drums. It can also help you record horns, woodwind and brass that’ll sit comfortably in an arrangement, with full-range sound to be mixed and refined to your heart’s content.

All of this is to say that the MD 421 Kompakt is no exception to any of this, and it can absolutely fulfil any role you might’ve chosen a MD 421 for. Better yet, the compact size of the Kompakt allows you to get closer to things like drums where hardware and cymbals can be inconvenient, removing a few things: worry that the drummer will snare roll onto the mic itself, or that you’ll be left with compromised sound because of the distance and space that the larger MD 421 demands. The Kompakt nestled nicely next to a snare on a session this past week, and it was also comfortably set up amongst other guitar cabinet microphones. Multi-miking a speaker cab is no mean feat, the tiniest adjustments altering the recorded sound in a huge way, and the smaller mic enclosure helped me really dial in the tones. The band were chuffed! Sonically, the Kompakt retains the same mid-forward, balanced sound of the MD 421, and I’ll happily be reaching for it session after session.

The Sennheiser MD 421 Kompakt is the next in a line of profoundly practical and widely-used range of microphones. Intended for broadcast as well as music recording, the original MD 421 found its way into the studio because of how accurately it captured sources. With allowances for very high SPL, the MD 421 remained in favour as music got louder and louder, with higher transient information. The MD 421 Kompakt takes all this and packs it into a more practically sized enclosure, with the same rugged design that makes it a mainstay of the studio. Reliability is the name of the game, the MD 421 Kompakt has this in droves.

A re-designed clip secures it to whatever means you have of pointing it at something, that source coming through with the crystal-clear clarity that the whole MD 421 range is so widely loved for.