The Sony C55p is a solid state small diaphragm condenser microphone that went into production in the 70’s. The C55AC uses the same capsule and electronics, but operates on batteries instead of phantom power and has a longer body to accommodate the batteries.
What makes the C55 unique is that it uses a “capsule turning system” that allows you to change the angle of the capsule by turning the little knobs on the side of the mic to make it front-address, side-address, or anywhere in between. This comes in handy when close-mic’ing drums, which the C55 happens to sound quite good on. Sliding the down the part of the body with the Sony logo on it reveals a high cut filter switch and an 8 dB pad switch. There is an additional three-position low cut switch at the base of the mic, labeled M for music (full range), V1 (low cut), and V2 (more low cut).
The C55 has a pleasant presence peak (which can be tamed with the high cut switch) and nice low end extension (which can be tamed with the low cut switch) making it an incredible workhorse in the studio - it sounds great on everything from close drums to overheads to acoustic instruments or guitar amps. Ocean Way Studios has more than thirty C55p’s in their mic locker - Allen Sides believes it to be one of the all around best microphones ever manufactured (see last image).
The C55p is hard to come by and sells for a higher price, but the C55AC is slightly more common and can be used successfully with a 9V battery, which will provide hundreds of hours of studio use, or it can be modified to accept phantom power pretty easily. John Peluso has modified a half dozen of them for us, and they function and sound just like our C55ps. The only (hardly noticeable) difference is that the 55AC has a slightly lower noise floor due to a higher polarization voltage.
