The Legendary TigerMan is a huge star in southern Europe where his signature glam-goth-rock combines with his amazing musicianship to create a unique performance experience. Otherwise known as Paulo Furtado, The Legendary Tigerman performs the vocals and plays all the instruments both in the studio and, even more incredibly, on stage, where he takes the concept of 'one-man-band' to its extremes. Here we catch up with Paulo and his trusted engineer Filipe Gonçalves to find out more…

As a solo musician, Paulo and his engineer are always looking for the best quality instruments and even better quality recordings. It is this search for premium quality that brought them to Sontronics, as they explain: "I read about Sontronics in the specialist magazines," says Filipe, "and I knew I had to use them for the Tigerman projects we were working on."

"It was Filipe who brought them to my attention," adds Paulo,
"and he turned up with some of the mics to try out live. The minute I heard the DELTA microphone amplifying my guitar it seemed like finally I was hearing ALL the frequencies of my guitar… it sounded amazing!"

That first experience with the Sontronics DELTA ribbon microphone, designed specifically to cope with the higher SPL of guitar amps, led Paulo and Filipe to invest in more Sontronics mics…

"We are using the DELTA and the HALO for our live performances, both on the guitar amplifier," explains engineer Filipe, "and I am also using the DM-1B, DM-1T and DM-1S on drums, along with an STC-1S pair [of pencil-style cardioid condenser mics] as overheads. The results are awesome!"

"For vocals, both live and in the studio, I'm using the STC-80," continues Paulo, "plugged into a small amp with loads of reverb!!! At home when I'm doing my own recordings, I use the DELTA on organs too."

It's fair to say that Paulo and Filipe are converts to the Sontronics family, after trying many combinations of mics and brands in the past, and the results are speaking for themselves, as Paulo explains:
"When I'm looking for microphones or effects, I'm looking for the best results. I think the DELTA is purely unbeatable for guitars and loud organs. And using it together with HALO on the amplifier gives my guitar sound an excellent balance. The STC-80 sounds crazy good along with this combination. I'm so happy with all these microphones! My sound just grew so much bigger and fatter when I started using Sontronics stuff!"

As an experienced sound engineer and producer, Filipe Gonçalves has worked his way through plenty of gear and can definitely hear the difference with Sontronics mics: "For a long time on guitar amps
I've used a dynamic like the SM57," he says, "and a lot of large-diaphragm mics. But when I started using the DELTA and then that in combination with the HALO, I could not believe the sound I was listening to! It really was the sound I've been looking for!"

It's not just the sound of the mics that Filipe and Paulo are enjoying. "I'm very happy with the sound, of course," starts Paulo, "but the packaging is great – those chunky aluminium cases protect the microphones in style – and the neo-classic design is just amazing. They look so good you could have one in your living room, just for decoration!"

"As well as the great sound," adds Filipe, "they seem to be quite rugged and the design is so unique too!"

It's obvious that Filipe and Paulo are enjoying their collection of mics in the studio and on the road, so it's not surprising to learn that they still have other Sontronics mics in their sights. "I´m going to test the APOLLO to record some old string instruments," says Paulo.
"I have a good collection of bizarre old instuments, like the Tremeloa, Violin-Uke, Art-Violin, Marxophones & so on so I want to hear how it performs. And I can't wait for you to design a
sub-kick microphone!"