The SM57 has always had a love/hate relationship with the author. On the one hand, it's utterly useless and inaccurate without padding (hello, unpadded sound interface preamps). On the other hand, when padded it can approximate the frequency response of a good condenser (just not the swiftness or sweetness, the SM57 transformer still shows). It is not as lovely and natural as a good pencil condenser, but it can add a certain stiffness to drums and it does have a use when it comes to recording guitar amps.

Truth be told, there're better dynamic microphones for recording guitar amps, even in the same price range. Still, if you're stuck with an SM57, there's a simple workaround for its trebley boost, which can often highlight the fogginess and harshness of a guitar and transistor effects/amplifier. The workaround is simply applying a compensation EQ - an EQ curve designed to neutralise the SM57's frequency response. Better still, Spline EQ is an equaliser plugin which allows controlling overall EQ gain range. Halving the SM57 frequency response by dialling 0.5 Spline EQ gain scale is usually better than leaving it dry, that makes the guitar play more solid. Spline EQ even allows negatives, so instead of neutralising SM57 response fully, an SM57 frequency response can be simulated (but not its transformer dynamics though) when needed: it does help to bring a guitar up a in a mix sometimes.



So here's the SM57 compensation EQ preset for Spline EQ. This is simply an inverted frequency response of the SM57 - applying this EQ preset brings the frequency response close to neutral.

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