Coles 4038

What I thought was more annoying was that no stand mounts are included, and because of the way the mic is designed, it doesn't fit in any universal sh...

You want the mid-range to feel like it's in front of you, you want the low end to hit you properly and you don't want too much sizzle on the cymbals. ...

But yeah, it has really nice, thick sound. It works really well as drum overheads.

The only vocal microphone I know of that flattens sibilance better than an SM7 would be a ribbon like the Coles 4038. Incredible microphone, but it’s expensive, figure-eight and may not be a good fit for every voice, as the high end is a fair bit subdued.

The Coles 4038 is an excellent recommendation if ribbons and figure eight work for you and your room. I’ve got the Coles and the C414 b-ULS you mentioned. Both work very well but are very different. My current go to pair are Gefell UM70’s - when those don’t work I put up the Coles.

I'll just share what I do being an alto and baritone sax player with the same goals. Ribbon mics are great, and too my surprise, after spending quite some time on finding the right mic placement, I needed to apply less processing when using the T-bone 500 than when using the coles 4038 which are around twenty times the price... If it were me, I'd stay clear from any condenser microphones for what you want to do. I have kind of an exception which is tube mics.