RØDE - M5 Matched Pair

Matched pair condenser mics like the Rode M5 should do the trick pretty inexpensively.

I've just been piecing together a budget home recording setup for my similar 'dude and guitars' music for recording in home office and around a busy house. I.e. very much a crappy recording environment. I've bought a bunch of stuff which collects dust, here's what I recommend based on what I use regularly and would cost about $300: A pair of cheap small diaphragm condensers like the Rode M5 or Lewitt 040 for your acoustic instruments. Also lets you play with stereo recording and works to capture vocals/acoustic at once if you need to. An SM58. Use for vocals and then take the grill/ball off to mic your speaker cab for electric. I tried and failed to get good results with a large diaphragm condenser. When you get a good take they'll make you say 'wow', but they capture *everything* which didn't work for my environment and level of talent... Lastly if you have money left put it into good monitoring headphones. My Sennheiser HD600s are the single best recording purchase I've made. There's zero point recording great audio if you can't hear it.

Just because none of the other responses have mentioned it: when you step up to a "proper" mic you'll need an interface with XLR inputs, and depending on the mic possibly one that can provide phantom power. Unless you get a USB mic, but imo that limits your flexibility going forward. If you only have $200 and you don't already have an interface, you might have to look at either second hand or USB. But when it comes to mics: buy once, cry once. You'll have a good mic for life, and you'll toss a bad one very quickly. Also just to throw my hat in the ring on mics: Rode. I have an M1, NT1 and M5s and they're all great. The M1 is especially good for baritone vocals.

SM57 is great. A small diaphragm condenser like a Rode M5 is also lovely. For a ‘few hundred’ you could get both! https://www.guitarcenter.com/Used/RODE/Used-RODE-M5-Condenser-Microphone-120927661.gc

Did you compare them side by side with others? You'll see that those numbers are totally unreal. Even the Rodes NT5 or M5 have lower self noise

I had great results with Rode M5 but can't remember if it was 2 mics xy or single mic. But yes, love these affordable mics

A RODE M5, a AKG C1000s (bought one used for $100 CAD) or something along those lines would be good affordable choices. But yes try the 57 (that’s used by lots of people) as well as try your WA 87 in that position and see how it sounds

I much prefer the AKG D5 - particularly over the Beta 58. The wired Sennheiser mic's I just don't like the sound. The cab mic's I don't super like either but they do okay if I blend them with a RODE M5. One of these days I'd like to try out the Austrian Audio because that's where a lot of the talent from AKG went.

The vocals on this song were a low end large diaphragm condenser from audio technica and everything else but the drums were rode m5s or sm57. https://youtu.be/P_Vt-Y-U6zo?si=THJt4HiPjkFGmucw From my experience a good performance is what matters the most. The rest of that album was done with high end equipment in the studio but this track doesn’t sound much different even though it was tracked in the bands practice space with the most affordable equipment I could get ahold of. It comes down to good performance, good mic’ing technique and a good mix.

1) Senheisser MKE 440 on camera or 2) Tascam TM2x on camera, either of those feeding directly into camera. and 3) Zoom H1n for backup sound. If I get a dress rehearsal I can set levels (usually down at 1 tick above no gain). I've also used AGC a lot on the camera audio. It's not the best for sure, but for live events you take what you can get. I've added a pair of Rode M5 cardioid condensers and a Tascam 70D, again set to 'low' and 1 tick above zero gain on the dials. That is some beautiful audio if I have time to set it up. (great for concerts - no ideal how I'm going to pull that off for marching band).