Radio Interference

This is the problem: While recording vocals, my singer has been getting so much radio interference that the tracks are unusable. The recording setup is extremely low budget, being done in his apartment with equipment from Radio Shack (mic and preamp), but the interference is a recent problem. Can anyone suggest a way of reducing the interference? Better equipment and recording environment would seem the obvious answers, but there's no room in the budget for any upgrades right now. Thanks.

Wrap the entire apartment in a lead shield?  Or at least aluminum foil?

Well, if it didn't do it before, then it's developed a fault that needs repairing, rather than replacing. It doesn't matter whether it's expensive or cheap as far as RFI is concerned - the most expensive kit in the world can be vulnerable to this.

There's a moderately good chance that the mic lead is faulty. Often, breaks in part of the screen can result in increased sensitivity to it. If you can simply unplug the mic, and the interference stops, then get somebody to look at the cable, especially each end of it, for starters. But if the interference continues, then you will have got some sort of a system fault, and that might be rather harder to diagnose from a distance.

There are all sorts of other potential things to eliminate as well - not the least of them being things like a large increase in the amount of radiated signal in a given spot. Has anybody started up a taxi service in the neighbouthood? This has been known to cause all sorts of problems.

If you don't feel confident to chase this down yourself, then get somebody else to have a look - because it really shouldn't be happening and it is generally fixable.

How close is the environment to the offending station? If it's fairly close there many not be anything that can be done, however, you may want to contact the offending station and let them know as there may be a problem with their transmitter. I would first try reorienting the setup. It could be something simple as moving one cable or even replacing a cable with a better sheided one. If you are in a metopolitan area it could be that the radio station's signal is reflected off of tall buldings (multipath). If you are very close to the station and it's a high powered one you may be out of luck as the RF field would be too strong.  Hope this helps.

Thanks for the advice. We'll see if we can get this fixed.