I'm a big fan of alembics, especially in the hands of Jimmy Johnson and Stanley Clarke. To me it seems that the alembic series basses' electronics just have a glorious treble sheen, that I have yet to find in other basses. However I'm never gonna be able to afford a series II :crying:
I'm thinking of having made a custom bass from renowned danish bass maker Johnny Mørch www.morch-guitars.dk, and in this proces, I would like to know if any of you know of alternatives in regard to pickups/electronics, that can give me that alembic-esque sound?
I'm considering EMG's, but wasn't happy with the J's I had in my '77 Jazz. Their treble was too "artificial" for me, but perhaps one of the EMG soapbars can give that extended, sweet treble, I'm looking for.
I should mention that single-coil is what I'm after.

Any input will be greatly appreciatet.

Thanks!

I have Alembic Activators in my jazz bass, couldn't be more pleased with them. Alembic pickups will get you the alembic-esque sound, but of course it will never sound or respond like a series bass.
filters man filters!
good luck!

I put EMG's in my P bass , then switched them out for Alembic Activator system as well. I will never go back to EMG's :)

thanks a lot!
Well activators... I probably would feel like i was only getting the second-best, you know?
I think, I should look into other companies, how crazy that might sound.
Perhaps Q-tuner p.u's and Glock onboard pre.

Anyone with better ideas?

FWIW:

Haven't had the Q's or Glock. Have had approaching a hundred different bass pups and numerous preamps - including Alembic activators. Including EMG's. EMG's sound like EMG's. Nothing has put a tone like the Alembics, especially that filter. Oddly, a PV T-40 pup actually sounds more similar to the Alembic pups than any other pup I've ran across.

I've also ran a variety of pups through the Alembic pre and ran the Alembic Pups through other pre's. I expected to find the tone in the pre. Interestingly enough, the pups had the tone as well - just not the tone variation the filter throws in with the pre.

Looking forward to hearing the idea that would be better than buying Alembic if you want Alembic tone.

A series I Alembic harnes recently sold on ebay for over 1K.

On occasion I play a Steinberger XL(they no longer make them)and believe it or not I can get the Alembic sheen you speak of(I've owned 3 Alembics over the years,2 series 1 and one series 2,I still have my 76 series 1 omega cut,lED's etc)if you trust Johnny Mørch to make your Bass I'm sure he can offer some insight into the tone that you are seeking and the end result will be an awesome Bass.


I traded a series 1 Alembic for my first Steinberger XL in 83(and no I don't regret it).

Thanks for your insights!
I'll continue this mind-project.....
Other inputs are very welcome!

Alot of Stanley's tone comes from Stanley. His hands are huge and light gauge strings on a short scale instrument have a major influence on his tone. There is enough glue in all those hardwood laminates to sink a ship and brass nut and bridge don't hurt. Pickups are hum cancelling on the S2. Ebony finger board, neckthrough. Man, aint no way its just the pickups brah. Try light gauge bass strings on a telecaster and see if your not closer to the tone you are hearing. Follow Mr. Levin and go with three strings filling every other nut slot. Trebalert.

I'm a huge Alembic fan, myself. But, if you haven't thought about it already, here's another approach that might hold some promise. Fred Hammon has recreated the old single coil Hagstrom pu's that Jack Casady and Phil Lesh used to play on their Guild Starfires. These pu's and those basses were the genesis of Alembic's development of its current electronics. I've installed Fred's Dark Star pu's in a couple of my basses. I've found that, paired with a Bart 3 band pre, they give me a very nice blend of the refinement (crystaline highs) my Alembic S2 had and an earthier punch than I could get with the Alembic. Lakland and a number of indie builders are enthusiastically offering Dark Star pu's in their basses as well as many people doing retrofits into all kinds of instruments. Here's Fred's website: http://basspickup.com/index.htm.

BTW - Taojonz is right about what makes a Series 2 a Series 2. The pickups and electronics are pretty sophisticated (the magnets on those single coils are huge - the S2 electroncs alone weigh over 2 lb.). Also note the S2 pu's are single coil (unlike all other Alembic pu's). That gives them more and clearer highs, but requires extensive noise surpression circuitry in the electronics package. But, when all's said and done: Alembic builds their basses for maximum sustain, between the neck through design, multilaminated necks (incorporating very dense woods), brass bridge, "sustain block" (8 oz. chunk of solid brass inset into the body on top of which the bridge is mounted), brass nut, ebony board, etc. A lot of this can be produced using similar parts and design (just think: I want a really, really heavy bass.), but at some point, you just have to think that Alembic does it better. Also, consider Stanley plays a short scale (30.5") and uses super light strings: 25,35,60 and 75. Here's a link about this custom-made Rotosounds: http://alembic.com/club/messages/393/29263.html?1151314551. Good luck.

As Johnny Mørch has a reputation of being both a great luthier and a pick up and electronics wizard, there's no doubt in my mind that he'll be able to build you a bass, with his own pick ups and electronics, that will give you the exact sound you're looking for. So if I were you, I'd give him a call to see if he could deliver what you want, while keeping all the good tips provided here in mind.

Good luck! I wish I was in a position to even consider having a Mørch bass built. Most of them look great, and all seem to be wonderful instruments.

Thanks alot guys!
The Darkstar is certainly an interesting new angle, I'll look into.
As for the Mørch, it's still considerably cheaper than an Alembic, and Johnny is great to deal with, hell make your craziest ideas come true!
I'm off to vacation, so no replies from me the next 14 days.
But please, give me more input!

my morch is one of the best basses i've ever played. so were other morch's that i played. why not go with morch's electronics? they are amazing!!! my bass has his stacked pickups which can be switched from humbucker to single coil with a push/pull knob and can go passive/active with a different push/pull knob. the treble and bass boost/cuts are in a stacked knob and i have passive tone shaping and a blend too (and duh...there is a volume). i'm a big fan of a sweepable mid too - noll makes a killer pre with a sweepable mid that can be found in a ton of european basses including ritters and basslines.

also, i've heard good things about the glockenklang (sp?) pre, but have no in person experience with anything outside of their amps...if their pre is half as impressive as their amps...that's the pre to with. what body model/scale length were thinking for your morch? i love my 36" curl!!!

Is a Morch really cheaper than a second hand Alembic? Although it's not like it used to be (my Series I was $750!), they can still be had pretty reasonably. For some reason Alembics just don't command great resale prices. I think that if you want an Alembic, you should get an Alembic. On the other hand a Morch seems like a great way to go for it's own sake!

Just a thought.

Edwin

Here's one way to go:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v371/Hammon/superfilter.jpg

BTW. Dark Stars and their Hagstrom Bi-Sonic fore-runners sound nothing like Alembic pickups. They are high impedence and wound such that their frequency response runs deeper into the low end.
When Wickersham, Rick Turner et al used them in their early bass modifications they lowered the Z with emiter followers before running the signal into the active preamps.
Rick Turner started literaly "hand winding" wire around bar magnets, counting turns 1-2-3- until he got tired or lost count (he sez) which yielded lo-Z pickups that Ron tested and found to be of a very broad frequency width but perhaps shifted more to the higher end of the frequency spectrum as compaired to the Hagstroms.
With the active preamp, dialing in a little bass with the lo-pass filter and voila!

These very early Alembic pickups have come into my posession.
Their from Phil Lesh's Alembic Osage bass that as it turns out came on to hard times with excessive and senseless modifications and is now presumed lost.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v371/Hammon/pickups1.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v371/Hammon/hist_Phil.jpg

Hey Fred. Sad to say, I've found my DS's sound quite similar to the sound I used to like most from my S2 -- when the DS's are running through the Alembic Superfilter.;)

I use the high pass filter in the Superfilter much the way I would use the on-board high pass on an Alembic bass, and ...voila! Maybe I'm not seeking the sound you feel is missing from your DS pu's that you can find with Alembics.

BTW, Edwin made a good point about used Alembic prices - They tend to be pretty reasonable. Like a new car, a large portion of the dollars spent on a new Alembic seems to evaporate shortly after it goes home with its new Papa. Worth checking out Ebay and some of the other used high end bass sources...

Bill

Heyyyyyyy man!
I didn't say there was something missing with Dark Stars.
Actually I find the Alembic pickups lacking to my taste.
Having said that one of my favorite bass sounds of all time is Phil's
Starfire ( The God Father) on Europe '72 sporting a set of Rick's lo-Z pickups. Phil is playing with a pick which I don't. I love the sound in that context but I'm not Phil nor do I play anything like him. I use DS pickups. They're MY sound.
If I took a gig with a Dead tribute band I would proly play "The Supreme Being" - my own early Alembic modification circa '72.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v371/Hammon/Untitled17.jpg

...sporting set of Rick's trapezoid pickups.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v371/Hammon/Untitled15.jpg

I love showing this fugger off....

Me too, Fred (For a minute, I thought I was defending your product to you - LOL!). I'd tend to agree that DS's have more of what I'm looking for at this point than Alembic electronics. That's why, when good/bad financial fortune (Son gets accepted to NYU.) forced me to part with my S2, I got busy building an active, twin DS'd bass with a Modulus neck. To borrow a phrase most often heard on the Alembic board, my bass has the SOG (Sound of God).

It sounds different than the Alembic to be sure, but the Superfilter lets me slice and dice the tone in ways that result in a very similar sound to the S2. But -- just about any bass sounds better through an SF-2.

Hijacking ended...:ninja:

I use the high pass filter in the Superfilter much the way I would use the on-board high pass on an Alembic bass, and ...voila!FWIW the SVF's onboard an Alembic are low pass filters.

I'm keen to try a set of DS.

For the original poster, why not buy a set of AXY/MXY/Fatboy pickups from Alembic?

FWIW the SVF's onboard an Alembic are low pass filters.

Duh. Whoops. You are correct. The point I was reaching for was that using the high pass, you can isolate and shape the single coil highs from the DS's. Though I explained it backwards (sort of), the texture of those highs is very sweet and smooth - much like the highs from Series pu's. On the other hand, Fred's pu's don't require any filtering to boost low frequencies, where I regularly used the low pass and band pass (on the SF-2) to bump the lows on my Series 2.

My DS'd EBO, played through the SF-2 pretty much nails the sound Phil got from his EBO (with Haggie Bisonics) and the sound of Phil's Godfather (fully Alembicized). The only noticable difference from the Godfather is that the solid EBO lacks some of the "hooty"/"farty" resonance of the semihollow Starfire body.

So, found internet access on my vacation! Thank you all for the input.
I'm wondering about the Alembic superfillter and the Darkstars.
I believe, and please correct me, if I'm wrong, that you can't bring in more treble, than what's inherent in a particular pickup's nature. A SD Quarter Pounder can never sound "hi-fi", no matter how many filters you put after it.
Many of you guys have mentioned early Alembic users like Lesh and Cassady, as well as Stanley.
The sound that's more or less the Holy Grail to me, is more like Jimmy Johnson with James Taylor and Allan Holdsworth.
To me the most beautiful post-Jaco bass tone, clear, defined with deeeep lows and lots of overtones.
He doesn't use the onboard filters on his Series II all that much.
So perhaps all that's needed to get a tone like this, is a couple of Low-Z, wide aperture single-coil p.u's with a simple preamp to boost lows and cut excessive highs?
Any suggestions?

I believe, and please correct me, if I'm wrong, that you can't bring in more treble, than what's inherent in a particular pickup's nature. Correct, in the main. The type of filter that Alembic uses allows for up to 12dB of boost at the filters roloff frequency. This is the Q control: some are a three position switch (S1) and a variable control (S2).
The Alembic pickups and the interface with the pre are designed for a wide bandwidth flat response (a QP is far from flat) so that the filter has maximum control over the spectrum.

You're correct about the difference between the Jimmy Johnson sound and the early Alembic Phil Lesh/Casady tones. They are two different animals. I'd still class Stanley's Alembics with JJ's, though - and I've heard him use all the twinkly highs Series 2 electronics are capable of. The difference between the onboard low pass filters in Alembic basses and the switchable Low/high/band pass filters (2) in the SF-2 is dramatic, though. The SF-2 can isolate and highlight highs, lows or a defined range (bandpass) - or a combination of any two of these at once. I would suggest the SF-2 as a good tone shaper for almost any application: It's that versatile.