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Active vs. passive IRL

I play an active bass _____ % of the time.

  • 100%. All my basses are active.

    Votes: 48 12.5%

  • 80%. Active is definitely the way to go, but I have a passive bass here or there.

    Votes: 65 17.0%

  • 50%. Half and half. Six of one, half-dozen of the other.

    Votes: 79 20.6%

  • 20%. Prefer passive, but I occasionally need a little extra boost in the EQ.

    Votes: 56 14.6%

  • Zero. All passive, all the time.

    Votes: 121 31.6%

  • Carrots

    Votes: 14 3.7%
  • Total voters
    383
G

Greenman72

May 16, 2023
515
862
#1
In real life, when do you play active basses and when do you play passive basses? Do you have certain situations that you prefer one to the other?

Note - For purposes of this thread, "active bass" means "active electronics, using the EQ". If the EQ is completely bypassed with the active/passive switch, then I don't consider that "active".
 
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#4
Going to have active setup with VBT later this week after I mod my daughter's Ibanez Mikro. Active EMGs without adding one of their EQ based control sets.

On the flip side, I have a fully passive bass with treble and bass controls (G&L L2500 with the preamp removed; treble/bass are both passive cut even when preamp is engaged).

In general I am happy to use active, passive, and active/passive basses. Some certainly fit better for certain purposes, but there is plenty of overlap too.
 
#5
Most of us have plenty of tone shaping on our amps (or preamp pedals) so it's more of - can you dial in the tone you want on your bass or on the amp?

In recent years I've found myself playing more active basses, but I don't do many adjustments on the fly, I get them set the way I want that bass to sound, and I use the EQ on the amp to adjust to the specific room/gig needs. Basically I don't want to adjust my amp wildly differently for different basses, I want the basses to bring their own tone and use the amp to boost that and then smooth the edges when needed.

I have plenty of passive basses I love, and some of my active basses sound great passive too. I don't really care if a bass is active/passive, but I think some builders have put thought into specific pickup/preamp combos that they've dialed in for their builds that add a unique voice to those instruments.

Recent example is the Elrick NJS I picked up, the Bartolini pickup/pre combo in that bass sounds so good and different than other basses I have. I don't care that it's active, I care that it has a pronounced voice that I dig. It just happens to be that active electronics are helping create that voice.
 
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#6
My main bass is active, my backup is passive. My third i only use at home is active, And my lady's squier i don't use anymore is passive. So technically 50/50 at home.
As i'm more a one bass man, i'm really happy with my main active. And if my backup would become my main, i think i would add a preamp to it. Find it quite usefull to be able to tweak a little on the spot following playing condition.
 
#7
Of my current, 16 basses, 5 of them are active.

When it comes to gigging, it really doesn't matter to me if they are active or passive. I do prefer an active/passive switch on them, but two of them do not have that and that's ok.

I will play which ever one screams 'Hey, take me!" when I am loading up to head to rehearsal or practice. My only rule there is whichever bass I use at the rehearsal before a gig, that's the one that goes to the gig.
 
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#8
I voted 20% prefer passive.... but it's really more reflective of my current stable than how much I play them. The bass I gig with the most by far in the last 2 years is active, but really only because I find it helpful for the gigs I've been getting (top 40 so several decades and styles... easy tone tweaking at my fingertips). But I use a passive bass in the original metal band I play in. I don't know that I have a preference.... different tools for different gigs.
 
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#11
Greenman72 said:
In real life, when do you play active basses and when do you play passive basses?
Click to expand...
"in real life"
- i play passive axes mostly, but that's because i only have one active ax ATM, and
- rotating all of my EB choices (i have 7 axes) fairly regularly: the active gets ~15% of my attention.
- (i used to play active axes exclusively because i only had one, maybe two, axes at a time!)
- i play passives at my rehearsals because the host supplies a small amp that won't handle my active.

i would have voted for the "it depends" option, but i voted "20%" because it fits my schedule, not because i prefer passive to active.
 
#12
The only time I consciously grab for an active bass is if in doing something ampless so I have a little control over my EQ. Other than that, it's largely a wash. Most of the "active" basses I own just have passive pickups run direct into an onboard preamp module. Even the basses I have that have true "active" pickups aren't radically different from any of the others. A bass is a bass is a bass. I think that's something that only becomes obvious when you own or have access to a large, diverse stable of basses.
 
#13
As of next week (hopefully), I'll own three active/passive basses.

I've been playing them mostly in passive as I play through a preamp/DI most of the time. The only time I would consider playing them in active is when I'm playing through a straight DI, such as the Radial J48 that's at one of the church campuses I occasionally play at.
 
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#15
So, I only own 5 string Ibanez Talman basses so I play actives for everything. They're all flat EQ, bridge pickup, tone rolled all the way off. Gives me that good throaty bass sound I like from prog bands and they take up chorus, octave and tube screamers really well. Plus the extremely hot preamps in these things are really nice.
 
#16
My old and tired story:
I play an active bass, with a push/pull passive switch
I used to play it always active cause bedroom tone
On day my batteries died at rehearsal, so I popped into passive mode.
Once I heard how much better it worked in a live situation, I never went back to active

A decent bass & amp can make 'extra' tone shaping options pointless
At least for me
 
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