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Agressive pickups?

#21
For a nasty, growly P-bass tone, you should check out Lindy Fralin. These have hotter output than current generation stock MIA Fender pickups, and more growl. The also have more clarity across the spectrum, but especially in the lows. I haven't listened to much Wetton-era K.C. lately, but based on my recollection I'd say the Fralin would get you there. Some complain about harsh highs with Fralins, but I don't have a problem. In fact, I like having those ringing highs available even though I usually roll off the treble a bit.

While we're side-tracking into K.C. gigs, my favorite was the Thrak tour with the double power trio lineup. It was just insane, and one of the best shows I've ever seen.
 
#22
High output pups clip the preamp? Sounds a little off to me... My Status or any other bass with an adjustable master volume have the possibility for much higher voltage hitting the pre. Consider that I run an Eden Nav pre of a Mesa 400+ I'd sure notice this. Pehaps you just didn't like they way they sound. Not to mention that almost everyone seems to be running some sort of a "fuzz/overdrive" pedal that might also be clipping the input stage.

Rio's may not be today’s "in boutique" pups but they are ferocious, one of my pals (Patrick Young) who played bass in the 80's hair/metal band Black "n" Blue loves the tone and all out balls to the wall aggressiveness of these pups.

I have them in the "P" MuyGrande and the MM Muy Grande format - fat, grinding and plain old nasty tone!!!

As for a sound clip - I'll see what I can do!

Cheers,

Toby
 
#23
atrapp said:
High output pups clip the preamp? Sounds a little off to me... My Status or any other bass with an adjustable master volume have the possibility for much higher voltage hitting the pre.
Click to expand...

umm, Yeah, well it stands to reason that unless you want to clip the pre, you have to run the pre at a lower level if you are running a relatively hot bass, no ? Stuffing too much wire into a small space seems to have the affect of robbing upper mids and hi's to my ear. I need those freq's in my signal chain! If the ony reason I'm putting that wire in is to get a hotter signal at the front end - then Why ? I don't hook my bass to the cabinet. I hook it to the amp. I let the amp do the work I bought it for...

I run a Radial Bassbone on the floor rather than active pre's on board for the most part. (Never say never, I have an active bass in the works. This time with an Audere.)

atrapp said:
Consider that I run an Eden Nav pre of a Mesa 400+ I'd sure notice this. Pehaps you just didn't like they way they sound.
Click to expand...

No question - to me clipping rob's punch. I want impact and punch, not distortion. Basically to my way of thinking out and out distortion robs punch. and in my book - what remains is undefined noise. I'm not fan of Eden and certainly not of Mesa. Perhaps out tastes diverge ? There is a huge differnce between volume and punch.

atrapp said:
Not to mention that almost everyone seems to be running some sort of a "fuzz/overdrive" pedal that might also be clipping the input stage.
Click to expand...

Only those folks that want muddy undefined sound. Personally I want the punch of a 'tunable kick drum'. A fuzz box should be reserved for a very occaisional and 'special' application IMO. YMMV, but they still suck tone and punch for the most part.

Well I do run a Route 66 OD/Comp - on my guitar rig... I will find a BrassMaster one day and I might use it for 1 song a night. I may also go for nights without using it. There is no question in my mind - Distortion in a bass rig sucks - big time.

atrapp said:
Rio's may not be today’s "in boutique" pups but they are ferocious, one of my pals (Patrick Young) who played bass in the 80's hair/metal band Black "n" Blue loves the tone and all out balls to the wall aggressiveness of these pups.
Click to expand...

I've worked with Muy Grandes in one bass. That bass was over the top brite. 1 pc Ash body, stock Ceramic J pickups, hi - mass bridge, uber-stiff 6 bolt neck joint. That sucker needed taming on the hi end. Rio's, as dark as they are fit the bill as they helped tame the high end.

atrapp said:
I have them in the "P" MuyGrande and the MM Muy Grande format - fat, grinding and plain old nasty tone!!!

As for a sound clip - I'll see what I can do!

Cheers,

Toby
Click to expand...

For me, the agressive tone really hasn't anyting to do with hi output from the bass. It's a matter of gain structure and EQ through the entire rig! Getting full frequency response from your bass is paramount as you can cut information that you find objectionable out of your signal with EQ - you cannot manufacture information (missing frequencies) to cleanly replace that which is not there. You can mask it with distortion but once you get a taste of clean and punchy - it's unlikely you'll be going back. It does require that you work the hell out of your picking hand and picking technique though ...

Rio's have their place. No doubt. They are dark however and that has to be taken into account when spec'ing pickups for a particular bass. Personally I hope never to have another bass so brite that it requires Rio's to tame it ...
 
#25
funny thread...

We all have our own opinions as to what "aggressive" pups sound like, and we have the pups we like and those we don't. I think the Rios sound "aggressive." If you don't, fine. If they clip the pre and it still sounds cool to me, I don't care. If you think a fretless Squire with piezos sounds aggressive, cool. But, don't try and tell me I'm "wrong" about what my ears hear from whatever bass/pup/pre/amp/cab I happen to groove on - without having heard that particular combo. Geez.

Now it looks like 4Mal and BartMan live in my general area, being that they are the most vocal critics of these pups - come give 'em a listen.
Click on the email link down below or got to www.tobyrapp.com for my number, lets have few cocktails or beer, maybe I'll Q up some rib - so we can get sauce all over the strings. Heck bring your wives or girlfriends they can hang with my gal.

Toby
 
#26
I'm headed out to Boring tonight to catch Arbitrary's band. Rumor has it Bartman may attend. I pm'ed Fish Slapper earlier ... pm for the details if you want to meet up.

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, right ? So we all have this sound in our head and it sounds just right to us. I mentioned earlier that for me 'aggressive' sounds like Chris Squire on Roundabout, Flea on BSSM, I can add Geddy on say Freewill. When you listen to those sounds they're pretty clean for the most part.

These days the guy I would be closest to emulating would probably be Conrad Lozano from Los Lobos (on a good night, on a good night) so cleary - aggressive bass tone, the way it is presented by those other 3 guys is not part of my daily act.

I sold off the JB-2 with Rio's I offered to buy the Rio's back if the buyer didn't like 'em. He was kind of skeptical as I didn't have the original pickups. Once he heard the bass it was like - oh, now I get it. In that one the whole thing was in balance - because of the Rio's ... I'm a huge believer in the balance thing. It starts at your finger tips and works it's way to the drivers or recorder. Every step of the chain has an impact on the end result. So you go a little dark here to compenstare for a little brite there...

I was talking with Chance last weekend. He seems to be getting pretty high on Delano. He's been pretty into Fralin and Rio, of course. I gather he's also trying to hook up with Audere. I hope he get's that working.

Next to the Dark Star, and maybe the Radial Bassbone, the Audere is about the coolest thing I've come across in a long time. I've got a hulk ready to transform - and Dave is having trouble sourcing one of the pot's I want for my admittedley oddball control layout. darn it ...
 
#27
atrapp said:
funny thread...

We all have our own opinions as to what "aggressive" pups sound like, and we have the pups we like and those we don't. I think the Rios sound "aggressive." If you don't, fine. If they clip the pre and it still sounds cool to me, I don't care. If you think a fretless Squire with piezos sounds aggressive, cool. But, don't try and tell me I'm "wrong" about what my ears hear from whatever bass/pup/pre/amp/cab I happen to groove on - without having heard that particular combo. Geez.

Now it looks like 4Mal and BartMan live in my general area, being that they are the most vocal critics of these pups - come give 'em a listen.
Click on the email link down below or got to www.tobyrapp.com for my number, lets have few cocktails or beer, maybe I'll Q up some rib - so we can get sauce all over the strings. Heck bring your wives or girlfriends they can hang with my gal.

Toby
Click to expand...

I'm unaware of having criticized any pickups. I've never even heard the Rios or the Delanos, so I can't say anything either way about them. I'd love to hear your band, and since my wife will be on sabbatical pretty soon, there's a good chance I can sneak out and do that some time.

I do like the Dark Star pickups, though, as 4mal can attest. (I'm buying his Dark Starred bass this weekend). :D

I'll be at arbitrary's gig tonight too. He'll most likely be using my rig (Brunetti/Bergantino) as I wanted to hear what it sounds like in the mix from the audience's perspective.

Bart
 
#28
I just dropped a Delano PMVC5 into my Lull P-5, replacing the stock Basslines pickup (which was just kinda plain vanilla, to my ears). Wow....the Delano added not only a good bit of output (but still very manageable), but quite a bit of sonic dimension as well. Fatter and more aggressive at once. More detail in the mids, especially. I like it...a lot. :hyper:
 
#29
Well as of now, the jury seems split over the rio grandes and the delano pickups. I can't find a place to buy the delanos at, so thats a deciding factor along with price. I like the look of the rio's better, as I'm going for less modern look, but looks don't matter that much if it means a big difference in sound.

Also I'm really considering a Darkstar, but I might just get the p- and mm pickups, then route the p-space bigger so I can fit a darkstar if i want to. Darkstars are pretty expensive, so I don't think they're really an option at this point in time.
 
#32
I'd change the title if I could, but I don't know how, sorry.

Well I'd ike to order as many parts for this bass from one place, and Warmoth seems to have the largest selection of items for fairly decent prices. Online, I'm ordering a maple/ maple jazz neck, possibly a tremelo bridge of some sort, and all the electronics and accesories needed to get this bass up and running. The body I'll buy at a local lumber yard, and I already have some of the other parts.

I know Warmoth has a good selection of everything I need, and for my pick-ups, they have the Rio Grande muy grande p-pickup and quite a few other choices. On Warmoth, however, they don't have a Rio MM pick-up, so out of Warmoth's pick-up selection, what MM pick-up (or any other aggresive pickup suited for the neck position for that matter) do you think is suited for me?
 

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