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Best Precison pups for finger playing?

#22
A lot of quality P-bass pickups are slightly different flavors of the same sound. Many of the ones I've tried sound very similar due to the position of the pickup. There are more aggressive flavors such as the G&L MFD and Quarter Pounders, a ton of vintage variations and more modern sounding pickups like the EMGs. I feel that you can make anything work for fingerstyle or pick playing. I tend to play finger style closer to the bridge and pick more over the pickup. My recommendation is a Nordstrand pickup and go to town.
 
#23
Pickup choice is pretty personal and comes down to what your tastes are, but for my tastes, nothing I've played has ever beaten the EMG Geezer Butler for a Precision sound like you get out of the best vintage Precisions. Perfect mids that are even up and down the mid spectrum but they never get ugly sounding, and a slightly subdued high end that makes pick playing edgy but doesn't drill you with crazy highs unless you want them, in which case you can just crank the treble a little more on the amp.
 
#24
Radio Face said:
If you want to sound better, practice more. A great player will sound great, because he/she practices and plays great, not because this or that brand of pickup is used.
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Which is pretty much BS, because as we all know, different pickups sound, well... Different. Tone really just isn't in the fingers, no matter how much you keep telling yourself it is.
Come on TB, we can do better than this.
 
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#25
DeathFromBelow said:
Which is pretty much BS, because as we all know, different pickups sound, well... Different. Tone really just isn't in the fingers, no matter how much you keep telling yourself it is.
Come on TB, we can do better than this.
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Actually, I don't disagree with the hands thing. If I ever sound bad, I never blame the equipment. OK, I do ;) but if I don't get at least a workable sound out of it, I can't blame the gear. And everything I use ends up sounding like me anyway.

But let's face it...some gear makes it easier for us than others.
 
#28
JimmyM said:
Actually, I don't disagree with the hands thing. If I ever sound bad, I never blame the equipment. OK, I do ;) but if I don't get at least a workable sound out of it, I can't blame the gear. And everything I use ends up sounding like me anyway.

But let's face it...some gear makes it easier for us than others.
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I totally agree. (Just being slightly snarky here...) But your last line nails it IMO. Some gear just holds us back. Sure, you ("you" as in anyone of us) might sound good, but why not treat yourself to something that makes you sound even better? ;)
 
#29
Radio Face said:
If you want to sound better, practice more. A great player will sound great, because he/she practices and plays great, not because this or that brand of pickup is used.
Click to expand...

I get the case to be made for using more responsive pickups - what I don't get is the hair-splitting folks do over which exact flavor of which brand is just right for what type of music. I guess that's why I really liked the SD QPs - they were very responsive and quite strong - better harmonic output than stock Fenders (or at least every stock fender I've ever played). I'm sure the same can be said for any good pair of aftermarket pickups. But yes, the coolest aero/lindy fralin/unicorn drool pickups won't make as big of a difference of learning how to user those fingers better.
David Jayne said:
This, a thousand times this. Having said it, don't overlook Bartolini. I recently installed a Classic in my '08 USA Std. which is generally regarded as having a rather thin sounding stock pickup. Instant improvement. Styles? Finger style is punchy, warm and clean with excellent note definition. Slap is very loud and aggressive but is easily tamed with the tone knob, and with a pick it nails the classic 'P Bass with a pick' sound. Zero noise. Excellent pickup, but again, there are many.
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Funny - I have barts in all but one nearly all of my basses... but I'm not wild about them as passive replacements. Great P'ups with a matching preamp, however.
 
#33
David Jayne said:
You wouldn't think so after getting your hands on my bass, I promise. It sounds quite good.
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What Bart pickups are in your bass?

I guess I could have phrased that better. They don't sound bad passive, the output is just rather weak, and they don't seem as alive as they do when paired with the right preamp. I love them when matched with an Aguilar Pre.
 
#34
Radio Face said:
Great sounding pickups + a lousy bass player = a bad sound. Like I stated before, if you play great, you will sound great, regardless of what pickups your bass has.
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Right, by that logic everyone with great amps or bass just wasted their money because they would sound the same on a $100 pawn shop beater and 50w practice amp. You are using flawed logic my friend.
 
#35
Hopkins said:
Right, by that logic everyone with great amps or bass just wasted their money because they would sound the same on a $100 pawn shop beater and 50w practice amp. You are using flawed logic my friend.
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I don't think that was his intent. I think in principal he's right. Meaning, if you suck, you'll sound like crap no matter what you play . If you're great, you will sound great with any decent bass. He didn't mention amps. We all know how that part works.
Anyway my pickup is an 8S. It's meant to work great passive.
 
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#36
Journey55 said:
Surprised no one has mentioned Bill Lawerence's P46 pickups, they're great!
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Yay! These are awesome.

Without wanting to offend any P-Bass-heads... It's a P bass. There's nothing too complicated to their sound. So, like a lot of people have been saying, any carefully made, well thought out aftermarket pickup is going to sound great. Then it's up to you.

INTP said:
Tone has to be either 100% technique, or it has to be 100% equipment.

Whichever one it is, we should talk about that one ONLY, and never discuss the other one again, FOR-EV-ER.
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I actually agree with the spirit of this post, as far as internet forums go. The OP's question was about equipment. Others (I'd go as far as to call them hijackers or trolls) jumped in with technique advice, unprompted. Does technique affect tone? Well DUH. Does gear affect tone? Well... you see the pattern. In posts about GEAR, let's talk GEAR, in posts about technique, let's talk TECHNIQUE. In posts where, for example, a sound clip is posted and the OP says "help me improve my sound" (i.e., non-specific questions/comments/posts), then, and ONLY THEN should the two things be discussed in the same place. It's presumptuous and actually quite rude to jump in with off topic comments about technique in a specifically gear-related thread.

Hopkins said:
Right, by that logic everyone with great amps or bass just wasted their money because they would sound the same on a $100 pawn shop beater and 50w practice amp. You are using flawed logic my friend.
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Bro, that's not how logic works. You can't infer your conclusion based on the statement you quoted. Just sayin'
 
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#37
I replaced both the stock PU and the greasebucket tone control from my special P, the PU is now a SD QP and the tone control is now controlled by an orange drop capacitor and now it sounds more like it. But that is too my taste and everybody is different they're sayin you know...
 
#38
David Jayne said:
I don't think that was his intent. I think in principal he's right. Meaning, if you suck, you'll sound like crap no matter what you play . If you're great, you will sound great with any decent bass. He didn't mention amps. We all know how that part works.
Anyway my pickup is an 8S. It's meant to work great passive.
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This post basically says that it doesn't matter what pickups you have in your bass. If you suck you suck, but if you sound good with a garbage pickup, then you will sound that much better with a nice sounding one. This tone is 100% in the fingers argument is pure nonsense.
 
#40
Hopkins said:
This post basically says that it doesn't matter what pickups you have in your bass. If you suck you suck, but if you sound good with a garbage pickup, then you will sound that much better with a nice sounding one. This tone is 100% in the fingers argument is pure nonsense.
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That's just not what is says at all. You're "logic" is completely flawed.

"Great sounding pickups + a lousy bass player = a bad sound" in no way logically implies "it doesn't matter what pickups you have in your bass".

Think about it.
 

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