Brightness issue

[geekrock]

Hi folks,

In your opinion, what makes one P-Bass brighter than another one?

Pots...? Pickups...? Something else?

Changed the cap in my '75 but had no noticeable effect other than making the sound muddier when rolled off.

Thx!


Mark

 

[tylerwylie]

Pickups, series vs parallel wiring. Having a denser higher mass bridge probably makes em brighter, fret material, string type.

 

[geekrock]

Pickups, series vs parallel wiring. Having a denser higher mass bridge probably makes em brighter, fret material, string type.

Do you know which one between series and parallel is the brightest?

 

[Connormac123456]

Stainless steel roundwounds+ maple fingerboard+ Alder for the body=
Perfect combo for brightness in a bass (in my experience)

 

[GlennW]

no noticeable effect other than making the sound muddier when rolled off.

I liked 500k pots with a .1uF cap.

Common sense assumes the 500k pots will make it even brighter; but imo/e the 250k pots are the culprit of mud, and the 500s add a presence (they don't really add anything, but it seems that way because the 250s are tone suckers).

I also like no pots with a cap selection switch, but the 500k's and the .1 cap was pretty good.

 

[InternetAlias]

A buffer circuit, parallel wiring, 1m pots, new strings.

 

[geekrock]

It's not out of hand by the way. I leave the tone up at around 60% and everythin's fine. I just find it too bright when it's all the way on.

I use nickel rounds and it's a rosewood board.

Just found out that parallel wiring is the brightest and is used as hum cancellimg/electrical imterference purposes.

I'm gonna check if that's how my luthier wired it when he changed the harness.

 

[tylerwylie]

Parallel is brighter than series, you lose some low mids but you get more sizzle. Most P pickups come wired as series by default (that cancels hum as well).

Stainless steel strings will sound awesome with a parallel P pickup. Woods don't really matter as much as the other components. Going with 1 Mohm volume/tone pots would leave it wide open as well. Also going active to prevent cable capacitance from sucking yer tone would be beneficial but some people have batteryphobia and are stuck in the 70's .

 

[InternetAlias]

Woods don't really matter as much as the other components.

Neck wood matters A LOT. It's possible to have a neck that's pretty dead in the higher range and it's impossible to get any sort of treble bar fret clank due to it. This happens.

 

[tylerwylie]

Neck wood matters A LOT. It's possible to have a neck that's pretty dead in the higher range and it's impossible to get any sort of treble bar fret clank due to it. This happens.

I think these are the exceptions that prove the rule then, I will contest that the neck woods to account for some of the tone, polls have shown that the difference between neck woods are easier to differentiate than body woods which have little to no impact. But I would say unless you have a bolt on neck with dead spots or a bolt on with a subpar neck pocket, the electrical components and fret material and bridge material have a greater impact.