Club Alleva Coppolo (Part V)

[Wilbyman]

I think there is a real difference in the sound incident to 60's-70's bridge pickup location, but it may be more of a "feel/response" matter more than actual "sound".

I feel most of the small differences we perceive are psychoacoustic perceptions of changes in "response" rather than actual sound. When I'm in the audience listening to my bass being played, it just sounds like BASS to me.

When I had my Lakland 44-94, I could split the back quad coil into upper and lower "J" pickups and there was a noticable difference in response (and perceived "sound") depending on the coil. The 60's-70's thing is "there" but the PU position is just part of it. There are lots of other "between" interpretations...like the Daryl Jones (swamp ash/60's spacing) which yield some variation of the J bass sound.

Looking for "CLASSIC FENDER SOUND" is like looking for God, it is too many different things to too many different people to quantify it and say "this is what does it!"

W

 

[bucephylus]

It is my experience that the 60's versus 70's pickup position has a relatively minor impact.

I'm not saying it won't make any difference, especially when soloing the bridge pickup, where the 70's will be a touch more midrangy, but IMO the slight pickup placement difference would be overwhelmed by the impact of body weight and fretboard material.

IMO.

Hi Ken,

Not sure I agree with that assessment.

CBS moved the bridge pup about 1/4" closer to the bridge. If you consider the physics of what's going on, that position will tend to emphasize more upper harmonic content; simply because those vibrations have a relatively higher presence as you go toward the bridge.

I believe for slap playing, that will give a brighter high end sheen; though depending on your ears and how you hear and/or are evaluating your tone, you may or may not pick it up.

For pizz playing, and particularly playing over the bridge pup, that delivers a significantly better cutting tone and emphasis of upper harmonics. In fact, for pizz playing with pre-CBS styled instruments (a la Sadowsky Ultra Vintage or AC LG), I would personally specify '70's placement, purely due to the harmonic enhancement reasons. I think that position was perhaps the one design change the CBS "engineers" made that was, for some, an improvement. Subtle though it may be.

IMO/IME

 

[svtb15]

I agree with you..
Oh the bent plate sounds great!... its not night and day difference to me.. but there is some.
the bent plate is woodier perhaps for lack of another word... it does have deep lows too.. but the lows are maybe slightly more enhanced with low mids..??? which makes it sound thick...with guts... the Alleva sounds wider ever so slightly... with extended hi's which is more open... but again very slight.. but noticeable...
I like the stainless steel barrels of the Bent plate.... I love the way it looks on the kbp5 to.. it does make it vintagy sounding... its punchy... and it has alot of sustain when i have new roundwounds on it...
My kbp5 is so light in weight and with that bridge it sounds very 60s fender P bass... it can go from jamerson type tone to john wetton of king crimson...

Jimmy has wound a new style vintage P 5 pickup for me and i will be trying it out this week... in fact it is "OUT FOR DELIVERY" as i type..

the PU that is the original is low mid punchy and warm sounding and very thick.. in a good way!! i cant wait to try the new one which should theoretically be more open in the top with a wider bottom...... some guys in LA really like the original PU when compared to the new demo that he has wound... maybe he can offer both in the future to tailor what the customer wants... thats up to him and he is the master builder.. i like to push the envelope and see how close he can get to vintage
he has shown he can do that

 

[KJung]

Hi Ken,

Not sure I agree with that assessment.

CBS moved the bridge pup about 1/4" closer to the bridge. If you consider the physics of what's going on, that position will tend to emphasize more upper harmonic content; simply because those vibrations have a relatively higher presence as you go toward the bridge.

I believe for slap playing, that will give a brighter high end sheen; though depending on your ears and how you hear and/or are evaluating your tone, you may or may not pick it up.

For pizz playing, and particularly playing over the bridge pup, that delivers a significantly better cutting tone and emphasis of upper harmonics. In fact, for pizz playing with pre-CBS styled instruments (a la Sadowsky Ultra Vintage or AC LG), I would personally specify '70's placement, purely due to the harmonic enhancement reasons. I think that position was perhaps the one design change the CBS "engineers" made that was, for some, an improvement. Subtle though it may be.

IMO/IME

+1.. again, not saying no impact, just for many of us, the pickup voicing, the wood, the weight, the strings, the fretboard material, etc. seem to have as much or bigger impact. No wrong or right answer here. Just wanted to make clear to the poster who asked the question that, IMO, an LG with 70's pickup position will sound MUCH more like a stock LG than an LM

 

[mothra2]

I agree that every change in every instrument impacts the tone someway. I guess my point would be that once Anthony has that exact pickup placement picked that sounds just perfect, it would sound totally different with another brand of strings, or moving your hand position slightly.

I'm relatively picky, and pride myself on being able to hear many subtle differences among basses, amps, etc. However, sometimes thing just get a bit silly IMO.

C'mon Ken, now really....this is not to suggest that you can't hear the clay dots.

 

[KJung]

C'mon Ken, now really....this is not to suggest that you can't hear the clay dots.

Creamy, with a touch of earthy flowering 'clayiness' (assuming mid Georgia clay, of course).

Hey, I love noodlin' this stuff as much as anyone and just like talkin' about it. There is such an interaction with all these different components, that I try not to talk about what a specific component 'sounds like', since it will sound different i the context of different component mixes.

However... I LOVE my LM5 with 70's pickup placement

 

[KJung]

I think there is a real difference in the sound incident to 60's-70's bridge pickup location, but it may be more of a "feel/response" matter more than actual "sound".

I feel most of the small differences we perceive are psychoacoustic perceptions of changes in "response" rather than actual sound. When I'm in the audience listening to my bass being played, it just sounds like BASS to me.

When I had my Lakland 44-94, I could split the back quad coil into upper and lower "J" pickups and there was a noticable difference in response (and perceived "sound") depending on the coil. The 60's-70's thing is "there" but the PU position is just part of it. There are lots of other "between" interpretations...like the Daryl Jones (swamp ash/60's spacing) which yield some variation of the J bass sound.

Looking for "CLASSIC FENDER SOUND" is like looking for God, it is too many different things to too many different people to quantify it and say "this is what does it!"

W

+1... that Lakland thing was strange, since I don't think either position was 'Fender exact', and the difference in position of each coil was quite a bit more extreme than the 1/4" difference of the 60-70 thing. Neither sounded very J like to me (although that could have been the original Barts I had in mine), but they did sound a bit different.

I could definitely hear a change in the mid character of the 55-94 I had when switching the coils on the MM pickup, so +1 there.

 

[Dan Knowlton]

I agree with you..
Oh the bent plate sounds great!... it does make it vintagy sounding... its punchy... and it has alot of sustain when i have new roundwounds on it...

I certainly agree with your take on the bent plate - I LOVE mine.

I talked with Jimmy about the new pickups at the LA Bass Day but have decided that (for now..of course) I'm going to stick with the original pickups. IMHO, it is just perfect.

I hate to say it, but I am not playing my Ken Lawrence Brase as much as I used to - Jimmy's basses are that good!

Dan K.

 

[KJung]

I certainly agree with your take on the bent plate - I LOVE mine.

I talked with Jimmy about the new pickups at the LA Bass Day but have decided that (for now..of course) I'm going to stick with the original pickups. IMHO, it is just perfect.

I hate to say it, but I am not playing my Ken Lawrence Brase as much as I used to - Jimmy's basses are that good!

Dan K.

The LG models just scream for the bent plate... very vintage looking, and still high quality and 'beefy' looking also. Nice!

 

[Bernie Connors]

The LG models just scream for the bent plate... very vintage looking, and still high quality and 'beefy' looking also. Nice!

I'm with ya on that! I love it on mine and it's a high quality bridge too. Nothing lacking there.

 

[Vic]

CBS moved the bridge pup about 1/4" closer to the bridge.

Actually, it was 1/2".

+1... that Lakland thing was strange, since I don't think either position was 'Fender exact', and the difference in position of each coil was quite a bit more extreme than the 1/4" difference of the 60-70 thing.

Also, any time you don't have a 34" scale, IMHO, it's kinda' crazy to even say "70's" pickup position.

 

[jonno1707]

Yea I really dig the bent plate on my LG as well...I needed to use some loctite to stop the screws from moving around but other than that she is perfect!

 

[Vic]

The LG models just scream for the bent plate... very vintage looking, and still high quality and 'beefy' looking also. Nice!

Yeah, I'm still very torn on this. I like the look of the bent plate, but I like the tonal descriptions of the hipshot (and the cost savings, for that matter. ).

 

[biggreddbass]

The LG models just scream for the bent plate... very vintage looking, and still high quality and 'beefy' looking also. Nice!

I can't say enough about how the bent plate has added to the sound & overall vibe of my LG5. I find that the amount of sustain that it provides is perfect to add a more vintage flavor to the sound of the bass.
I have tried all 3 bridges(badass, hipshot, bentplate) in the 4 + years of my LG5 and they all sound great .... it just depends on what you from the bass. Once I got a different Coppolo bass with 70's spacing that was more modern sounding, i really wanted my LG5 to become my "old sounding" bass. The bent plate bridge definitely helped to give me more of what I wanted to hear from my LG5.
I am also really curious to know what an LM5 would sound like with the bent plate bridge. Does anybody out there have one?

 

[jonno1707]

I can't say enough about how the bent plate has added to the sound & overall vibe of my LG5. I find that the amount of sustain that it provides is perfect to add a more vintage flavor to the sound of the bass.
I have tried all 3 bridges(badass, hipshot, bentplate) in the 4 + years of my LG5 and they all sound great .... it just depends on what you from the bass. Once I got a different Coppolo bass with 70's spacing that was more modern sounding, i really wanted my LG5 to become my "old sounding" bass. The bent plate bridge definitely helped to give me more of what I wanted to hear from my LG5.
I am also really curious to know what an LM5 would sound like with the bent plate bridge. Does anybody out there have one?

In your opinion how do the Badass and Hipshot compare on an LM model?

 

[cnltb]

Some top players actually go to the lengths of testing and re-testing different positions even down to a 36th of an inch before the pickup hole is routed...

Even I have done that...

 

[biggreddbass]

In your opinion how do the Badass and Hipshot compare on an LM model?

IMO, the Badass II has the most mass and is extremely focused. It might just be my ears, but I think that the Badass bridge chokes some of the tone from the bass ... not sure how else to describe it.
The Hipshot, however, sounds focused, feels good under your hands, and offers the quick release option. So far, it is my (and jimmy's, of course) preferred bridge for the LM's.
I think that the Hipshot Bridge gives a more open sounding tone than the Badass II.

 

[jonno1707]

IMO, the Badass II has the most mass and is extremely focused. It might just be my ears, but I think that the Badass bridge chokes some of the tone from the bass ... not sure how else to describe it.
The Hipshot, however, sounds focused, feels good under your hands, and offers the quick release option. So far, it is my (and jimmy's, of course) preferred bridge for the LM's.
I think that the Hipshot Bridge gives a more open sounding tone than the Badass II.

Cool...

 

[mothra2]

...
Also, any time you don't have a 34" scale, IMHO, it's kinda' crazy to even say "70's" pickup position.

+1

 

[biggreddbass]

Hey guys ... I just spoke to Walter Cosby on Facebook.
His Modern 4, the one & only, got stolen at a gig several weeks ago.
I believe he lives in the DC area.

"The A C Modern 4 (got stolen) as I was bringing in both A Cs I own to my regular gig. Had it leaning against my car and didn't see anyone around who would bother with it. "

Let's all send him positive vibes that it turns up soon.