Yes, they were active, at least if Jack is considered a trustworthy source on the subject.
You know the legend about if someone was really there in the 60s? So now, this this position being asserted, I'm going to have to defend my position or resign from the thread. That's OK for a few minutes because reading this whole thread and now doing this are helping me procrastinate this morning. And, obviously, its a subject I love.
So, beyond knowing Jack personally, all I can tell you all the way over there in Sweden is that Jack has said about me that I know more about his basses than he ever did. On top of that, I've figured out something about his basses that he either never knew or forgot. Bear once insisted to me that Jack never played a hollow-body bass in the 60s. What can you do? And I'm going to drop this and let you work on it.
As far as what Alembic did, there is far more than the filters. But having gone all the way through this and out the other end for the last 4 decades, for those who aren't already certain they know everything there is to know on the subject: the biggest difference in Jack and Phil's basses and tones and your own is their right hands. Its certainly true to say that Jack's right hand is the biggest part of his tone. But its also true of Phil. How your hand holds the pick, the stiffness and angle of the strike, is what distinguishes Phil. A passive EBO with Hagstrom pickups, a heavily modified Starfire, its all that hand, that angle. The filters make for a fun exploration, every bit as much as the amps do. But its mostly hands and strings. Its work, maybe the work of years, but test it yourself. What Alembic did in those days, before they settled on a product line and became a real company, was, stoked and largely funded by Bear, facilitate exploration. The filters are fun, but they don't make the sound. The musician makes the sound.
Re: Bisonics vs. Dark Stars. Yes, they are different pickups. I prefer DSs. But to really know how different they are takes more than one or two samples. Its might be safe to say that I'm the owner of more of each than anyone in the world, including a box of Bisonics at Rick Turner's shop. Its almost impossible to find sets of Bisonics that sound alike - like anything else, they all age differently. To obsess over it is to be obsessive, and there have been few people more obsessive on this topic than me, or for longer. I find I can use and do use them interchangably, with no thought as to whether the bass has one or the other.
Last time I posted on this topic in talkbass someone cited Dan Schwartz to tell me how wrong I was. Please don't bother; that guy doesn't know anything.
