Does Anybody Use Bartolini M34's?

[EricTheEZ1]

I've found only one post on the whole of Talkbass that even mentions the M34. M34 pickups are Barts replacement of EMG 35 sized housing. I believe they have EMG 40 and 45 sized ones as well.

Does anybody out there use these pickups? Bartolini offers these models:
M34C - bright, smooth humbucker strong lows and low mids

M34K - brighter humbucker - treble enhanced version of the M34C

M34X - brightest, but not harsh, humbucker - more treble and bass than the BB4K

M34E - bright, smooth triple coil design

M34EX - brightest, treble enhanced version of the M34E

If anybody uses any of these or has any comments on them, please post it here. Sound clips would help a lot. Thank You.

-Eric.

 

[luknfur]

FWIW:

had the 34C's, darkest pups I've every had - out of some 75 - 100 pups. For me they were unuseable without using capacitors.

 

[EricTheEZ1]

What kind of bass were you using? Acoustically bright/midrange/dark? I've seen a couple reviews here and there where the person was apprehensive about getting them for fear that they would be too dark and they were quite pleased.

BTW, the bass I'm considering installing these in is a Schecter Elite-4. It's an extremely bright bass for having a rosewood fretboard, especially.

Also, Luknfur, are you ever going to do another pickup showdown? You should do it "basstasters" style so we can hear them all. Just a thought.

-Eric.

 

[luknfur]

What kind of bass were you using? Acoustically bright/midrange/dark? I've seen a couple reviews here and there where the person was apprehensive about getting them for fear that they would be too dark and they were quite pleased.

BTW, the bass I'm considering installing these in is a Schecter Elite-4. It's an extremely bright bass for having a rosewood fretboard, especially.

Also, Luknfur, are you ever going to do another pickup showdown? You should do it "basstasters" style so we can hear them all. Just a thought.

-Eric.

The bass they were in was a Schec Elite 4. I tried a Bart TCT and NTMB with them and too dark to be of use. What ended up working was a passive harness using a 54' Les Paul wiring scheme, like a 47mfd cap to one tone and a considerably variant cap size that escapes me for the other tone. Used the Bart all HB 3 way switching running both inside coils/Both HB/both outside coils. Bassically two J-like tones that brightened it up enough to play to stuff and the dual HB's were tolerable with the added caps.

The M34's were in series. I can't recall if I ever tried them parallel or not. Been too long ago but they weren't wired in that final harness parallel cause I don't recall it having two switches.

Basses of even the same model will vary acoustically. I sold it cause I started routing my basses and so could install soaps in them. It's possible it was an acoustically dark bass anyway. The only way I've really been able to figure the acoustics properties of a bass out is by throwing different pups in them - over time you figure it out. In my limited experience, neckthroughs are darker and compressed tonewise anyway.

I still do periodic pup reviews but I've never messed with clips or recording, so it's not in a basstasters format. I personally find solo tones pretty useless except for solo bass playing which I don't do. Almost invariably, tones that work to music totally suck solo and solo tunes rarely work to music. And the vast majority of time, a pup that puts out choice solo tones doesn't adjust well to music. The best way I know to choose a pup is track record - from written reviews from players and their general comments. Everybody's playing through a myriad of different variables and if there's some concensus in their opionion, you can pretty much bet that pup's worth looking into.

Clips would be good for the Bass Tone Glossary though. Beyond me how everyone's so hung up on samples yet no contributions to the glossary. One just never know, do one?

May get around to it myself at some point but I've been dinking with the micro bass setup lately and that's something I find of personal interest. I would have no personal use for clips aside from sticking them on the glossary. Hard for me to get into anything I could care less about. The pup reviews are primarily a by-product of my own personal interest.

 

[12bass]

My recommendation would be either the M34CX, or M34CB. The CX is the both brighter and deeper, more open sounding version. It's definitely not dark like the C. I have experience with both the C and CX, and would go with the CX (by the way, I think the "X" in your list should be CX).

The CB (Classic Bass) series have received great reviews from players I respect, but I have no experience with them. From what I hear, they too are more present in the highs than the C, but designed to be "vintage" sounding, whatever that means..... perhaps a bit rolled off in the extreme highs compared to the CX.

Here's a Bartolini blurb about the CBs

"Classic Bass" CB series bass pickups are passive designs featuring an extended and more resonant frequency range. They have far more "air" and definition at the top without sacrificing lows and low mids.

 

[luknfur]

I personally find solo tones pretty useless except for solo bass playing which I don't do. Almost invariably, tones that work to music totally suck solo and solo tunes rarely work to music. And the vast majority of time, a pup that puts out choice solo tones doesn't adjust well to music. QUOTE]

FWIW:

By the way, for those who want to draw their own conclusions, easy to do.

Get a good solo tone and try to play it to music. Then adjust the bass to play to a tune, stop the music and play it solo. Tone adjusted to music played solo typically sounds airy, thin, and lifeless (classic vintage Fender being an excellent example) and good solo tones just don't work to music with few exceptions.

I'd never really thought about it but seems I first read it in the Bass Player Mag J pup shootout. Anyway, it stuck and I've paid attention since with my pups swaps/reviews and found it to be so 90% of the time at least. Very seldom in my reveiws do I state theres a good solid solo tone cause the tones I use for the solo tone assessment come from tones to music. Usually they're iffy at best, but occassionally not.