Hello! After a few years playing a G&L Tribute SB-2 in a rock band I decided to get a Gibson EB (made in 2018) for the extra pickup options and tone control. The bass is comfortable, the neck feels great and the pickups sounds really clear and smooth while being able to get quite aggresive. But there a few things about the pickups and controls that are puzzling me. Could anybody weigh in on what they think is going on here?
1) Volume Knob Tapers
The volume for each pickup taper in a way that they go from silent to extremely quiet when turning the knob until it gets to the last few degrees of the turn where the volume suddenly jumps up to 100%. On my previous bass I tended to play with the neck pickup on about 80%, gunning it to full on for specific sections of the set. This isn't really possible with the EB as the volume needs to be full on and even turning down a smidge will make it get lost in the mix.
Connected to this is the fact that blending both pickups there isn't a big variety of tones available. The pickup volume need to be up full to have a noticeable affect on tone. At home, you can hear the subtle difference adding a pickup on half volume makes but it does not make any difference at a live level. A shame as with my previous bass the volume taper of the bridge pickup was very effective when mixing with the neck. So my questions are:
- Is this volume taper normal for this bass?
- Are there any mods I can do that will help make the volume taper more smooth and linear?
2) Pickup Coil Taps (I may be using this term in correctly)
Unlike my experience with the volume knobs, I find the coil tapping options very useful and effective. I find the neck pickup untapped really mid-pokey so I usually use it tapped and reduce the mids around 900hz a smidge. It doesn't feel like much volume is lost when tapping except for the tone becoming slightly mid-scooped.
But one thing I was curious about was that switching between tapped and untapped on a pickup that is at 0 on the volume will alter the tone of the other pickup. For example, I have the neck pickup on full volume and the bridge pickup completely off. The neck pickup's tone will change when I tap or untap the bridge pickup via it's volume knob and vice versa.
- Does anyone know why tapping or untapping one pickup affects the other pickup?
I found lots of useful information in this thread (HERE) but I'm still not quite sure is going on. I'm able to deal with the issue with the volume tapers by trying to control the volume and tone of the bass through working on my technique but I am still curious to know if these issues are normal and if anybody has some expertise on what is going on here. Thanks for any help! It's a great bass.
1) Volume Knob Tapers
The volume for each pickup taper in a way that they go from silent to extremely quiet when turning the knob until it gets to the last few degrees of the turn where the volume suddenly jumps up to 100%. On my previous bass I tended to play with the neck pickup on about 80%, gunning it to full on for specific sections of the set. This isn't really possible with the EB as the volume needs to be full on and even turning down a smidge will make it get lost in the mix.
Connected to this is the fact that blending both pickups there isn't a big variety of tones available. The pickup volume need to be up full to have a noticeable affect on tone. At home, you can hear the subtle difference adding a pickup on half volume makes but it does not make any difference at a live level. A shame as with my previous bass the volume taper of the bridge pickup was very effective when mixing with the neck. So my questions are:
- Is this volume taper normal for this bass?
- Are there any mods I can do that will help make the volume taper more smooth and linear?
2) Pickup Coil Taps (I may be using this term in correctly)
Unlike my experience with the volume knobs, I find the coil tapping options very useful and effective. I find the neck pickup untapped really mid-pokey so I usually use it tapped and reduce the mids around 900hz a smidge. It doesn't feel like much volume is lost when tapping except for the tone becoming slightly mid-scooped.
But one thing I was curious about was that switching between tapped and untapped on a pickup that is at 0 on the volume will alter the tone of the other pickup. For example, I have the neck pickup on full volume and the bridge pickup completely off. The neck pickup's tone will change when I tap or untap the bridge pickup via it's volume knob and vice versa.
- Does anyone know why tapping or untapping one pickup affects the other pickup?
I found lots of useful information in this thread (HERE) but I'm still not quite sure is going on. I'm able to deal with the issue with the volume tapers by trying to control the volume and tone of the bass through working on my technique but I am still curious to know if these issues are normal and if anybody has some expertise on what is going on here. Thanks for any help! It's a great bass.
