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Lakland 55-OS - NBD

Th3 Fly

Th3 Fly

Jul 30, 2018
23
53
#1
I had recently ordered a Lakland 55-OS and was told to expect delivery in December. Plenty of time to prepare for NBD post on talkbass I mused. Imagine my surprise when I got the call confirming early delivery. Yay! A quick trip to my music hang to buy a case & pick it up. I am now in possession of my lusty desire and am fleetingly absent of want (lets see how long this lasts).
I have owned other Laklands. A Skyline jazz 5er. A p bass. A Korean 55-01 that i particularly bonded with & now the 55-OS. I still have the 55-01 so compared them off the hop. Due to the offset body the 55-OS looks noticeably bigger. I weighed both and the 55-0S only weighed 0.3 lbs more (9.3). The weight is distributed well. I played for an hour and noticed no fatigue.
The neck is simply a joy. Beautiful finish work. No hand gashes from slapping sharp fret ends out of the box. Being at home with bigger necks I feel this is a better fit for me than all the other pencil or baseball shape options out there. I sold a Peavey Cirrus 5 usa to make this happen; great bass but the neck wasn't for me. 1st impressions:
I notice the improvement in the pre amp from the 55-01. Bass is more present and hits with a thud. The toggle switch for cutting and boosting wasn't particularly dramatic but I was able to find some really nice tones switching back and forth with the pickup blend. Cut and boost to taste accordingly. Overall very useful and effective onboard electronics. I see some shade towards the bartolini mk p/u but I'm digging them and have for years. The only time a bass player ever asked me about switching the Barts on his bass I showed him the EQ section on his amp and saved him 300$.
Here are the pics:
 

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#2
Been considering one of these as a "decent pro level bass but not so expensive I'm worried about beating it up at my crazy band's gigs" instrument, but I noticed Sweetwater actually pulled it off their site as of the other day.

It's a conspiracy to push me to the more pricey 55-02 lol
 
#3
Th3 Fly said:
I had recently ordered a Lakland 55-OS and was told to expect delivery in December. Plenty of time to prepare for NBD post on talkbass I mused. Imagine my surprise when I got the call confirming early delivery. Yay! A quick trip to my music hang to buy a case & pick it up. I am now in possession of my lusty desire and am fleetingly absent of want (lets see how long this lasts).
I have owned other Laklands. A Skyline jazz 5er. A p bass. A Korean 55-01 that i particularly bonded with & now the 55-OS. I still have the 55-01 so compared them off the hop. Due to the offset body the 55-OS looks noticeably bigger. I weighed both and the 55-0S only weighed 0.3 lbs more (9.3). The weight is distributed well. I played for an hour and noticed no fatigue.
The neck is simply a joy. Beautiful finish work. No hand gashes from slapping sharp fret ends out of the box. Being at home with bigger necks I feel this is a better fit for me than all the other pencil or baseball shape options out there. I sold a Peavey Cirrus 5 usa to make this happen; great bass but the neck wasn't for me. 1st impressions:
I notice the improvement in the pre amp from the 55-01. Bass is more present and hits with a thud. The toggle switch for cutting and boosting wasn't particularly dramatic but I was able to find some really nice tones switching back and forth with the pickup blend. Cut and boost to taste accordingly. Overall very useful and effective onboard electronics. I see some shade towards the bartolini mk p/u but I'm digging them and have for years. The only time a bass player ever asked me about switching the Barts on his bass I showed him the EQ section on his amp and saved him 300$.
Here are the pics:
Click to expand...

Is the difference only in body size from the 55-01?
 
#5
halcyo said:
Definitely not an expert, but it seems like it's the exact same bass except for a new body shape. I DO like the new shape, but I wish they would do something else new, like different pickups, and my personal dream lakland, experiment with something wild like a multi scale neck or something wild. haha
Click to expand...

Lakland used to sell 55-01's with US Bartolini electronics for about a $300 up charge. Such bass would be a nice for Lakland to bring back.
 
#6
We get an improved pre-amp, fatter A$$ & new cut/boost options with the toggle.
Some improvements to be sure.
I took it to band practice 1st night and it was great in the mix as you would expect. I do love my 55-01 though ...
 
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#7
Dr. Cheese said:
Lakland used to sell 55-01's with US Bartolini electronics for about a $300 up charge. Such bass would be a nice for Lakland to bring back.
Click to expand...

Having not played the US Barts i can only comment on what I've heard through computer speakers but I will say i like these MKs. And honestly I don't see the advantage on a 300$ upgrade option off the hop as the improved pre amp moves these MKs much closer to the grit and definition the US Barts are known for. To my ear at least
 
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#8
Th3 Fly said:
Having not played the US Barts i can only comment on what I've heard through computer speakers but I will say i like these MKs. And honestly I don't see the advantage on a 300$ upgrade option off the hop as the improved pre amp moves these MKs much closer to the grit and definition the US Barts are known for. To my ear at least
Click to expand...

Most folks who have played both prefer US Barts, but it's great if you love the MK1's.
 
#9
I played the stock electronics in my early 2000's 55-01 for years. Always sounded good. I recently upgraded it with a US Lakland preamp and Nordstrand JazzBar 5's- single coil alnico V "60s wound" pickups. Now it sounds really REALLY good. Closer to a 60s bass for sure.
 
#10
Smooth_bass88 said:
I played the stock electronics in my early 2000's 55-01 for years. Always sounded good. I recently upgraded it with a US Lakland preamp and Nordstrand JazzBar 5's- single coil alnico V "60s wound" pickups. Now it sounds really REALLY good. Closer to a 60s bass for sure.
Click to expand...

Did you ever upgrade the pre amp in the 55-01 before the pickup swap? I'm curious how much the preamp will really make a difference vs. pickup swap as the 55-os has the new 5.4 bart pre. This looks to be a step up from the basic pre in the 55-01. I'm happy with the mk1 pickups in the 55-OS but perhaps it is a matter of not knowing what I don't know about the Nords.
 
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#11
Th3 Fly said:
Did you ever upgrade the pre amp in the 55-01 before the pickup swap? I'm curious how much the preamp will really make a difference vs. pickup swap as the 55-os has the new 5.4 bart pre. This looks to be a step up from the basic pre in the 55-01. I'm happy with the mk1 pickups in the 55-OS but perhaps it is a matter of not knowing what I don't know about the Nords.
Click to expand...
I actually did just exactly that. I upgraded the preamp before upgrading the pickups. Certainly the US Lakland pre is better than the one that was in there, but honestly there's not much of a difference in the overall actual tone of the instrument. I heard a much bigger difference in tone when I swapped out the pickups. They sound so great I keep the bass in passive mode mostly.
 
#14
Looks like a cool bass.
I spoke to Carl Pedigo about MK1 pickups and preamps a while ago. He said alot of guys with 55-01's swap different pickups and preamps and quite a few actually come back to the MK1 pickups and a Lakland Preamp.
The MK1 pickups are quite good and the preamp is the weak spot. Sounds like your bass already has the pre rectified. Lots of guys put lots of different pickups (often Nordstrand) in these, but it's definitely a situation where I'd play it and see whether a switch is really necessary for you.

The MK1 system has got to be around 20 years old now, maybe older as I have vague memories of possibly seeing a Cort curbow with MK1 setup in the late 90's. There are alot of 20 year old pickups that still sound great but OEM import preamps have come a long way and I'm kind of surprised Lakland still uses the MK1 Pre. I looove me some Lakland, but IMO, by today's standards the MIK preamp is not good enough for a bass that retails at over a grand. Surely there is some other, better import pre they could put in there at a similar price point. I've noticed that years ago other companies like Ibanez and Cort swapped out the MK pre for their own proprietary models but continued to use the pickups.
 
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#18
I just landed a 2012 55-01 that came to me upgraded but included the stock MK1 stuff. LH-3 and Nordstrand dual coils. I played it for a day and then reverted to stock. I actually like the MKL1 pre and pickups. I can see why some folks diss them though. Lakland has some slap and jazz fans and for them, I think the upgrades provide some refinement. I personally like that the MK1's can get kinda rude in a P-Bass like way. Fit's my playing style.

One thing I had forgotten - Lakland basses seem to take to what ever setup you want easily. I cranked the truss a bit, dropped the saddles and have super low, no clack action with DR SunBeams after about an hour's time. Really easy bass to work on.

PSA - the Nordy DC's and LH-3 are in the GFS ...

I've had a 2011 44-01 since 2012. Literally hundreds of gigs on it. Unlike some folks, I also prefer that my Skyline's come as MII. I've had both MIK and MII. The MIK basses had some flaws, the MII seem to be spot on every time - and the plek job. Yeah, buddy!
 
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#19
Smooth_bass88 said:
I actually did just exactly that. I upgraded the preamp before upgrading the pickups. Certainly the US Lakland pre is better than the one that was in there, but honestly there's not much of a difference in the overall actual tone of the instrument. I heard a much bigger difference in tone when I swapped out the pickups. They sound so great I keep the bass in passive mode mostly.
Click to expand...

I swapped out the MK1 preamp in mine first as well. Went with an OBP3 and NTMB. The difference for me was like night and day. Put a set of MK5's in her at first, then Nord Big Blades, and that added some clarity, and extra umph, but didn't really alter the tone that that much.

DWBass said:
I agree. The MK-1 pickups are not bad at all. The preamp, however was crap, IMHO.
Click to expand...

The MK1 preamp is crap IMO too. I would always play the 55-01 in passive mode. The MK1 pups aren't the worst out there, but I noticed after tracking with it for a while, that the frequency response was a bit lacking. Just too mid range and top end heavy for me, with boomy'ish, ill defined low end.
 
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#20
4Mal said:
I just landed a 2012 55-01 that came to me upgraded but included the stock MK1 stuff. LH-3 and Nordstrand dual coils. I played it for a day and then reverted to stock. I actually like the MKL1 pre and pickups. I can see why some folks diss them though. Lakland has some slap and jazz fans and for them, I think the upgrades provide some refinement. I personally like that the MK1's can get kinda rude in a P-Bass like way. Fit's my playing style.

One thing I had forgotten - Lakland basses seem to take to what ever setup you want easily. I cranked the truss a bit, dropped the saddles and have super low, no clack action with DR SunBeams after about an hour's time. Really easy bass to work on.

PSA - the Nordy DC's and LH-3 are in the GFS ...
Click to expand...
Out of curiosity, did you ever try the MK1 pups with the LH3 preamp?

I admit that my experience with a stock MIK 55-01 lines up with yours. I was quite happy with it stock for most of a decade and many, many gigs. When I finally got the itch, I swapped it up passive with a set of Chisonics.

Liked it well enough but shortly thereafter I got a 44-94 style Carlo. The 55-01 just couldn't complete with the tone, playability, or weight so it was returned to stock and sold.

If given the chance again, I probably wouldn't have gotten the Chisonics or at least not until trying just the preamp upgrade first.
 
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