Music Man sound and pickups

[BassLife77]

I have an OLP MM3 5 string. I had a Wilkinson MM pickup installed in it. My problem is that there are almost no highs coming through. I've changed strings and even with the treble dimed, it's still muddy.

Any suggestions of tips would be welcome. TIA

More than likely its the pickup. The problem with those mass produced chinese pickups is they don't make them for sound quality. they just wrap the poles and send it on its way. If it's wired to pots without a preamp it should have a fair amount of zing because there are no electronics filtering the sound. The alnico pickup for my OLP 5 string is from Korea and its bright and zingy. I looked around and I notice they don't sell them anymore. I would just bite the bullet and buy a higher quality pickup like a Nordstrand. quality 5 string pickups are hard to find in a budget price range

 

[Steve Dallman]

The cheap Artec I have in my homegrown specs the same as a Stingray pickup. With the Stingray 2 band preamp it is fantastic. I had a different preamp earlier with sweepable mids that also worked well, but the Stingray preamp is just "it."

The Wilkinsen is double the resistance. While it isn't as high impedance as some bass humbuckers I've worked with, it's double the Artec or Stingray. (I have a MM for a new project, and it measures the same as the Artec.) I tried a Wilkensen, wired in parallel, and it was muddy compared to the Artec.

If I tried the Wilkinsen passive, I'd use 500k linear for the volume and 500k audio for the tone. I would keep it wired in parallel, not series.

The Stingray two band is pretty low input impedance. A Stingray pickup, wired in parallel is pretty low impedance. If I remember right, each coil is just over 2k resistance. Two coils in series half that.


The Wilkinsen is twice the impedance and likely loaded the preamp down, reducing high end. Many add a high impedance buffer to a MM preamp so it works better with other pickups.


The. issue is. pickup impedance. (Sorry about the periods...my keyboard. is adding them.)

 

[Robthebastard58]

I recently bought a sterling sub ray4 (black with maple fretboard!) and to me it's an amazing bass with beautiful sizzling tone. I've read that it doesn't quite match the classic mm tone, to now that my appetite has been whetted I want to push the envelope further. I'm a mod guy, I like to tweak this and that trying to squeeze all I can out of what I got. I read the other day that Delano makes a sweet pickup that matches the mm tone a little better than the sub and John east makes a preamp that puts your tone right into stingrayville. Has anyone here tried this setup? Thoughts?

 

[rojo412]

I had the Delano 5 string dual coil in a SR5-style bass and it was quite true to the MM tone. I attached a clip with it running through a 1992 Stingray 3 band preamp, if you want to hear.
John East makes the best stuff ever, so if there's a preamp made to emulate the real deal Stingray stuff, he makes it! That said, Nordstrand makes one too that is basically the original design and I've heard good things about that, too.
(my apologies for the terrible playing, by the way... I was just going for the tonal palette.)

 

[Robthebastard58]

I had the Delano 5 string dual coil in a SR5-style bass and it was quite true to the MM tone. I attached a clip with it running through a 1992 Stingray 3 band preamp, if you want to hear.
John East makes the best stuff ever, so if there's a preamp made to emulate the real deal Stingray stuff, he makes it! That said, Nordstrand makes one too that is basically the original design and I've heard good things about that, too.
(my apologies for the terrible playing, by the way... I was just going for the tonal palette.)

Your playing is just fine. Tone is fantastic, I like a touch more sizzle and crunch but you basically nailed it. Thanks for the reply!

 

[rojo412]

Thanks, you're too kind!

I do a lot of mods and like to catalog the sounds using GarageBand, for instances just like this.
Which actually reminds me... I need to restring my 89 SR5 and record that. It's got THE standard of original MM tone, if you ask me.

 

[fermata]

I have a question about the stock pre-amp on the SBMM SUB Ray4. I haven't had any problems with it being too hot/distorting, although the volume control is weird. I'm contemplating either doing the volume control mod or switching to a classic SR pre (like the Retrovibe Stinger). Any arguments one way or the other?

And how does the stock treble control compare to old SR circuit treble? The stock almost seems more like a high mid control to me, which I kind of like. Thoughts?

 

[rojo412]

The SUB Ray 4 preamps are really nothing like the true 2 band Musicman EQ.
As an owner of many of the 2B equipped Stingrays over the years, the way it works actually seems different than almost every other preamp I've tried:

It's a "boost only" preamp, although some people argue that it's mostly boost with slight cut. What makes it different sounding to me is, when you boost the treble, it doesn't just "bring up the high". It actually seems to change a bit of the frequency as well. It's kind of like how a tone control does that in a P bass, for example. I don't have the proper verbiage to explain it, but I notice a difference when compared to, say, an Aguilar preamp. If you boost the Aggie, it gets crispier... but when you boost the MM, it gets crispier and the voice changes a little.

When you look at the components of the classic 2B pre versus most, you also see that it's made differently. You don't just have 2 50k linear pots connected to a board. They use a 100k Audio for the bass and a 1MEG Reverse Log pot for treble. I have no idea how to explain that, I'm sure someone with more electronics experience could elaborate on it. Point is, it's not a run-of-the-mill preamp.
And I don't know if this also has an effect, but the signal from the pickup goes through the preamp BEFORE the volume, where as most other systems have the volume before the preamp section.

 

[fermata]

Thanks, that's helpful (having never played an actual 2-band Stringray). So since it's mostly boost, does dialing the treble down mellow out the tone much? To my ears the Ray4 pre sounds like it has equal boost and cut on either side of the center detent (which I gather the true MM pots don't have).

 

[rojo412]

Here's a recording of the range of the treble control. I did it starting with no boost, then gradually increasing it. Then, because it sounds more pronounce in the slap, I did the same with some slap/pop.
The bass was set to "0" the whole time.
I hope this does a decent job of explaining what I'm trying to describe.

 

[thebassbuilder]

I liked the recording! To me this sounds like the recordings of old and crazy how different other versions sound compared to this.

 

[fermata]

Great demo, rojo412--that's incredibly helpful (hopefully to others who come across this thread, too). That sounds quite different from the Ray4 pre. At the risk of asking for too much, any chance you could do a similar demo of the bass control?

 

[rojo412]

The first taste is free... but then it's gonna cost ya...
Just kidding! Here you go.
I did the bass, then added the treble, then cut back to no boost, then gradually at the same time. You'll hear what I mean

And if you want to know, the bass is a USA SUB body and stock Alnico pickup and 2 band electronics, but it has a Status Graphite replacement neck. The strings are newish, but nicely broken in Ken Smith Stainless 45-105.

 

[fermata]

Fabulous! That's such a helpful demo. As they say, the check's in the mail...

 

[ERIC31]

More than likely its the pickup. The problem with those mass produced chinese pickups is they don't make them for sound quality. they just wrap the poles and send it on its way. If it's wired to pots without a preamp it should have a fair amount of zing because there are no electronics filtering the sound. The alnico pickup for my OLP 5 string is from Korea and its bright and zingy. I looked around and I notice they don't sell them anymore. I would just bite the bullet and buy a higher quality pickup like a Nordstrand. quality 5 string pickups are hard to find in a budget price range

So would just adding a preamp (SD for instance) make a noticeable difference with this pickup? Or should I just gut it and replace everything...pickup and electronics?

 

[thebassbuilder]

So would just adding a preamp (SD for instance) make a noticeable difference with this pickup? Or should I just gut it and replace everything...pickup and electronics?

You need to start with another pickup first and see if you like that sound and then add a preamp if not or all at once. The preamp will not fix a bad pickup. If a pickup is lacking anything the preamp will not add it back. You mentioned SD, they have a pickup and preamp combo for a MM, that would sound great. The SD stuff is very good and well priced.

 

[ERIC31]

Got the preamp installed! My tech guy routed out a battery box spot on the back and drilled out an additional hole for the balance knob.

Now I have volume-bass-treble-balance controls.

Sound has improved drastically but still needs a little more top end. I'll be switching out the Wilkinson pickup for a Nordstrand. Then it'll be perfect!

 

[Quadzilla]

New Musicman pickup avail. Here is a first-impressions review:
New Musicman Replacement Pickup! Proto / Ulyate with MM and J Coils

 

[kkaarrll]

I have been very impressed with the @Carey nordstrand mm5.4 pickups in my fretless, the "single coil" sounds are incredible in passive. I just use the blend to taste, no tone knob needed. They can then get just about any sound you want with the preamp (in my case a delano sonar 3).

 

[ChronicPyromaniac]

Can I get the opinion of someone more knowledgable than me?

I want to replace the pickup in my Ray4 with an Alnico pickup, to get more into the range of Stingray tone. I'm seriously considering the Duncan, since I have their products in some other basses and guitars and they always sound good. I've also been checking out the GFS MM Pro Plus (is that the Alnico one?), mostly because of the features it has at the price. I've heard good things about GFS' guitar pickups as well. The preamp in my bass is not stock; it's a legit EBMM 3 band I got on eBay. The Duncan would be about the top of my price range, ruling out more expensive replacements. Any help is greatly appreciated.