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My 'basstasters' for Jazz pickups

David Wilson

David Wilson

Supporting Member
Oct 14, 2002
11,670
468
Lower Westchester, NY
#1
ok, so I've finally done something I've been meaning to finish for a while.

One of the problems with pickup samples is that they're often recorded in different basses with different signal chains, different strings, playing styles etc....

I thought it would be a good idea to have, ala Basstasters, samples of different pickups in the same bass, with the same strings, played by the same person and going through the same signal chain.

Last year, I recorded samples of the following pickups:
Villex
Dimarzio J
Dimarzio Ultra Jazz
EMG JV
Nord 4JSE
Aero single coil
Sadowsky hum cancelling
Bartolini 9J
Bartolini 9 Classic Bass
SD Antiquity II single coil

All were recorded in a passive Fender Geddy Lee Jazz bass, strung with DR HiBeam roundwounds. The signal chain was bass to Korg PXR4 recorder. The playing style is uniform, in that it's consistently bad ;) My home recording skills aren't great, so the signal to noise ratios can vary from sample to sample.

I've uploaded these to http://pickups.dmw.ftml.net

Now, the yahoo briefcase service doesn't appear to work 100% of the time. But that's outside of my control, so if you can't get the link to work there's nothing I can do about it - try again later. If someone has an alternate hosting site they feel like providing, I'll happily upload there.

I don't have the bass anymore, so I can't record any other comparitive samples, but I thought it'd be a handy resource
 
#2
Awesome! A pre-emptive thanks for doing this. I love these kinds of shootouts (and I usually end up learning a thing or two in the process.)

(But indeed, it's not working for me right now and I shall indeed try again later.)
 
#6
Just a few random impressions:

I definitely like the DiMarzio Ultra Jazz better than the other DiMarzio Jazz. The latter seems to have a quackier, more nasal tone.

The EMGs sound a tad muffled to my ears.

I like the Bartolinis probably best of all (not too surprising since I have 9J's in my fretless Carvin kit bass.)

The Sadowsky and Seymour Duncans both sound really great too. Good, overall balanced tone.
 
#7
Kurt, cool. Good to know someone got them ;)
Maybe yahoo briefcase has some bandwidth limiting in it, so only so much can be downloaded per hour?
As a backup, I created a gmail account and sent the files to that account.
They'll appear in the inbox for downloading.
The login is jazzpups, password is talkbass.
Since this is a shared email account, play nice. Don't use it to send abusive email, or delete ANYTHING from the inbox.
 
#10
Yup, I bought 'em all. Some new, some used.
As to my favorite, I can only say that I had favorites for *this bass*. As the same pickups will sound somewhat different in different basses, what I liked in the GL jazz might not be perfectly suited for another bass.

That being said, the Sadowsky were my favorite hum cancelling in this bass. The Aeros were my favorite single coils in this bass.
 
#11
Thank you, man, great resource!! My favourites are Sadowsky HC and SD Antiquity.

I definitely like the DiMarzio Ultra Jazz better than the other DiMarzio Jazz. The latter seems to have a quackier, more nasal tone.
Click to expand...
That's strange... this sample sounds very different from DM J as I know them from my J bass. I know, each instrument is different, but I believe that these pups don't have this sonic signature. Maybe it is wiring thing, I don't know. More true reproduction of these pups is on Link Removed page.

Anyway David, BIG thanks to you. Very helpful, saved lot of efforts and money probably too..!!
 
#15
nemo said:
That's strange... this sample sounds very different from DM J as I know them from my J bass. I know, each instrument is different, but I believe that these pups don't have this sonic signature. Maybe it is wiring thing, I don't know.
Click to expand...
No, the wiring was fine. The GL Jazz is naturally a little low end shy, so I think that's the bass characteristics coming through in that recording
 
#17
David,

just now saw this thread. Pretty cool. I didn't have any luck but I'll try periodically till I do. Looking forward to checking out the tones.

TB hasn't gone through the bandwidth change yet but Paul said he'd email me when it comes to pass - apparently getting close. Maybe those clips would be a good link to reference in the bass tone glossary.
 

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