Newbie question about pickups

[MegaSwing]

Pickups are all-important. Just try making ANY sound without them. But they aren't the only thing. Therein lies the bugaboo.

Sometimes perfectly good pickups simply don't sound great on a particular instrument. Just make sure the instrument you're making changes on is worth the trouble, because there always exists the possibility that all your efforts to improve it might go for nought.

It's an inexact science, to be sure.

 

[JimmyM]

To those who think the audience doesn't care...why try to play the right notes? Or tune your bass? Why bring a bass at all? Bring a didgeridoo instead. It makes "boom boom" noises and it's cheaper. Hell, just go home. What's the point of even being there? The audience doesn't care.

But wait...if the audience doesn't care, then why don't ALL bands have a huge following? If the audience didn't care, certainly they would view Pepe And The Podunks exactly the same as they view The Beatles.

Hmmm....looks like they care after all.

 

[Michael B]

To those who think the audience doesn't care...why try to play the right notes? Or tune your bass? Why bring a bass at all? Bring a didgeridoo instead. It makes "boom boom" noises and it's cheaper. Hell, just go home. What's the point of even being there? The audience doesn't care.

But wait...if the audience doesn't care, then why don't ALL bands have a huge following? If the audience didn't care, certainly they would view Pepe And The Podunks exactly the same as they view The Beatles.

Hmmm....looks like they care after all.

As much as I agree with you in this topic, this point is off. You can make in-tune notes with the MIM Pups.

 

[40Hz]

As much as I agree with you in this topic, this point is off. You can make in-tune notes with the MIM Pups.

But there's more to making good music than just playing in-tune notes. That much at least is certain.

Sure, anyone can make any bass and any amp go "boom boom boom." That's not enough for me. It may be enough for you, but when I do a gig, it's not enough that I fulfill the minimum obligation of the job and leave it at that. I want people to leave my gigs thinking that every single person on that stage cares so much about the presentation that there's no room for improvement in any way, shape or form. We don't always live up to that ideal, but we darn sure try. That, IMHO, is what separates a great band from the average. And the times that I haven't bum me out to no end. That doesn't mean you have to spend a fortune...I've shown up with some very cheap gear, indeed. But it's gosh darn good cheap gear that reflects what I believe my sound should be, and if it doesn't, I either mod it till it does or I get rid of it. Life is too short to gig gear you don't like just because of this mistaken notion that the audience can't tell the difference. The audience doesn't care what instruments and amps you use, but they can absolutely tell when things aren't right, and they can certainly tell when you suck. You might get away with a clam here or there, but if your whole evening sounds like a clam, you bet your butt they can tell. Ive seen enough bands get booed off the stage to know that. And having gear that makes you comfortable and confident is all part of not sounding like a clam all evening.

No micturation...just fact.

If you're truly being professional about anything - not just music - you'll find more wisdom and truth in the above than you'll find in a stack of philosophy books.

To borrow from that meme of others: Striving to do things the right way, and as best you, can won't exempt you from the disdain of people who don't care, and who will mock you for trying.

Do your best to do it right anyway.

 

[kosmicwizard]

Just bought P Bass Made in Mexico. Workmanship is very good. Very happy i went with that model. so is my wallet. But does changing out the pickups make that much of a difference. Guitar center has a a set Fender has released a 1962 reissue for 79.95 for the P Bass. would it be worth the extra cost. it's not so much i'm wanting vintage pickups. just asking. i did just buy a Fender Rumble 200 combo cabinet. i know some will hate it others won't. but for 479.00 so far i am very impressed with what i'm hearing.

Thanks for any advice you might have....

Nice amp! Nice axe! Nice price on that 62 pup! I have that pup in my bass, it is my favourite fender pup in the world. I think you will find a noticeable difference between that and your stock pup. Very much worth the upgrade imho. Cheers.

 

[Canadian APII]

Yes Pickups make a big difference. They can't change the inherent harmonics or things like sustain. If it is a crappy designed and built bass you will get crap out. If it is a good bass you will get good sound from the pickups.

 

[40Hz]

Nice amp! Nice axe! Nice price on that 62 pup! I have that pup in my bass, it is my favourite fender pup in the world. I think you will find a noticeable difference between that and your stock pup. Very much worth the upgrade imho. Cheers.

Occasionally somebody cuts through the ruckus and debating and puts the train firmly back on the track regarding the OP's original question. Well done!

-------------------------------------------

You hurl great wisdom at my head.
But pray, instead of stones, give bread? - S.Johnson

 

[JimmyM]

As much as I agree with you in this topic, this point is off. You can make in-tune notes with the MIM Pups.

I was addressing the people who chose to use this thread to tell us that the audience doesn't care. Sometimes I do that...use a thread with a smaller point to address a larger point that comes up in the discussion.

 

[Stranger Danger]

Only the good ones

 

[TheCouchBassist]

I find changing pups is like adjusting EQ and gain on my Amp. It makes a difference but still keeps the bass sounding like a P bass.
I would also say cost is no indication of better tone.
I've had Fralins in my P basses over the years, but always ended up selling them and putting in the Frender 62RI the OP is posting about. Never made enough difference to warrant keeping the high end pups when something half the price would do the exact same job.

100% agree. I have a Road Worn P. The stock pickups sounded fine at bedroom volume, but felt thin and hollow at gig volume. I was going to replace them with Antiquity's, but decided on The Original P-Bass pickup as the price was so good. To my ears they are MUCH better than the stock ones.

 

[topcat2069]

Don't forget... You should get a complete setup, including pickup hight adjustment !!!

 

[pappabass]

I have a LTD that came with EMG active pickups, it is the best sounding bass I have owned, sounds too good to change them. Like others have said, changing pickups do 'change' the sound, may not be the sound you want. I have played some name brand basses that sound bad. there is a difference between a bad sound & a sound you don't like. My son likes the heavy metal sound, he has a Sterling Ray4 that fits him perfect, Great bass, but I don't like the sound.

 

[jallenbass]

I was addressing the people who chose to use this thread to tell us that the audience doesn't care. Sometimes I do that...use a thread with a smaller point to address a larger point that comes up in the discussion.

That's kind of Ninja.

 

[Mosstone]

MIMs are much better these days than they were back in the '90s (when I bought my MIM Jazz). Every now and then, I feel like I want to get a P-bass and when I A/B MIM Ps vs AS Ps, they sound pretty much the same to me. The pups in the USA P might be a little hotter, but they both have that distinctive P-bass tone. I wouldn't feel like I was missing anything at all with the stock MIM pup (and I'm a compulsive modder).

It's easy to think the grass is greener with a 'better' or 'more expensive' set of pickups. Or to assume that just because you have a less expensive guitar, the pickups must be junk. In the case of my MIM Jazz, the pickups didn't sound 'bad', they just didn't sound very exciting to me. On the other hand, a bassist friend of mine loved the sound of that bass and was always asking to borrow it for gigs (I ran sound for that band, so it wasn't a big deal). Good tone is in the ear of the listener.

I eventually ordered a set of Bartolinis (and waited 6 months for them), thinking they MUST sound better than my crap Mexican pickups. After all, don't a lot of boutique builders use Barts? Don't a lot of people rave about them as an upgrade? They cost a lot of money, so they've gotta be better, right?

I was less than impressed and so was everyone in my band. Popular consesnsus was that my SX Jag with Fender '75RI Jazz pups sounded worlds better, so the Bart-loaded MIM Jazz got relegated to back-up status.

Conversely, on my most recent build, I ended up going with a 'cheep' GFS pickup over a Seymour Duncan that cost twice as much. I wouldn't say the SD sounded bad, I just liked the sound of the GFS better.

My Epiphone Classic IV Thunderbird comes stock with USA Gibson pickups. I never cared for Thunderbirds before because I didn't like the tone or the clubby neck. For some reason, the Classic IV sounds 100x better than the Gibson bird (to my ears) even though they have exactly the same pickups and construction is identical. I like the feel of the neck better too, so it's all win. But a lot of T-Bird owners are going nuts for these vintage-replica pups made in Hong Kong, swapping out their Gibson pups for them. While I'm tempted to try them, I already LOVE the sound of that bass with the stock pickups, so why should I change them?

To sum up; yes, pickups can make a BIG difference, but it's not always a positive one - more expensive doesn't automatically mean 'better'.

Emotional bias can color perception. If one thinks their bass or pickups sound like crap because they're not expensive enough, then not much is going to change their mind until they start listening with their ears instead of their wallet.

If it ain't broke, don't fix it. You must have thought your MIM P-bass sounded good when you bought it. What changed your mind?

 

[Michael B]

MIMs are much better these days than they were back in the '90s (when I bought my MIM Jazz). Every now and then, I feel like I want to get a P-bass and when I A/B MIM Ps vs AS Ps, they sound pretty much the same to me. The pups in the USA P might be a little hotter, but they both have that distinctive P-bass tone. I wouldn't feel like I was missing anything at all with the stock MIM pup (and I'm a compulsive modder).

It's easy to think the grass is greener with a 'better' or 'more expensive' set of pickups. Or to assume that just because you have a less expensive guitar, the pickups must be junk. In the case of my MIM Jazz, the pickups didn't sound 'bad', they just didn't sound very exciting to me. On the other hand, a bassist friend of mine loved the sound of that bass and was always asking to borrow it for gigs (I ran sound for that band, so it wasn't a big deal). Good tone is in the ear of the listener.

I eventually ordered a set of Bartolinis (and waited 6 months for them), thinking they MUST sound better than my crap Mexican pickups. After all, don't a lot of boutique builders use Barts? Don't a lot of people rave about them as an upgrade? They cost a lot of money, so they've gotta be better, right?

I was less than impressed and so was everyone in my band. Popular consesnsus was that my SX Jag with Fender '75RI Jazz pups sounded worlds better, so the Bart-loaded MIM Jazz got relegated to back-up status.

Conversely, on my most recent build, I ended up going with a 'cheep' GFS pickup over a Seymour Duncan that cost twice as much. I wouldn't say the SD sounded bad, I just liked the sound of the GFS better.

My Epiphone Classic IV Thunderbird comes stock with USA Gibson pickups. I never cared for Thunderbirds before because I didn't like the tone or the clubby neck. For some reason, the Classic IV sounds 100x better than the Gibson bird (to my ears) even though they have exactly the same pickups and construction is identical. I like the feel of the neck better too, so it's all win. But a lot of T-Bird owners are going nuts for these vintage-replica pups made in Hong Kong, swapping out their Gibson pups for them. While I'm tempted to try them, I already LOVE the sound of that bass with the stock pickups, so why should I change them?

To sum up; yes, pickups can make a BIG difference, but it's not always a positive one - more expensive doesn't automatically mean 'better'.

Emotional bias can color perception. If one thinks their bass or pickups sound like crap because they're not expensive enough, then not much is going to change their mind until they start listening with their ears instead of their wallet.

If it ain't broke, don't fix it. You must have thought your MIM P-bass sounded good when you bought it. What changed your mind?

In this case the MIM pickup is likely ceramic. The replacement is alnico 5. Big improvement likely. As you pointed out, it may be different depending on what year your MIM is. Mine is 95.

 

[Honch]

Pickups are the first and foremost sound generator on your bass (or electric guitar). It's what strikes you the first. It is what has the most immediate impact to the timbre that is heard by the audience. Some people thinks tonewood and hardware makes just as much impact on final tone/timbre, but these things are most detected by the one who plays it, not just listening to it. An unkowing audience can tell the difference between single coil pickups and humbuckers as well as extranenous noise and/or hum. The rest they couldn't care less about. Like, a little bit more sustain than on your other bass, or less. They hear if a string it out of tune, or the string breaks that's it.

However, if you, who plays the instrument yourself detects some kind of "gnarl", or something that has DAWNED SLOWLY on you as the years go by, you may very well go into different bridges, tonewoods, string alloys and else, as well as pickups. Small subtle things. By and large, I think you only could or should change out pickups on a P-bass if they have too low ouput, with hum and noise very present (i e you bought a cheap copy one), and you're entriely dissatisfied with the pickups you have right now. Once you get rid of noise and hum and has DECENT output, the rest is just taste, and I often associate this with a grocery store shelf of spices. You have different spices other than salt and pepper. I e "what should it be used for". Luckily there ain't no "one-spice-fits-all" as there is "one-pickup-fits-all". There are as many choices to choose from as in that spice shelf. Some may be to your liking and some not. Some you'll just hate, some you just love, and everything in between of course. There's no general rule of thumb here other than get rid of the poorest output and the noisiest hum.

There are no better pickups, as such, or more "transparent". Just different. The word transparent is not applicable to anything electric, as there is no yardstick for how the solid body bass guitar sounds acoustic. You'll have absolutely no reference for how it really should sound when all electricity or magnetism is removed. So "transparency" is pure BS when it comes to pickups and cables when it comes to solid body electric instruments. Like if you should say "this synth sound more transparent". The only thing you can tell for sure, that it sounds different than before. Not better.

Pickups DO make that much difference, otherwise everybody would just get stuck with split coil P-bass pickups of one design, brand, model and make. I will think, they make the most difference, equal up there with the strings. Brand new ones sounds better than very old ones, and so on. Different alloys, gauges will play havoc with the sound as well. And lure you into thinking "oh...it must be the pickups..."

 

[M.R. Ogle]

Strings are the first and foiremost sound generator on your bass or guitar.

 

[Mosstone]

In this case the MIM pickup is likely ceramic. The replacement is alnico 5. Big improvement likely. As you pointed out, it may be different depending on what year your MIM is. Mine is 95.

Mine was a '97. I knew at the time that the pickups in MIMs had ceramic magnets, but I didn't think they sounded much like ceramic pups. They just sounded really bland and generic to me. Output wasn't very high, either. I think they were around 6k ohms resistance.

I used to assume that alnico was 'better' than ceramic too (mostly because you tend to find ceramic pups on lower-priced guitars) but it depends on what you want. If you're looking for a Jamerson type sound, I'd stay away from ceramic, but if you want a more aggressive, in-yo-face kind of tone for hard rock or metal, then ceramic pups are great. I prefer the sound of a EBMM Sterling over a Stingray due to the ceramic pups. The pups in my T-Bird are ceramic as well... Sounds awesome! I've also got a set of cheepie ceramic Jazz pups that sound great and will eventually go into a future build. I personally prefer alnico magnets for most applications, but ceramics can sound great too.

BTW, I just happened to notice that we used to be neighbors! (Lowell's my home town).

 

[CharlyG]

The audience doesn't care about tone nuances. Pay attention...

 

[Eric Bates]

I have a 2011 MIM P bass. I like it. The tone is fine. I was able to keep a 73' P bass at my house for a few days and noticed a significant difference between the two. Both had rounds but don't know what kind either have. The 73' was much clearer and more sensitive to how I played it. I could hear everything my fingers did on the strings. It could also get a warmer, mellower tone which I liked. On my mim, I can't get away from the "electronic" sound (I don't know how else to describe it). I assumed this was because of the pups. The tone knob also had a much bigger range on the 73'. Don't know if that had anything to do with the pups. Just an observation from someone in the same situation, skill level (maybe) as the original poster.