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OD Pedals & Active Basses

Jim C

Jim C

I believe in the trilogy; Fender, Stingray, + G&L
Supporting Member
Nov 29, 2008
15,870
14,110
Bethesda, MD
#1
You guys offered some good advice regarding using an overdrive pedal to emulate the sound of an overdriven tube amp similar to Ronnie Wood on the Beck-Ola album. Those suggestions along with a few hours of searching has also made me aware that an active bass can react differently than a passive with an OD. I'm using a SR with a Mesa Walkabout.

Pedals under consideration are:
Tech 21 VT, Pork Loin, Sparkle Drive, Barber LTD SR, Calinbread SFT, Xotic bass BB, Fulltone OCD, and Hematoma

And now for the question: Will any of these pedals work particularly good or bad with a Stingray? TIA
 
#2
These pedals should work okay with a musicman stingray. if you like tube-screamer like overdrive pedals, the pork loin and the voodoo lab sparkle drive would sound killer with your stingray. I own a musicman clone and a digitech bp355. the digtech bp355 has a distortion channel that's modeled after a voodoo lab sparkle drive and I think it sounded pretty killer. it may not be the same as the real deal, but at least I got a pretty killer sound with this combination. if you want an overdrive pedal that doesn't obliterate low-ends, go with either the way huge electronics pork loin or the voodoo lab sparkle drive. the tech 21 sansamp vt bass would be a good choice too if you like tube emulated sounds. this pedal would also work fine with a musicman stingray bass.
 
#3
IMHO it is not a question of active vs passive basses.

It is more a question of pickups. Whereas often active basses tend to have ceramic loaded PUs which do have more hi mids and tend to sound harsh with OD.
Passive basses often have ALNICO loaded PUs which sound more organic than the ceramics.

And there are active basses that have ALNICO loaded PUs. Those have the same characterictics than passive basses (given he active treble control isn't cranked)
 
#4
A few things to consider. Most of the pedals you mentioned including ours were designed for guitars with passive pickups. This is not to say they can't be used with active pickups just keep in mind your bass may have a hotter output which will make the pedals distort much quicker. You may need to be more judicious with your bass guitar's volume.

I believe the Mesa amp you mentioned uses a HF driver which means your amp is full range. Distortion boxes generate complex harmonics that do not usually benefit from the extended frequencies of a full range system. Just ask any lead guitarist. Our pedals employ speaker emulation circuitry so this will not be an issue with our pedals.
 
#10
gillento said:
IMHO it is not a question of active vs passive basses.

It is more a question of pickups. Whereas often active basses tend to have ceramic loaded PUs which do have more hi mids and tend to sound harsh with OD.
Passive basses often have ALNICO loaded PUs which sound more organic than the ceramics.

And there are active basses that have ALNICO loaded PUs. Those have the same characterictics than passive basses (given he active treble control isn't cranked)
Click to expand...

I see your point but wouldn't this be more a matter of the treble setting/output of an active bass as opposed to what the magnets are made of?
Seems like either magnet material could work or not work depending on the players active EQ settings.
 
#11
The Fulltone OCD is a cool pedal, but it doesn't preserve the bass very well. It's more of a "Hey! Look at me!!!" screaming rip the head off the guitar player kind of pedal. As an in-the-pocket OD I am not finding it useful. I play an active Spector bass, but just judging from the pedal's voicing and comparing it to my Fulltone Bass Drive, for in-the-pocket playing I'd go with the Bass Drive - or one of the others on your list.
 
#12
tech21nyc said:
I believe the Mesa amp you mentioned uses a HF driver which means your amp is full range. Distortion boxes generate complex harmonics that do not usually benefit from the extended frequencies of a full range system. Just ask any lead guitarist. Our pedals employ speaker emulation circuitry so this will not be an issue with our pedals.
Click to expand...

Thanks for this; an idea that I have known but not cosidered.
In my case I'm using just the Walkabout head and not the matching combo which does use a tweeter.
For cabinets, I use either a TL-606 (old school single 15) or a Bergantino HT322 which uses a 1x12, 2x10, and a high frequency horn; very much a full range cabinet.

Is it safe to say that a cabinet with a horn/tweeter is less desirebale than a standard speaker with OD assuming that the overall tone has some high frequency components?
i.e. - speakers sound better with distorted bass than tweeters?

Also realize that the VT pedal does not have this issue based on your post.

Lastly, is the standard VT bass pedal still available? Seems like GC and MF only offer the deluxe bass model online, yet the guitar character pedals are still listed.
 
#15
Speaking again from personal experience...Catalinbread's Hyper Pak is another active-friendly OD with usable tone all the way across the drive knob's sweep. The bad part is that they're now out of production, were built in limited quantities (around 100 IIRC), and not easy to find. Still, something to watch for...one shows up in the classifieds here about once a year or so.
 
#17
Jim C said:
I see your point but wouldn't this be more a matter of the treble setting/output of an active bass as opposed to what the magnets are made of?
Seems like either magnet material could work or not work depending on the players active EQ settings.
Click to expand...

I don't think it lies in the "treble area". I think ceramic magnets have a different "lo-mid to hi-mid ratio" (favouring the hi-mids).
To my ears this sounds harsh.

Furthermore I am convinced, ceramic magnets react less to playing dynamics! Dynamic playing is crucial to a decent overdrive (not necessarily full distortion) sound.

All this goes without saying that HF drivers (tweeters) should be turned off or filtered with some kind of LP filter/speaker simulator.

IMHO
 

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