Double Bass Pickup and Amp for Kay/Keyboard/Guitar

[thegasman]

Hi, everyone -

I have had great luck on this forum before, so I will try again!

I am in the market for an acoustic pickup for my Kay bass. I primarily play jazz, but do play some folk gigs from time to time. Having thumbed through these forums briefly, I understand that the K&K Bass Max is probably my best bet. Those posts were quite old, however, and I was wondering if that wisdom still held true today.

I also will be needing a relatively small (read: easy to transport) amp for use with the Kay. Does anyone have suggestions? Price range for the amp isn't much of an issue, but I def don't want to be wasting money...

As an aside, I also have a Nord Electro 2 keyboard that could use an amplifier. I also plan on acquiring an electric guitar at some point.

Does anyone know of an amp that might be suitable for all three of those uses? I understand that each instrument would benefit from its own amp, but unfortunately I don't have that luxury. If I had to prioritize, I would put the Kay first, keys second, and guitar third.

Hoping for good news...

thanks again!

 

[longfinger]

Check out the Acoutsic Image Coda, and Ten2 products.

I have an older CodaR, (3rd gen) and it works great/good for double bass, electric bass, acoustic guitars (nylon and steel, and arch-top too), keyboards, vocals, even electric guitar if you have some pedals in front. I heard it with a Nord C2 with vocals at the same time and both I the singer, and the keyboardist were impressed. Basically, it is a mini-PA that is easy to carry, has all the needed stuff built-in, and has power to deal with low pitched instruments.

I suggest the two channel option as it gives you more possibilities with a duo.

 

[Ric Vice]

Check out the Acoutsic Image Coda, and Ten2 products.....

I have an older CodaR, (3rd gen) and it works great/good for double bass, electric bass, acoustic guitars (nylon and steel, and arch-top too), keyboards, vocals, even electric guitar if you have some pedals in front.....

I suggest the two channel option as it gives you more possibilities with a duo.

+1 AI is about to release a new pre amp/powered cabinet combo appropriately named the Flex. It has a re designed pre amp that can be easily mounted on a mic stand for easier access. The pre has separate low and high mid controls for more discreet EQ among a host of other new features.The powered speaker has separate 300 watt digital power amps for the two 10" drivers and a 50 watt digital power amp for the tweeter. It also features a electronic crossover. So you should probably hold off until you can audition one.

Ric

 

[Jake deVilliers]

A keyboard amp will do a great job with your Nord and your Kay. Its the only kind of amp that has a flat enough response to sound good with your keyboard and they make great DB amps, too. I've used Roland and Yorkville and they both sounded terrific.

Good luck!

 

[thegasman]

Thanks, everyone! Really good advice.

I guess my only remaining question would be about tubes. An amp with tubes would really make a big difference for the keyboard/guitar side of things (overdrive).

Is there such a thing as a tube amp that sounds great with DB, keys, AND guitar?

Ok, maybe "great" is a reach. What about "surprisingly good?"

thanks!

 

[longfinger]

IMO, forget tube amps... too heavy.. and not really clean. It's easy to add "dirt" to a clean system, it is not really possible to get clean from a "dirty" system.

IMO the Nord does not need tube stuff as it has all sorts of sonic goodies built into it. For the solid body electric guitar, get a pedal/pedals to put before the amp. Your pedal board will give you overdrive, distortion, little-tubes etc. that will then be faithfully made into sound by a clean amp-cab combo / PA.

 

[DoubleMIDI]

I think a Genz Benz Shuttle 3.0-10T (if you still can get one, they are discontinued now, I think) would be a good amplifier too and very portable. The cab has a tweeter, there is almost no (or very little) colouration by zero EQ settings.
Maybe the 10T-cab a little bit weak on the bottom, but I always dial out some bottom if it gets louder and for a little bit of bass amplification there is a bass boost switch that is useful. Depends also on the bass. I found this mostly with my EUB, my 4/4 double bass has enough of its own bottom acoustically.

 

[BobKay]

I had a K&K Bass Max on my Kay, but recently swapped it out for the new David Gage Realist Lifeline. Note that it only works if you have bridge adjusters. I also have an Acoustic Image Coda Series 4. After putting these two parts together, I feel the result is much better than my previous setup - the K&K through a Baggs Paracoustic DI pre-amp, into a G&K MB112. The K&K sounded better through the AI Coda, but the Lifeline is better, at least on my bass.

You might also check out the AI Clarus. It is supposed to be better for keyboard/guitar, but might also work well with the Kay.

 

[Mark Gollihur]

You might also check out the AI Clarus. It is supposed to be better for keyboard/guitar, but might also work well with the Kay.

Just to clarify; the Clarus is the head-only model - I think you meant the Corus, which is almost identical to the Coda, but has a more efficient (but less bass-friendly) woofer. So it has a more "forward" sound than the Coda, which tends to emphasize the sound for guitar and keys better for those players - but it doesn't have the "guts" to do bass well (it rolls off the low frequencies too high in exchange for the higher efficiency.)

But the head unit is identical in both - it's the Clarus head, just with different nameplate, in the Coda and Corus (and Ten2) combos.

 

[BobKay]

Thanks for correcting Mark, and for the extra information. I'm not familiar with the Corus other than the clips posted by AI. Thought it might have some utility for both, but clearly not.

 

[Jake deVilliers]

IMO, forget tube amps... too heavy.. and not really clean. It's easy to add "dirt" to a clean system, it is not really possible to get clean from a "dirty" system.

IMO the Nord does not need tube stuff as it has all sorts of sonic goodies built into it. For the solid body electric guitar, get a pedal/pedals to put before the amp. Your pedal board will give you overdrive, distortion, little-tubes etc. that will then be faithfully made into sound by a clean amp-cab combo / PA.

+1 This is the way to go.