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pickups sounding "bland"

S

Speedy Claxton

Feb 2, 2008
53
0
Jacksonville, Fl
#1
I have a pj bass and I feel the pickups sound a little too tame for my taste. I would like to add that I can also run the bass active but I like the simplicity, and in most cases, the tone of a passive bass. Is there a way I could "liven" up the sound of my pickups without buying a new set? I was thinking new pots could do the trick.. not too sure though.
 
#4
I play through a gallien krueger backline 600 and I just recently changed the strings. Honestly, there's nothing wrong with the way it sounds, I've heard tons of basses that sound worse, it's just doesn't appeal to me all that much and I was wondering if new pots or any other simple procedures could remedy my, for lack of a better term, problem.
 
#5
Basslines Quarter Pounder pickups are a sure cure for the blands.

Changing pots or capacitors won't do much for any real change. Maybe a switch to connect the P and J in series, although it might also sound like crap.
 
#6
Speedy Claxton said:
I play through a gallien krueger backline 600 and I just recently changed the strings. Honestly, there's nothing wrong with the way it sounds, I've heard tons of basses that sound worse, it's just doesn't appeal to me all that much and I was wondering if new pots or any other simple procedures could remedy my, for lack of a better term, problem.
Click to expand...

sounds like you need new pups - check the bay for any used ones. Someone might have pulled higher-end stock pups out of their bass that you could pick up for cheap
 
#8
A few years back got an almost new squire jazz from Ebay,looked & played great but the
amp,sound was not the hit.So after a while got me a set of SD stk-j2 stacked,that was
now a lot better but somehow still not, hmm,wow or you know what I mean.
So I invested in a Noll active tone circut,comes complete wired with 3 stacked pots,
just have to conect the pu's.Now the damm things almost to hot to handle,its all in there. Also in the 80's had a guitar builder fit me the active PJ set from EMG in a standard preci
which has over the years become my work horse,this one can do it all with still some
left, for those moments when seldome needed.
 
#9
if the pots are 250k, switching to 500ks will indeed wake it up a bit. you'll want linear ("B") volumes and an audio ("A") tone.
 

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