Enjoy the benefits of a premium membership!
Upgrade Account
-
TalkBass has been independent since 1998. Add your voice.
Create a free account to reply to discussions, view embedded media, and browse with fewer display ads.
Join free Log in
Want zero display ads or expanded classifieds tools? Compare plans.
- Status
JPSBassist said:
Sorry guys...I don't know the answer to that. AJ told me that it's confidential and wouldn't tell me. AJ does a lot of work for big name artist so can't dispel names. Thought maybe somebody here would know the name. Lol /:
Gah... I really love the idea of these dual mode pickups, but the volume loss really prevents from going with it.
I have TWs on my Euro5LX and I disconnected the coil tap and left them in dual coil mode permanently. Id really like to be able to switch to single coils though and not have a volume drop. Im not expert in the matter, but I assume it wouldnt be impossible?
It would make those pickups and whatever bass they were in twice as versatile. Im coming to really like the single coil j pup sound, but Im hesitant to go for it on my next 5 string because I dont want to be limited to that sound. The TWs would be perfect.. If only!
I'm going to step out on a limb here and suggest that these pups were never meant to be switched "on the fly" in a performance situation.
And I know that us non-Billboard Top 100 bassists do our own tech work... but think about the single/dual coil thing like this:
In a recording studio situation, the volume drop isn't an issue. You prep your bass, plug in, set your tone, volume, whatever, and honestly your signal is managed through the boards. You'd record whatever you were recording and then you'd have time to "reset" your bass for the next song... etc...
And let's say you're a touring bassist with a rack of available basses and a tech... (or remove the tech, but you have multiple basses, each for a specific purpose such as drop-D, or alternative tuning, humbuckers vs. J... whatever). You'd have the bass setup for either the single or dual coil mode and if you needed it for both, you'd have two... one setup for each. That's why guys like Mike Kroeger have 10 basses in a rack when they tour. You set it up and leave it alone.
Again, we're real guys and not stars with huge bank accounts... OK... some of us on this board might actually be that person... but not me.
I don't look at the volume loss as an issue because I know about it therefore I plan ahead. I have the basses I have for a reason, each one has a purpose in the recording studio.
The EMG TW pups are really great IMHO because you CAN pull such a large tonal range from them. I can't think of a situation where I'd need or want to switch modes during a song. And the setup-adjustment in volume takes so little time to manage if switching between songs.
Set your volumes appropriately during your sound check and I use a type of tape called "camera tape" which we use in Hollywood for everything because it doesn't leave any tape residue behind... And I put a strip of tape on the volume knobs of my amp/pre-amp and make a mark with a sharpie for I (single) and II (dual). Then all I have to do is press/pull the pots and walk over to the head and turn the knob.
Unless I'm not getting something... I don't get what the big deal is?
[Invalid or Expired Link Removed]
[Invalid or Expired Link Removed]
[Invalid or Expired Link Removed]
From the FWIW Dept.:
I think the frustrating thing with the EMG MM and TW is that it doesn't have to be this way.
If you've ever owned a Lakland 55 (I did), or any other bass using the Bart MM pup, you know that whether in single or double coil mode there is no volume difference.
I prefer EMG's overall, but they dropped the ball here. The Barts show that it doesn't have to be an issue. Why EMG can't seem to do the same is the head scratcher.
I play with my volume(s) wide open for consistancy.
I don't want to have to find the previous "unity gain" spot on my volume knob because of a different coil setting.
I have TW's in my Spector 6 and never use the single coil mode for this reason.
Plus, if I'm playing my other Spectors with non-coil spliting EMG's at my normally open volume setting and switch to the bass with the TW's, in single coil mode they can't compete (I set up all my basses to be of a consistant unity volume setting to each other with the volumes open).
I think EMG has just been lazy with this issue.
Hi everyone!
I just finished a little project. I was playing around in my home studio and decided to redo an older NIN song. So I recorded everything over but the drum track.
I was field-testing my new HD video camera... and I decided to put a "music video" together. I won't bore you guys with the cinematography technical stuff on this camera or the shoot. But holy cow this footage looks great considering I did it without a crew and with only one studio light (a 2x2 softbox... 500w tungsten bulb).
Anyway. It's basically a SPECTOR-PORN video.
Click on the image below to visit my YouTube Channel and the video.
Link Removed
Excellent. I love the 'point of focus' shots - don't know the right term - but you see a certain part of the bass in focus and the rest is blurred.
With your mug shot in there, it personalizes the video and also seems to express the joy of 're-creating' the track and the video.
Very impressive.
In my mind, what with technology being all advanced and whatnot, I shouldnt have to adjust for a volume drop. If other companies can make their coil tapping pickups without a volume drop, then I would come to expect the same out of EMG.
Sure in a recording situation this is no problem.. I would probably use completely different basses for different tones, etc. But if the technology is there, and is a reality with other companies, then in the live setting I SHOULD be able to immediately switch my pickup setting mid song with a simple pull of a knob instead of having to adjust volumes as well. Maybe most people wont ever need or want to do a switch mid song, but I would like to have that ability.
I dont want to have to bring multiple basses to shows either. Sure you look cool and you feel like hot stuff switching between every other song (or like a d-bag, depending on how you look at it) but at the end of the night, it's me whose loading everything back up. One more thing to keep track of, carry, not loose, not break, care for etc etc when there's already enough going on.
Ill admit that I may be too used to technology and having these abilities and options available to me, whereas the "old cats" from way back when would only dream of stuff like this... But if it's here, I kinda expect it to work right, before they put it out there. To me, they DONT work right...
Sure in a recording situation this is no problem.. I would probably use completely different basses for different tones, etc. But if the technology is there, and is a reality with other companies, then in the live setting I SHOULD be able to immediately switch my pickup setting mid song with a simple pull of a knob instead of having to adjust volumes as well. Maybe most people wont ever need or want to do a switch mid song, but I would like to have that ability.
I dont want to have to bring multiple basses to shows either. Sure you look cool and you feel like hot stuff switching between every other song (or like a d-bag, depending on how you look at it) but at the end of the night, it's me whose loading everything back up. One more thing to keep track of, carry, not loose, not break, care for etc etc when there's already enough going on.
Ill admit that I may be too used to technology and having these abilities and options available to me, whereas the "old cats" from way back when would only dream of stuff like this... But if it's here, I kinda expect it to work right, before they put it out there. To me, they DONT work right...
Yeah, I don't have any experience with Bart's... the TW is the first single/dual in-one I've ever used. So I guess because I haven't known anything else, the issue isn't an issue for me... it's just the way these pups work and I've not had reason to be bothered (irritated) by it.
It's what I do. I could have recorded "The Good Soldier" all on my Euro4-TW-35. But I liked the sound of the muted notes coming out of the NS-4 better. So I used it. I almost used my NS-2JA-R, but it was a little too clicky... if that makes sense. I get what you are saying here.
Cool. Perhaps you could find a way to make the song more interesting... I'm all for making the bass a star in any song.
See... not to be disrespectful of your opinion, but I'm going to ask you to step out of your box for a moment. I don't do live performances... but if I did, I'd want to take what I needed to best serve the music being played... to give the best experience to the audience.
I guess a lot of people go to a live performance and they don't care if the music sounds like the studio recording(s). But some do. Some appreciate the switching out because honestly, if a single bass could handle every song's needs, then there'd be one type of bass.
My point is that instead of looking at it like the bassist is either trying/feeling cool or feels like a d-bag, perhaps the guy who switches basses three or four times during a show cares about the music and doesn't care/think about how it looks. What if they care about his/her performance (sound... not looks), or. cares about those few people in the audience that appreciates the hard work and effort the band is making.
To me, it's sort of lazy to not want to give it your all. Not calling you lazy... but saying that if the work of packing/unpacking for a show outweighs the joy of doing a great job and giving an audience a show to remember, perhaps you should switch to being a session player like me... it's much less headache.
And I'm only offering my personal feelings on why I want to perform and make music (studio or otherwise). To me it's about remaining true to the music. Especially if it's someone else's music. I owe them that respect to give it my all.
I hear you. Thus my comment about "we are our own techs". No roadies when I head into someone else's studio. I understand.
But if it's here, I kinda expect it to work right, before they put it out there. To me, they DONT work right...
Again, I'll defer to you on this since my experience with this type of pickups is very limited.
Close, it's called "Selective Focus" and it's why there's so much hype over this camera. It'd be a small book on why cameras work the way they to do explain it. But untill recently (like the last two years) video cameras suffered from having a crippling design contraint regarding controlling shallow focus... the chips that the video was captured on were very small and thus because of a bunch of physics laws regarding lenses and focus, they tended to place everything in focus (called deep focus).
This camera has an enormous sensor, full 35mm (still which is larger than motion picture). And thus it is capable of insane selective focus. Which is why I got it. To shoot stuff just like this.
We call it "cinematic" when you can trick a video camera into creating something that looks like motion picture film. And this camera is very, very cinematic in its scope.
Yeah... thanks... I did it basically because I didn't have any appropriate playing footage for that spot and I wanted to break up that lull in the playing as the song goes from muted to the outro. I toyed with putting something totally random like one of my cats sleeping or something. Then it would have really been an "art film". LOL.
Thanks. I have a whole slate of Spector bassed videos like this planned... and with a bunch of different Spector Artists, not myself. Little cool 1-2 minute videos, each one featuring Spectors and a single artist... in different environments. Video Spector Porn. What's not to love about that?
I guess I came off a little harsh and made the wrong argument there..
What I meant to say was that I would much prefer being able to bring one, MAYBE two basses to a show to cover all my tones. Sure Ill cover myself properly for studio purposes with several basses with distinct and different tones.. but for the live setting, the more I can get out of one bass, the better.
The biggest reason being (and I should have made this my argument previously) that Im not yet playing big clubs or venues every show where my gear is safely stored side/back stage. The last thing I want is to have one of my basses stolen, worse, to have multiple basses stolen (or any gear for that matter). Obviously, things will happen. Im aware its unavoidable, but id much rather take the chance of loosing one bass than multiple...
Like you said, if there was one bass that could do "everything" then everyone would have it. And again, like you said, you would prefer being as true to the original music as possible, same here. I like to make things interesting with a variety of bass tones, and having this option at my fingertips that doesnt quite work like it should is sooo frustrating...
The idea of having a pickup that can switch from dual to single coil is awesome, it multiplies the tone options by such a large number and would make that bass so much more versatile. Id argue even to the point where just about any tone could be achieved to a suitable level in the live setting. Enough so that 99/100 people wouldnt have any reason to complain.. And I think that's good enough for me. And lets be honest, youd be hard pressed to find a large ratio of people at any show who really care THAT much about the bass tones anyways...
Sad, but true. Obviously, its tough to make a fretted bass sound like a fretless or something kind of extreme like that, there are limits and I realize that.Point being, there's no reason why EMGs dual mode pickups should have the volume drop, others are quite capable of making it work, they should too.
I played one tonight. Still in love with it.
I played mine Sat/Sun and still in love as well.
I guess I came off a little harsh and made the wrong argument there..
What I meant to say was that I would much prefer being able to bring one, MAYBE two basses to a show to cover all my tones. Sure Ill cover myself properly for studio purposes with several basses with distinct and different tones.. but for the live setting, the more I can get out of one bass, the better.
The biggest reason being (and I should have made this my argument previously) that Im not yet playing big clubs or venues every show where my gear is safely stored side/back stage. The last thing I want is to have one of my basses stolen, worse, to have multiple basses stolen (or any gear for that matter). Obviously, things will happen. Im aware its unavoidable, but id much rather take the chance of loosing one bass than multiple...
Like you said, if there was one bass that could do "everything" then everyone would have it. And again, like you said, you would prefer being as true to the original music as possible, same here. I like to make things interesting with a variety of bass tones, and having this option at my fingertips that doesnt quite work like it should is sooo frustrating...
The idea of having a pickup that can switch from dual to single coil is awesome, it multiplies the tone options by such a large number and would make that bass so much more versatile. Id argue even to the point where just about any tone could be achieved to a suitable level in the live setting. Enough so that 99/100 people wouldnt have any reason to complain.. And I think that's good enough for me. And lets be honest, youd be hard pressed to find a large ratio of people at any show who really care THAT much about the bass tones anyways...
Point being, there's no reason why EMGs dual mode pickups should have the volume drop, others are quite capable of making it work, they should too.
No worries, I wasn't offended or anything. I'll be the first person to tell you that I have to force myself to try new things... I'm like most people; when I find something I like or that works for me I usually stick with it regardless.
These new pups are a whole new world for me. Just like the 35" scale 4-strings in BEAD. Whoa... what a great concept.
It's totally cool and I completely respect your opinion. I mainly wanted to sort of stand up for the bassist that changes their instrument several times during a performance because they care about the sound... That was all.
So no worries. I really appreciate that you can state your feelings and defend your statements in such a professional manner. One can never get upset when someone does that (I hope anyway).
When I see the EMG guys at NAMM I'll absolutely bring this up and state why I'm bringing it up. Who knows, perhaps this is something they are working on.
I can say this, Spector's relationship with EMG is rock-solid. EMG pickups are a big part of that unique Spector sound we all love. And they do listen to Stuart. We'll see what they say.
And I dream of a white 1983 Brooklyn NS-2... Leo Quan bridge and crown neck inlays...
I find it... the seller wants a fortune... I agree... I buy it and take it home... where my wife beats me to death with it.
LOL. Some dreams are great... others are not so great.
Yeah... it looks like it. I have the polo shirt and the T-shirt with the headstock on the back.
I'm not sure when that was taken out of the store. The store is handled by the main office. I actually don't manage it.
Thanks for bringing that up. I am working with PJ on some new design ideas. I'm going to try and have one or two made for me to wear at NAMM this year.
We'll see how that goes.
- Status
