Suggestions for Pickups for Aggressive Rock/Metal tone

[fearlessbass25]

Hello all,

Forgive me if this subject has been covered before; I'm a total n00b here.

I am in the process of building a bass from Warmoth and Allparts.

Here's what I am going with:
Ash body P bass body routed for p/j setup Finished in Surf Green (or maybe dual jazz humbucker like previous Fender American Deluxes.. depending on your suggestions)
Maple Jazz neck with maple board and black binding and block inlays.

Here are my questions:

Active or Passive and why?

What Preamp should I use if active?

What Brand Pickups would you suggest?

I am looking for an agressive bass tone that remains full.
My band will be down tuning to CGCF so it needs to handle Low tuning well. I will also be building a second bass for AEAD tuning at some point in the future.
The music is somewhere between Breaking Benjamin/Sevendust/KSE, however, I do not play with a pick and the bass lines are a bit more intracate than just root note gooves.

My rig is simple:
Ampeg SVT Heritage Head and matching 8x10 Cab.
Potentially adding an MXR Bass Compressor and a SansAmp Bass Driver DI for a little dirt on the front end. (I have an aguilar tone hammer at my disposal and honestly I hate the thing, I can't get anything I like out of it).

Any opinions or suggestions to help get me in the right direction would be great!
Thanks!

 

[pizzazombie]

Use stainless steel strings and play with a pick.

 

[fearlessbass25]

Already using stainless. Don't wanna use a pick.
Playing finger style sounds warmer... which I like for what I'm going for.
You actually didn't answer any of the above questions that I had about pickups and preamps.
I'm not after a typical metal bass tone. I'm trying to sit in the mix.. Not cut through it.
I don't need a lesson in tone.. But some opinions in bass pickups and preamp selection would be helpful. I assumed I was in the right place considering this is a bass forum and all.

 

[walterw]

you can make almost anything work with the right rig and EQ.

my bias is towards classic designs; they don't need lots of EQ correction, they just naturally sound good. as such, i think you can't lose with straight-up passive jazz bass pickups. with a bit of preamp grind downstream, geddy, tim-bob, flea, and lots of others have no trouble getting a heavy, modern tone out of them, especially with finger-style.

active EQ basses strike me as more suited to cleaner styles, while rock guys (like me) dig passive.

 

[Nedmundo]

I tend to agree with walterw, and would recommend Lindy Fralin P/J, with a noiseless Split Jazz for the J. They're expensive, but for a build like this you may as well go for it. They have fairly hot output, and lots of inherent grind IMO, and are good for heavy stuff despite the "vintage" label. I think they would satisfy your stated goals.

 

[fearlessbass25]

May check into the Lindy Fralins.
I'm familiar with their guitar pickups but never considered them for bass. I think the passive route is probably where I'm going and I tend to agree on the "vintage" label being good for more modern stuff. At least it has stood true for guitar pickups for me.
Thanks for the advice!

 

[mpdd]

g&l mfds like in a sb-2, no active stuff needed with these, very hot

 

[walterw]

G&Ls are good, but "hot" isn't necessarily the goal here. it might even be counter-productive if you're trying to keep edge and clarity with a more grindy and aggressive rig.

 

[grendle]

IMO the p/j setup is the way to go. It's hard to go wrong with any good pickup honestly. Fralin, duncan, EMG's, bart , etc. please don't go that far with good parts, a good rig , and then make it crap tacular with a distortion pedal or unit. Do setup said bass with some string buzz n clank, and feed a hot signal to the amp you spent good money on and let it do its thing like its supposed to. Learn the eq and gain staging of the ampeg ( all of the eq effects the gain) and let the preamp tubes do their thing, which is why you bought it , and why it's legendary. If your gonna go through all that trouble and run it through a distortion unit just go buy any off the shelf bass and don't bother, they will all sound equally craptacular. Sorry just a rant.

 

[Unrepresented]

IMO the p/j setup is the way to go. It's hard to go wrong with any good pickup honestly. Fralin, duncan, EMG's, bart , etc. please don't go that far with good parts, a good rig , and then make it crap tacular with a distortion pedal or unit. Do setup said bass with some string buzz n clank, and feed a hot signal to the amp you spent good money on and let it do its thing like its supposed to. Learn the eq and gain staging of the ampeg ( all of the eq effects the gain) and let the preamp tubes do their thing, which is why you bought it , and why it's legendary. If your gonna go through all that trouble and run it through a distortion unit just go buy any off the shelf bass and don't bother, they will all sound equally craptacular. Sorry just a rant.

All good advice minus the unnecessary, and misplaced rant against effect pedals.

 

[fearlessbass25]

IMO the p/j setup is the way to go. It's hard to go wrong with any good pickup honestly. Fralin, duncan, EMG's, bart , etc. please don't go that far with good parts, a good rig , and then make it crap tacular with a distortion pedal or unit. Do setup said bass with some string buzz n clank, and feed a hot signal to the amp you spent good money on and let it do its thing like its supposed to. Learn the eq and gain staging of the ampeg ( all of the eq effects the gain) and let the preamp tubes do their thing, which is why you bought it , and why it's legendary. If your gonna go through all that trouble and run it through a distortion unit just go buy any off the shelf bass and don't bother, they will all sound equally craptacular. Sorry just a rant.

And I do agree with the idea of over saturating the bass tone with heavy distortion pedals. The amp just stays extremely clean even with the gain pushed up to around 3 o'clock. Just needs a little extra "umph" in it for drive.

Currently I'm using a 30th anniversary sting ray and, for the life of me, can't get the thing set up properly. Even with my local master luthier/tech working on it.
I think it needs a crown job. I'm just not happy with it period. The bass is loaned to me by a friend so I'm not looking to sink money into it to fix it. The tone is great, it just won't quit buzzing. But even it doesn't make the amp as "gritty" as I want it.

I'm not planning to add pedals to the rig except maybe a little compression. But maybe the new bass with the right pups will make the difference in what I'm after As well.

That's why I'm asking for suggestions.

 

[grendle]

All good advice minus the unnecessary, and misplaced rant against effect pedals.

sorry i was a couple beers in.

 

[grendle]

And I do agree with the idea of over saturating the bass tone with heavy distortion pedals. The amp just stays extremely clean even with the gain pushed up to around 3 o'clock. Just needs a little extra "umph" in it for drive.

Currently I'm using a 30th anniversary sting ray and, for the life of me, can't get the thing set up properly. Even with my local master luthier/tech working on it.
I think it needs a crown job. I'm just not happy with it period. The bass is loaned to me by a friend so I'm not looking to sink money into it to fix it. The tone is great, it just won't quit buzzing. But even it doesn't make the amp as "gritty" as I want it.

I'm not planning to add pedals to the rig except maybe a little compression. But maybe the new bass with the right pups will make the difference in what I'm after As well.

That's why I'm asking for suggestions.

cool, by buzz i assume you mean fret buzz and not bad electronics buzz ? you honestly want it to buzz a bit everywhere / evenly. that's the "distortion" you usually hear on most bass tracks that you just cant get with a pedal. The buzz comes out like distortion once it hits the tubes, but it's part of the tone comming in.

do you run your ray fully boosted on the bass? that's a biggie that a lot of guys don't get. the beauty of an active bass is you can boost it fully just to hit the preamp harder and push the tubes, then eq the head to get your tone. Similiar to what guitar guys do with the maxon 808 and 5150 setup you hear in a lot of metal ( the Adam D setup). The 808 isn't used at all except as a level boost. Even with everything off though the 808 still colors the tone a bit though

The heritage is a great amp but honestly might not be the best for what your looking for. It's a USA made svt cl basically. it does the cranked tube thing pretty well, and it gets better when you run it at 2 ohms. If your wanting more distortion /gain the 2 or 4 pro might be better. I'm partial to the 2 non pro personally, but that's me. Being a finger player will be a bit tougher, i basically control the distortion with my right hand , bu thats with a pick.

there's a bunch of ways to get where you want to go, it just depends on what you want to hear.

 

[fearlessbass25]

cool, by buzz i assume you mean fret buzz and not bad electronics buzz ? you honestly want it to buzz a bit everywhere / evenly. that's the "distortion" you usually hear on most bass tracks that you just cant get with a pedal. The buzz comes out like distortion once it hits the tubes, but it's part of the tone comming in.

do you run your ray fully boosted on the bass? that's a biggie that a lot of guys don't get. the beauty of an active bass is you can boost it fully just to hit the preamp harder and push the tubes, then eq the head to get your tone. Similiar to what guitar guys do with the maxon 808 and 5150 setup you hear in a lot of metal ( the Adam D setup). The 808 isn't used at all except as a level boost. Even with everything off though the 808 still colors the tone a bit though

The heritage is a great amp but honestly might not be the best for what your looking for. It's a USA made svt cl basically. it does the cranked tube thing pretty well, and it gets better when you run it at 2 ohms. If your wanting more distortion /gain the 2 or 4 pro might be better. I'm partial to the 2 non pro personally, but that's me. Being a finger player will be a bit tougher, i basically control the distortion with my right hand , bu thats with a pick.

there's a bunch of ways to get where you want to go, it just depends on what you want to hear.

Fret buzz to the point of nearly fretting out is not helpful. I can deal with a little fret buzz but not as much as I have with the MM
I'm extremely happy with the tone of the amp and decided tonight after using a different bass that I'm going passive for sure.

But to answer the question. I typically run the amp like this
Ultra hi and low engaged. The eq selector on 2 with th bass and treble pushed just past noon and the mid pulledjust below noon. Sounds awesome for what I'm after plenty of low end rumble and just enough cut to be defined with what I'm doing.
The bass eq on the MM was as bass boosted quite a bit. Mid flat and the Treb boosted a bit but not as much as the bass.
The tone was fantastic for my taste. But the bass just doesn't play right. It's too buzzy. I expect a little rattle but not as much as it did...

 

[grendle]

Fret buzz to the point of nearly fretting out is not helpful. I can deal with a little fret buzz but not as much as I have with the MM
I'm extremely happy with the tone of the amp and decided tonight after using a different bass that I'm going passive for sure.

But to answer the question. I typically run the amp like this
Ultra hi and low engaged. The eq selector on 2 with th bass and treble pushed just past noon and the mid pulledjust below noon. Sounds awesome for what I'm after plenty of low end rumble and just enough cut to be defined with what I'm doing.
The bass eq on the MM was as bass boosted quite a bit. Mid flat and the Treb boosted a bit but not as much as the bass.
The tone was fantastic for my taste. But the bass just doesn't play right. It's too buzzy. I expect a little rattle but not as much as it did...

Cool. Usually the ultra low and hi buttons are the devil. The ultra low scoops the eq, and the ultra hi does it even more so you end up with a V looking eq curve, then try and fight to get the mids back. If your happy with it then rock on!

Yeah you want some fret buzz but it shouldn't fret out. One piece necks can be a bit tricky and move a lot.