Super punchy jazz bass tone

[Emanuel Apascaritei]

alright so its very simple and it just takes one solder. you need to connect the the neutral wire from the neck pup to the live wire of the bridge pup. for this you need to de-solder the wire from the neck pup to the ground on the neck pot and the live wire from the bridge to the and connect them. you get the idea?
this way the neck pup volume knob will be your only volume knob. the bridge pup knob wont work anymore and tone knob would stay normal! i did it in like half a minute and i loved it. moreover it only takes another minute to put it back this way if you dont like it

[Invalid or Expired Link Removed]

three steps:
1. remove the black wire from the neck pot shell
2. remove the white wire from the bridge pot lug
3. solder the two of them together!
your bass might not have white or black wires but you'll know by where they are attached. shell=ground/neutral wire, lug=live

Great! Thanks!!

 

[BuffaloBass]

I use my Mesa tube preamp to give it punch. Also, ensure the pickup heights are correct. Manufacturers vary but 3-4mm when you fret at the 12th is correct.

 

[Emanuel Apascaritei]

I use my Mesa tube preamp to give it punch. Also, ensure the pickup heights are correct. Manufacturers vary but 3-4mm when you fret at the 12th is correct.

thanks, I´ll check this out.

Closer the strings to the pups = more output volume??? I know volume and punch are 2 diferent things, it´s a just a little off topic question, nothing else.

 

[dabbler]

I´m really interested of how to do this but without the parallel/series button as I still want to preserve the same pots. Do you have any schematic? All the schematics I have found were with the parallel/series switch. Thanks!!

What's so special about the pots? Consider this:

1. If the pots are vintage, you don't have to throw them away (actually only one pot would change, I do mine on the tone pot), but the pots on my switchpots (all of my passive J's have a series/parallel switch) get the job done.

2. The J pups in series give a good approximation to a P bass sound. How good it is is partly affected by how you have your pup heights adjusted. IOW, the relative volume from each affects the tone. But this adjustment must be made with the pup heights for reasons explained in #3 below.

3. No matter how you do series, you only need ONE volume pot in the series configuration (when you do the switch it will remove one of the pots from the circuit in series mode). In series, they act like one big humbucking pickup, any pot in the signal change affects BOTH pups.

4. If you add the switchpot, your Jazz will be super verstatile as you have all the J sounds AND P sounds!

 

[JustOpenYourMind]

I'm the first to ask,

What do you mean by punchy tone?

Barking mids like Jaco Pastorius

or more like being hit in the chest with a pillow?

 

[Dave]

For me, rolling the neck pickup off just maybe 1/8th of a turn and leaving the tone wide open gave the punch and presence in the mix I was looking for.

 

[guroove]

I'm the first to ask,

What do you mean by punchy tone?

Barking mids like Jaco Pastorius

or more like being hit in the chest with a pillow?

This is an excellent point. I've always found the series wiring to make it more of a growling tone, while parallel wiring sounds "tight" to me. I've always thought of tight being more punchy.

Some people find flatwounds to be more punchy because of the way the low mids hit, while others might find roundwounds to be punchy because of the clarity and the highs.

 

[Emanuel Apascaritei]

I'm the first to ask,

What do you mean by punchy tone?

Barking mids like Jaco Pastorius

or more like being hit in the chest with a pillow?

Good question and sorry I didn´t explain it from the start.

the 2nd option is what I belive I´m looking for. More like a Stingray type of sound, if that gives you the image

 

[Emanuel Apascaritei]

What's so special about the pots? Consider this:

1. If the pots are vintage, you don't have to throw them away (actually only one pot would change, I do mine on the tone pot), but the pots on my switchpots (all of my passive J's have a series/parallel switch) get the job done.

2. The J pups in series give a good approximation to a P bass sound. How good it is is partly affected by how you have your pup heights adjusted. IOW, the relative volume from each affects the tone. But this adjustment must be made with the pup heights for reasons explained in #3 below.

3. No matter how you do series, you only need ONE volume pot in the series configuration (when you do the switch it will remove one of the pots from the circuit in series mode). In series, they act like one big humbucking pickup, any pot in the signal change affects BOTH pups.

4. If you add the switchpot, your Jazz will be super verstatile as you have all the J sounds AND P sounds!

Nothing special about the pots, the only thing is I don´t really know where to buy a pot wich has the switch here in Madrid. Maybe somebody who lives here can chime in and give me a help

 

[Flaggus]

I would agree that 'punchy' requires a bit more definition. To punch through in a band situation, especially a loud rock band?



In this example I'm using Dimarzio Ultrajazz PUs in an 08 American Jazz, favoring the neck. Touch'o'hair from a fulltone bassdrive into a GK 1001. DI out of the GK. This mix is off the board.

Keep in mind that was sounds good solo, may not sound good in a band. If your looking for an EQ point, 500hz is a good place to boost.

 

[Frank Orlando]

Flats

Yep... what he said. Bridge volume at 6, neck volume at 7, tone at 5. Use your amp volume to control the overall volume. Chromes. Punch, round, mellow... the string attack is just like, "pop". And that's with a flat EQ too. All fundamental and punch. Keep twiddling with the controls... all J's are not created equally.

 

[Emanuel Apascaritei]

I would agree that 'punchy' requires a bit more definition. To punch through in a band situation, especially a loud rock band?



In this example I'm using Dimarzio Ultrajazz PUs in an 08 American Jazz, favoring the neck. Touch'o'hair from a fulltone bassdrive into a GK 1001. DI out of the GK. This mix is off the board.

Keep in mind that was sounds good solo, may not sound good in a band. If your looking for an EQ point, 500hz is a good place to boost.

I´ve listen to this and actually I could hardly hear the bass. That´s not what I´m looking for, sorry. I´d call that tone as muffled. IMHO. Though it could have been the headphones I used to listen to it.

One of this days I´ll go to the studio and record it there. I´ll try an Avalon U5 and Universal Audio La-610 and see if I get the tone I have in mind. that big punchy tone

Thanks a lot guys here, I love this forum and the great support we have here. I really apreciate it.

Keep it comin´

 

[yellofury]

Hmmmm
I usually leave the EQ flat on my amp and do all the tweaking on the bass
for slap/punch I just dime all the knobs: vol 100% vol 100% tone 100%

for fingerstyle and more smooth tones I dial neck volume 100% bridge 25% tone 100%

for more of the Ray sound its the reverse: 25% neck 100%bridge and 100% tone

theres variations of all of these and with experimentation
you will find some sweet ones
I use DR extralifes which to me makes a great slap tone
anyways heres some craptastic playing on a Jazz

 

[Emanuel Apascaritei]

I can´t find it in youtube but the exact tone I have in my mind is: Born in Time by Eric Clapton. The bassist is Nathan East and I belive the bass he´s playing is his signature.

I´d love to achive that with a normaly poor little Jazz Bass.

It´s tough

 

[thehangingmist]

you tried the series wiring? i just got a geddy lee with sadowsky hum cancelling pickups in it and it is punchier than what i used to get out of single coils but am thinking about installing a s/p switch anyway soon

 

[billm67]

I have a mim jazz bass that I had replaced the pickups with duncan vintage jazz pickups. It sounded good but didn't have the punch that you are talking about. I think that is a modern sound created with a preamp. I just added an audere preamp with jazz preamp with the 3 band eq. This seems to let you go from basic passive sound to punchy modern sound..and of course, 90 percent of it is in the fingers. They were doing it long before active preamps were around.

 

[Emanuel Apascaritei]

you tried the series wiring? i just got a geddy lee with sadowsky hum cancelling pickups in it and it is punchier than what i used to get out of single coils but am thinking about installing a s/p switch anyway soon

So I did the series wiring yesterday and try it out today in the studio. I also played on the neck pup and...finally there was a lot of punch there. I tested it side by side with a stingray (fretless with flats) and was just about there in terms of tone and volume.

I imgaine if I put there a preamp that would be it...

The DI I used in the studio was Universal Audio LA-610 with the eq and comp bypassed

 

[thehangingmist]

So I did the series wiring yesterday and try it out today in the studio. I also played on the neck pup and...finally there was a lot of punch there. I tested it side by side with a stingray (fretless with flats) and was just about there in terms of tone and volume.

I imgaine if I put there a preamp that would be it...

The DI I used in the studio was Universal Audio LA-610 with the eq and comp bypassed

cool isnt it!? a preamp would definitely seal the deal! or a p bass heh! because essentially the p pickup is wired in series for that sound! p=punch!

 

[Emanuel Apascaritei]

Back to stock, Love it, and ALL the punchy sound I was looking for is in the fingers and the tehnique. I just roll of a 1/4 of the neck pick up and I play right near the bridge pick-up.

Though I had to try the series wiring to see what am I missing.

I´d like to add a pre-amp, maybe the Sadowsky....aLeRT- G.A.S. -AlErT