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The Reverend Club (part 8)

#1,641
I see a number of colours have disappeared from the range on the official Reverend page...Decision P and Mercalli 4 took my attention in particular. Should we read anything into this Chris? Any new colours or styles incoming? I've a big birthday coming up soon, so you never know, may treat myself :)
 
#1,643
sPiKi said:
I see a number of colours have disappeared from the range on the official Reverend page...Decision P and Mercalli 4 took my attention in particular. Should we read anything into this Chris? Any new colours or styles incoming? I've a big birthday coming up soon, so you never know, may treat myself :)
Click to expand...

Not allowed to say.......;)
 
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#1,645
Saw Mike Watt throttle the living daylights out of his Reverend signature bass last night. Also got to hang out while he and the band played on Adult Swim's "FishCenter Live"!
watt5.jpg watt4.jpg watt2.jpg watt1.jpg
 
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#1,650
BeauZooka said:
The P-Rail and J-Rail pups are similar and are also designed by Joe. Not part of the Railhammer line though obviously.
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You’ve got a point. I’ve got the fat fish which has a p-rails in the bridge and it sounds great. I just feel like the design concept of the railhammer line could be effectively applied to bass. I typically dial in a fairly bright, aggressive tone in bass and sometimes it can be difficult to get the E and A strings sounding bright and aggressive without the D and G Sounding too thin.
 
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#1,651
melloncollie said:
You’ve got a point. I’ve got the fat fish which has a p-rails in the bridge and it sounds great. I just feel like the design concept of the railhammer line could be effectively applied to bass. I typically dial in a fairly bright, aggressive tone in bass and sometimes it can be difficult to get the E and A strings sounding bright and aggressive without the D and G Sounding too thin.
Click to expand...

I don't know anything about the pickups but I have struggled getting a bright enough sound from the Reverends that I have owned. I absolutely love the brand, the look and the feel of the instruments but they have always been just a bit dark sounding for my tastes. FWIW I only play 5 strings so I'm limited to the Mercalli 5 as a choice in the new Reverends.
 
#1,652
jmbjandfam said:
I don't know anything about the pickups but I have struggled getting a bright enough sound from the Reverends that I have owned. I absolutely love the brand, the look and the feel of the instruments but they have always been just a bit dark sounding for my tastes. FWIW I only play 5 strings so I'm limited to the Mercalli 5 as a choice in the new Reverends.
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Same here. My fatfish was pretty perfect out of the box. It’s not a super bright instrument but it gets a nice aggressive tone that works for what I do.

My thundergun on the other hand has been through some extensive mods to get it where I wanted it. An audere preamp and Nordstrand bigblademan pickups are in it now and it’s got a great gritty, metallic tone. Reverends bass pickups do steer towards the meaty sounding.
 
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#1,653
No problem getting bright out of my Merc 4. I'm using a Mesa Subway D800 (not particularly bright sounding to start with) with a Tech 21 VT Bass preamp (original model) in front of it. Most nights I find myself dialling down the top end of the VT pedal. The Decision P is a bit more throaty and requires more cut particularly to the mids on my amp.
 
#1,654
melloncollie said:
Same here. My fatfish was pretty perfect out of the box. It’s not a super bright instrument but it gets a nice aggressive tone that works for what I do.

My thundergun on the other hand has been through some extensive mods to get it where I wanted it. An audere preamp and Nordstrand bigblademan pickups are in it now and it’s got a great gritty, metallic tone. Reverends bass pickups do steer towards the meaty sounding.
Click to expand...

I'd say "meaty" is a great description. A glorious tone for sure but sometimes I'm looking for a little more edge...
 
#1,655
sPiKi said:
No problem getting bright out of my Merc 4. I'm using a Mesa Subway D800 (not particularly bright sounding to start with) with a Tech 21 VT Bass preamp (original model) in front of it. Most nights I find myself dialling down the top end of the VT pedal. The Decision P is a bit more throaty and requires more cut particularly to the mids on my amp.
Click to expand...

From all the demos online, I think the new Decision P has the tone closest to what i would look for. Just wish they would make those Rail P pickups in a 5 string model!
 
#1,656
jmbjandfam said:
I don't know anything about the pickups but I have struggled getting a bright enough sound from the Reverends that I have owned. I absolutely love the brand, the look and the feel of the instruments but they have always been just a bit dark sounding for my tastes. FWIW I only play 5 strings so I'm limited to the Mercalli 5 as a choice in the new Reverends.
Click to expand...

You might want to do some experimenting with higher value tone and volume pots. I’m not sure what Reverend are using these days but if there are 250k pots in there you could bump them up to 500k.
It’s a pretty cheap and easy solution and might get you where you want to be.
 
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#1,657
Joe doesn't like the sound of the 'B' with a rail. I'm going to email him tomorrow. I've thought about it for awhile, and this conversation has me thinking it might be something. Kind of a rail hammer jazz bomb. Rails under the treble strings, and pole pieces under the B and maybe E.
As far as brightness, I don't know if my ears have changed, but I'm all the way on the neck pickup on my Mercalli, bass at 2 o'clock, treble at 10 o'clock on my GK Fusion, and its still a little to trebly for me!
 
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#1,658
chris4001asat said:
Joe doesn't like the sound of the 'B' with a rail. I'm going to email him tomorrow. I've thought about it for awhile, and this conversation has me thinking it might be something. Kind of a rail hammer jazz bomb. Rails under the treble strings, and pole pieces under the B and maybe E.
As far as brightness, I don't know if my ears have changed, but I'm all the way on the neck pickup on my Mercalli, bass at 2 o'clock, treble at 10 o'clock on my GK Fusion, and its still a little to trebly for me!
Click to expand...
That sounds like a interesting design almost like half a jazz pickups half a musicman style pickup.
 
#1,659
BeauZooka said:
You might want to do some experimenting with higher value tone and volume pots. I’m not sure what Reverend are using these days but if there are 250k pots in there you could bump them up to 500k.
It’s a pretty cheap and easy solution and might get you where you want to be.
Click to expand...

I don't know if all Reverend basses already have 500K pots in them, but the Decision P definitely does. I have two of them, and I have also struggled to get the edge that I want sometimes. Don't get me wrong, the Rev sounds great, but as a lifelong Fender guy it's hard to get that level of clarity and top end from them. I think it might well be the inherent character of the Korina bodies. In one of my Decision P's I changed out the pickups for Dimarzio Model P and J pups. I have a lot of experience with those pickups (they have been my favorites for years) and after the swap I was able to get more top end out of the bass, but it still had that same basic dark quality to it.
 
#1,660
Sparkdog said:
I don't know if all Reverend basses already have 500K pots in them, but the Decision P definitely does. I have two of them, and I have also struggled to get the edge that I want sometimes. Don't get me wrong, the Rev sounds great, but as a lifelong Fender guy it's hard to get that level of clarity and top end from them. I think it might well be the inherent character of the Korina bodies. In one of my Decision P's I changed out the pickups for Dimarzio Model P and J pups. I have a lot of experience with those pickups (they have been my favorites for years) and after the swap I was able to get more top end out of the bass, but it still had that same basic dark quality to it.
Click to expand...

It might be worth bumping them up to 1 Meg pots then. Maybe you're right that it won't help, but it's easy and cheap to try.
 
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