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What do you think of these pickups?

J

jster

Apr 22, 2014
20
0
39
#1
"Fender American Special PJ-Bass RW VIB FSR, bass guitar, Thomann 60th Anniversary model, alder body, maple neck, rosewood thomann fretboard, "C" shape, 20 frets, 41 mm saddle width, 1 x american standard Precision bass Alnico pickup and 1 x american standard vintage alnico Jazz Bass single coil pickup, colour: violin burst (handstained), incl. original Fender gigbag, made in USA"

You can do a search to see it. Talkbass won't let me post a link since I have so few posts.

I am thinking of buying this bass, but I read that the pickups aren't very good. Is that true? I bought a Dusty Hill type Squire bass earlier this year for about 300 EUR and don't think it sounds very good. Especially higher up the neck. And on the top two strings. The tone seems to qualitatively change when I get to the D string. (I did put some black nylon strings on. Not sure if that matters.) Maybe tomorrow I'll put a .wav file up for you guys to listen to.

When I try out basses at the local store, only the 2000 EUR Fenders sound good. (They only had about 20 basses to try.) I mention this because another big issue is that so many of them sound like crap on the lowest five notes. I had to return one bass the next day because the low end was so bad. And earlier this year, I bough another one on ebay that turned out to have low end problems. Is that the way it is with cheaper basses??

I have been playing guitar forever, but I am doing a fair bit of bass recording and I have been really struggling to get a decent tone. I just direct line in; not sure if that makes a difference.

Can anybody tell me what I should buy? I just want a nice you know Chuck Rainey with Steely Dan type sound when I direct in to Logic. Is that asking too much? If I buy this Thomann bass, it will be my fourth bass purchase this year. I'm done being a cheaparse, but I don't want any more problems!

Thanks
 
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#2
The P-bass pickup is very good. The standard. BUT...I always have a problem with putting a single coil pickup with a pickup that is essentially a humbucker, the P-pickup. If I got the bass, I would budget enough money to change out the Jazz bridge single coil pickup with the split-coil humbucking version to both balance the tone and keep the entire bass humbucking.
 
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#3
jster said:
"Fender American Special PJ-Bass RW VIB FSR, bass guitar, Thomann 60th Anniversary model, alder body, maple neck, rosewood thomann fretboard, "C" shape, 20 frets, 41 mm saddle width, 1 x american standard Precision bass Alnico pickup and 1 x american standard vintage alnico Jazz Bass single coil pickup, colour: violin burst (handstained), incl. original Fender gigbag, made in USA"

You can do a search to see it. Talkbass won't let me post a link since I have so few posts.

I am thinking of buying this bass, but I read that the pickups aren't very good. Is that true? I bought a Dusty Hill type Squire bass earlier this year for about 300 EUR and don't think it sounds very good. Especially higher up the neck. And on the top two strings. The tone seems to qualitatively change when I get to the D string. (I did put some black nylon strings on. Not sure if that matters.) Maybe tomorrow I'll put a .wav file up for you guys to listen to.

When I try out basses at the local store, only the 2000 EUR Fenders sound good. (They only had about 20 basses to try.) I mention this because another big issue is that so many of them sound like crap on the lowest five notes. I had to return one bass the next day because the low end was so bad. And earlier this year, I bough another one on ebay that turned out to have low end problems. Is that the way it is with cheaper basses??

I have been playing guitar forever, but I am doing a fair bit of bass recording and I have been really struggling to get a decent tone. I just direct line in; not sure if that makes a difference.

Can anybody tell me what I should buy? I just want a nice you know Chuck Rainey with Steely Dan type sound when I direct in to Logic. Is that asking too much? If I buy this Thomann bass, it will be my fourth bass purchase this year. I'm done being a cheaparse, but I don't want any more problems!

Thanks
Click to expand...

That's a great bass.

However, for the best results you should be using some kind of pre-amp before your interface; Tech 21 makes some great, inexpensive pedals that simulate classic, expensive tube amps very well, I'd recommend looking into the VT Bass DI in particular.
 
#6
I am also worried that that bass is on the light side. I am so freaked out about a bad low end, that I think I want something built like a tank. And the neck is supposed to be thinner. I worry about that. I was just so shocked at how many basses have horrible low ends. A low G seems to go in and out of tune on a lot of the stuff they sell. Or so it seems to me.
 
#7
A decent P or J bass should be able to muster up a fat, articulate tone without too much trouble. A know a few guys who primarily play guitars but track bass at home, both of their techniques are pretty extreme. One guy plucks very lightly and just feathers the bass, the other guy uses an aggressive, chopping pick attack. Both these guys needed really specific set-ups to get anything good out of their basses. I'm not assuming that setup is your issue, being that it sounds like you've experienced the same playability issues with multiple basses I thought it couldn't hurt.
Out of curiosity, are you tracking through monitors or cans?
 
#8
I think that most of the issues come from my trying to save money. Stupid me, I figured a cheap bass would be OK. The first bass was maybe broken. I got it used. The second was cheap crap. The low end on the Dusty Hill type Squier that I use now is ok. My complaints about it are more that I feel like I can't play anything fast and melodic on the D and G strings above the seventh fret because the sound there is quite different from the rest of the bass. Maybe those strings are too close to the pickup. I raised the E and A strings up high off the fretboard so I could eliminate all buzzing. But I didn't mess with the D and G strings. Partly out of laziness and partly because I thought maybe it would cause more intonation issues. Which brings up another issue: I've had to struggle to play things in tune. I tune the bass for each tune and maybe even 4-5 cents flat. But when I look at Flex pitch in Logic for something I record, notes are often 8-10 cents sharp. Also, when I'm tuning it, I'm amazed how wildly the meter swings.

I track in cans. I don't have monitors at the moment.

The fact is I´m no Chuck Rainey, but I can play much better than this bass is allowing me to play. I actually could probably continue to use this bass, but the player in me wants something that responds nicely all over the fretboard. I am pretty sure I could groove a lot harder with a better bass. I'm really afraid of pushing it because the sound is just not very consistent.

I don't know why I got the nylon wounds really. I guess my thinking was I wanted to be able to slide around the fretboard with my weanie guitarist fingers and not have too much fret noise. But maybe the loss of brightness/mids makes the bass sound worse. I dunno. At present, it just sounds kinda cheap. Pickup is probably cheap.
 
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#9
Here is my advice, get your bass set up by someone who knows how to set up basses. Have the guy doing the set up put some nice roundwounds or flatwounds on it depending on your personal taste. (Rounds are brighter and zingier, Flats are mellow with a good fundamental and minimal finger noise. For rounds try Daddario XLs, Rotosound 66s, for flats try Daddario Chromes)

Most cheap basses sound just fine after a proper setup. The fact that you have made 4 bass purchases already leads me to believe you just assume the bass sucks because it isn't set up if at all.

You know why the expensive basses at the store seem so much better? Because the store sets up the expensive basses properly! ;)
 
#12
Here is a 24bit mp3 with five 11 note scales: G major at the third fret, A at the fifth, C at the eighth, D at the tenth, and E at the twelfth fret. I have RotoSound black nylon strings. I am going directly into Logic with no amp or effects (through an RME interface). And I am just using my thumb. What do you think is going on with this bass?



Thanks
 
#13
I don't hear anything abnormal. Your bass doesn't sound broken or defective or anything like that. A good set up with some rounds/flats is still my vote.

Any bass can play bad and sound bad if the set up has issues.
:thumbsup:
And getting a good set up is way cheaper than buying a new bass!
 
#14
Thanks Jellin,

Don't the D and E strings sound terrible when I start those last two scales at 0:45 and 0:57? Like there are overtones from some other note. Like some sort of metallic underwater sound. Some kind of submarine thing?

And then the notes on the D and G string sound so naked by comparison.

Yes, a set up is obviously a good thing. I just don't think there is anybody within a couple of hours of where I am. :(
 
#16
Yeah, I used a capo and pushed it down and it did seem to sound better. I gotta get a smaller phillips. There are two screws at the top and bottom. Can I just screw them all the way down? Is that how you lower it?
 
#18
Great advice! I lowered the pickup basically all the way! The tone is much better now! But I lost a lot of gain. Probably not that big a deal because the rest of my set up has such low noise. I am just cranking the gain in Logic.

This is the bass:

http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/PBassCabBlk/

I still have the RotoWound black nylon strings which I really like from a playing point of view. I have some rounds but I was too lazy to try them again.

What do you think of that pickup? It is called a Fideli'Tron. Is there a much better pickup I could buy? Maybe something active? At this point it really seems to me that the pickup + pickup setup is/was the heart of the problem with this bass. I don't really know much about bass pickups. The bass itself, seems pretty good, except maybe the tuners could be better. Any thoughts on those tuners?

Thanks!
 
#19
That's perfectly normal, the farther away the pickup the quieter it will be. Try to find a balance, I would raise it a little bit or until it starts sounding underwater and then back it down until it stops.

The pickup is fine but they don't sound a lot like traditional p or J pickups which may be the sound you are after?
 
#20
I would move it further down if I could. It still sounds slightly underwater. And I have the action pretty high, although I may try and lower that a bit tonight.

Not sure what my favorite bass tone is. Actually it is an upright! Hehe. But for electric bass, I would have to say the sound on Josie by Steely Dan. Penny Lane maybe second place.

How did Chuck Rainey play like that with no fret noise? I was listening to Marcus Miller I believe on Just the Two of Us and there was a lot of fret noise. I don't think they would allow that today. But what do I know.
 

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