Why so little discussion about bass pickups?

[Dr. Keebs]

I also agree that, in a broad context and in the real world outside of this forum, bass players aren't as concerned with small details as we are concerned with our role in the bigger picture. I've never swapped pickups or thought about any specs. If it sounds good, it's just that, and it does what it needs to.

 

[dwizum]

I see your point. Bass is my instrument but I've always been a curious, experimental type and I guess I'm a bit envious of the wacky (often times, nonsensical) things the guitar community comes out with. That's why I've enjoyed poking around the forum here. There does seem to be a more experimental vibe, I just wish it was more apart of the broader bass community.

You're among friends here then!

Looking for people to discuss weird guitar configurations with is an easy search. Looking for people to discuss weird bass configurations with, or moreso building non-traditional pickups, can be like fumbling around in the desert with a blindfold on. Lucky for you, you've found the oasis!

 

[Peeved T-40]

There aren't as many forums for bass players as for guitar players, because there aren't as many bassists. And since the basic mechanics of pickups (electronics generally) are the same for guitars and basses -- the only real differences involve working frequencies -- most of the information shared in guitar forums is just as useful for bass players. When I search the web about some kind of bass-relevant electronics topic, most of the time it's answered to my satisfaction in a guitar forum or blog post, and that includes somewhat esoteric issues like Q filters and varitone switches.

I think the other part of the matter is that bassists and guitarists often have different goals in mind. Many guitarists obsessed with pickups are trying to recreate very specific historical sounds, to the extent of being kind of hypochondriac about the subtleties in the sound. There are plenty of bassists who are also into historical recreation but most just want to be heard, and their interest in tone is mostly about pickups that sound pleasing to them while being sufficiently audible in a mix. And that's a much easier target than a constantly fleeting idea of exactly what Jimmy Page's guitar sounded like at some specific concert.

Yes, I agree guitar players seem to veer heavily into snake oil territory on their quests for "the perfect tone". A lot of times it reminds me of audiophiles talking about how "danceable" their $2,000 headphone cable is. it's nonsense but i appreciate the experimentation and sometimes something pretty cool will come out of it.

 

[beaglesandbass]

you know what? if it rubs you the wrong way, maybe that's your problem. There is not a single thing about my question that is in anyway rude, disrespectful or otherwise offensive unless you decide to deliberately take it as such. You in particular have been nothing but abrasive and defensive about what's an honest and reasonable question. "Why is there less discussion about pickups among bassists than there is with guitarists". leave it to the internet to punish someone for legitimate curiosity.

Sorry I asked

by the way, you know what else rubs people the wrong way? saying "a little friendly advice" because "a little friendly advice" is never friendly.

Yeah, you're right. What do I know? I've only been a member here for almost 20 years, and a moderator for most of that. It's not like haven't seen countless well intentioned threads from new members gone awry which leads to alienations and insults. I couldn't possibly have any experience in dealing with new members getting defensive about their own threads when interpreted the wrong way. Kudos to you though for cherry picking my post and not responding to the parts of my post that dealt with your question. Enjoy your time here.

 

[Chef]

The discussion about guitar pickups is endless. It's all about what kind of pickup, who made it, what year is it, how's it wound, what new pickup tech is out there and how they're wired up. But when it comes to bass it pretty much just seems to be a non discussion. It kind of just ends at precision or jazz.

occasionally there's a something a bit different like a humbucker (or bass bucker if you will) or some weird vintage pickup will poke it's head out every once in a while but generally speaking, I just never really hear the bass community talking about pickups.

Why is that?

Dude; theres this whole sub forum, right here, that you found, filled with thousands of threads about pickups...........................................................................................

 

[BassFalcon]

I see your point. Bass is my instrument but I've always been a curious, experimental type and I guess I'm a bit envious of the wacky (often times, nonsensical) things the guitar community comes out with. That's why I've enjoyed poking around the forum here. There does seem to be a more experimental vibe, I just wish it was more apart of the broader bass community.

check these out, instead of a coil of wire it's a stack of copper tracings on wafers to make the coil. Apparently very versatile as well.
Fluence Electric Bass Guitar Soapbar Pickups | Fishman

 

[Peeved T-40]

Dude; theres this whole sub forum, right here, that you found, filled with thousands of threads about pickups...........................................................................................

Again... I wasn't implying that no one is talking about pickups here... on a bass pickup forum...

I came to the bass pickup forum to ask why, broadly speaking, outside of this forum, bassists seem less concerned with their pickups and electronics than guitar players.

I wasn't implying anything about this forum or the people here

 

[Peeved T-40]

check these out, instead of a coil of wire it's a stack of copper tracings on wafers to make the coil. Apparently very versatile as well.
Fluence Electric Bass Guitar Soapbar Pickups | Fishman

Those are kind of neat. Do you of any pictures of the inside of them? I'm not seeing any on a cursory search

 

[Slater]

Aside from the obvious guitar vs. bass ratio in the marketplace, I believe part of it is the lower bass frequency itself. It's just more difficult to capture those lower notes efficiently and effectively, so there are just fewer pickup designs that work well.

 

[BassFalcon]

Those are kind of neat. Do you of any pictures of the inside of them? I'm not seeing any on a cursory search

 

[neddyrow]

I don't talk about pick-ups because I'm a Nordstrand Guy and won't put anything else in my basses.

 

[Peeved T-40]

Aside from the obvious guitar vs. bass ratio in the marketplace, I believe part of it is the lower bass frequency itself. It's just more difficult to capture those lower notes efficiently and effectively, so there are just fewer pickup designs that work well.

That's a fair point but there's still stuff you could do with the wiring and in general, the wiring schemes in basses are pretty simple and to the point. I mean, there are active basses with full EQs and stuff in them but I've never seen anything that I might call a Stratocaster of basses for instance. Like a bass that's loaded out with pickups and wired to allow for all kinds of combinations. Maybe there's some high end, boutique stuff out there but certainly nothing off the shelf.

 

[dwizum]

I freeze-framed that video on the cross section and tried to count the "turns" in each coil, but it was a little challenging. Looks like it's roughly 30 across and 40 tall. That would make for 1,200 turns. I'm wondering if anyone else can validate that. Two "coils" so 2,400 turns total in the pickup.

A normal wire wound pickup might have two to four times that much, or more. I'm wondering how they compensate for the lower signal output as a result of the low turn count. I know their bass pickups are active, but they also have a passive mode that bypasses the onboard preamp. So it's not like they're just boosting the weak signal.

It doesn't strike me as materially different than a wire wound pickup but maybe I'm missing something. Winding a coil is cheaper and faster than making a multilayer pcb, so it's not like this was done for manufacturing or cost efficiency. The "choose which portion of the field is active" theoretical feature he talks about in the video, based on the offset coils and the vias, is possible with wound pickups. I'm wondering if that offset is even a deliberate feature to achieve some specific tonal goal, or if it was done because that was the only way they could have room for the row of vias along the edge.

Has anyone cut up a bass Fluence pickup? I wonder if they're much different inside.

 

[dwizum]

Aside from the obvious guitar vs. bass ratio in the marketplace, I believe part of it is the lower bass frequency itself. It's just more difficult to capture those lower notes efficiently and effectively, so there are just fewer pickup designs that work well.

I don't want to be a bubble burster or theory-killer here, but it's not any harder to capture bass frequencies versus guitar, in terms of pickup design. All of the common pickup layouts/designs can easily be adjusted to work with either frequency range.

 

[Dr. Keebs]

Yeah, you're right. What do I know? I've only been a member here for almost 20 years, and a moderator for most of that. It's not like haven't seen countless well intentioned threads from new members gone awry which leads to alienations and insults. I couldn't possibly have any experience in dealing with new members getting defensive about their own threads when interpreted the wrong way. Kudos to you though for cherry picking my post and not responding to the parts of my post that dealt with your question. Enjoy your time here.

I hate causing waves and arguing on the internet. Don't like putting that energy out there. Makes me cringe. I avoid it like the plague, and usually TB posts that devolve into that. It bears no fruit.

With utmost respect for your time here in general and as a moderator specifically - you speak of the pitfalls of ridicule and alienation of new members/posters asking questions a certain way, but I see the same behavior from you in response to OP. He later clarified specifically what he meant, i.e. bass pickup discussions in the real world, outside of Talkbass. I personally agree on that, and it's an interesting point about guitar players vs. bass players, IMO. Guitar players are a silly bunch.

Sometimes, it's worth probing/steering a conversation to gain clarity, rather than jumping all over someone when you don't understand their intent.

Respect to all, and peace for today.

 

[NoiseNinja]

I mean, of course there are more discussions of bass pickups on a bass forum in the pickup section. That's why I asked here.

im talking more broadly. There doesn't seem to be the same kind of interest in pickups for bass as there is with guitar. There's certainly less variety and experimentation (I'm not saying there's non).

there's tons of discussion and experimentation around guitar pickups and their configurations. I will grant you, a lot of it is nonsense but I would be lying if I didn't say they come up with some pretty neat stuff. I mostly only see weird pickups or interesting configurations on multi-thousand dollar, boutique type basses.

there are lower end basses with interesting configurations here and there like the Epiphone EB-3 but in my experience people are pretty hostile to them. I see people trash it's neck pickup all the time on this forum. Personally I think it sounds interesting but It doesn't seem most people are interested in different when it comes to basses

Again not matching my observations at all, but then again people tend to focus on different things and weight the objects of that focus individually as well, so that the very same owl might very well seem to look more like a bat to one person while more like a hawk, or even a sparrow or a blackbird, to another, depending on individual perspective, and might even do so to someone otherwise truly believing them self to be looking from an objective perspective, since the human condition is of such trickery nature as to never truly allowing for true objectivity, no matter how hard one, even with the most, objectively or otherwise, genuine intention, might try to achieve such, and has its ways of trickering us into thinking as if that was not the actual case of reality, despite it actually being exactly what it is not, objectively speaking, or at least attempting as close an approximation to the target as having no other option than shooting blindly will ever get anyone - by most certainty me at very least.

 

[Sixgunn]

The discussion about guitar pickups is endless. It's all about what kind of pickup, who made it, what year is it, how's it wound, what new pickup tech is out there and how they're wired up. But when it comes to bass it pretty much just seems to be a non discussion. It kind of just ends at precision or jazz.

occasionally there's a something a bit different like a humbucker (or bass bucker if you will) or some weird vintage pickup will poke it's head out every once in a while but generally speaking, I just never really hear the bass community talking about pickups.

Why is that?

 

[Silky Johnson]

I think bassist are more logical than guitarists and realize it's mostly subjective and describing sounds with words over the internet is borderline pointless.

Jk about guitarists tho*

*Jk

 

[red_rhino]

A) You can't swing a dead cat here in TB without hitting some conversation about pickups.

Would that be an overwound dead cat? Or a reverse-out-of-phase dead cat? I like a scooped dead cat, but it can get lost in the mix. (What's the best dead cat for metal?)

I came to the bass pickup forum to ask why, broadly speaking, outside of this forum, bassists seem less concerned with their pickups and electronics than guitar players.

So thinking about "outside of this forum", you're making an interesting observation. Thinking back about how people in the audience would sometimes ask about gear, it does indeed seem that the questions my guitar player gets are usually about his pickups. OTOH, the questions I usually get are about woods and on-board preamps.

But I think the conclusion you're drawing isn't really accurate. I do know guitar players who can talk on endlessly about pots and caps and over/underwinding yadayadayada, and I know guitar players who don't care if their pickups are wound with rusty razor wire. Same with bass players. There are some who get excited about the use of vintage copper from old pickups being repurposed into new pickups, and some of us who like what we like without regard to why we like it.

I think the short answer to your question is that it's because we're bass players, not guitar players, and therefore we fry different fish.

Oh, and welcome to Talkbass.

 

[Element Zero]

Hmm. I dunno. Guitarist are a picky breed.