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Hi everyone,
I normally post in the guitar forums. I've been playing around with the Triple Shot mounting rings. That got me thinking about bass and whether a lot of switching options on bass is a popular thing, especially since many bass players tend to dial in their tone on their basses and not their amps.
So I found this video:
Doing stuff like this on a Jazz bass doesn't surprise me because of its versatility and association with fretless playing and Jaco.
However, I prefer a PJ or even a PP bass (I find BC Rich predominantly makes these--I prefer them to two soapbar basses) when playing 4 string. I started to wonder if a lot of these switching options would be worth the trouble of installation on my basses.
For reference, I like the Fender Original (non-Custom Shop) bass pickups and use my amp/DAW settings to make up any difference in output or tone. I find these pickups are very clean, articulate, and even vs. something like a Quarter Pounder which for me is a bit much.
In my experience, going parallel on a bass really only helps if you have a really muddy or oversaturated pickup and want to clear things up a bit.
I'm thinking about DiMarzio P bass pickups here, mainly, as I know they are wired for 4 conductor and, in my experience, can be a bit much if one is looking for clarity and a vintage sound.
However, I have rarely heard of a phase switch on basses, especially PJ and PP models (I'm not even sure it can be done due to how a P bass pickup is built--I assume the E and A coil would be put out of phase with the D and G coil, or perhaps one entire split P with the other split P in a PP setup).
To my ears, a soapbar bass is the most bland sounding. It seems to try to emulate a Jazz bass without hum and an MM but sounds completely like neither. I would be interested in trying series/parallel/phase on these mainly because they are so common. I more or less think of them as a bass version of a guitar humbucker. I regret that more and more new basses seem to be going this way in terms of construction, probably due to reduced costs of construction.
To my ears, an MM sounds fullest, especially a dual MM. My understanding is MM pickups generally can be wired a lot of ways. Most of the possible switching options are demonstrated here:
In the first video above, the Jazz bass didn't sound as different to me out of phase as a guitar does (I associate out of phase and parallel sounds with funk guitar). In fact, it sounds like a phaser could be dialed in to produce the exact same sound by notching out certain frequencies. Going series/parallel just seems to thin out the sound, almost like turning up a tone knob to treble.
In short, my conclusion is you could put series/parallel and phase switches on a bass, but the results wouldn't be as noticeable as on a guitar.
I would appreciate everyone else's thoughts/advice on this, as I'm sure I'm probably wrong.
Thanks all.
I normally post in the guitar forums. I've been playing around with the Triple Shot mounting rings. That got me thinking about bass and whether a lot of switching options on bass is a popular thing, especially since many bass players tend to dial in their tone on their basses and not their amps.
So I found this video:
Doing stuff like this on a Jazz bass doesn't surprise me because of its versatility and association with fretless playing and Jaco.
However, I prefer a PJ or even a PP bass (I find BC Rich predominantly makes these--I prefer them to two soapbar basses) when playing 4 string. I started to wonder if a lot of these switching options would be worth the trouble of installation on my basses.
For reference, I like the Fender Original (non-Custom Shop) bass pickups and use my amp/DAW settings to make up any difference in output or tone. I find these pickups are very clean, articulate, and even vs. something like a Quarter Pounder which for me is a bit much.
In my experience, going parallel on a bass really only helps if you have a really muddy or oversaturated pickup and want to clear things up a bit.
I'm thinking about DiMarzio P bass pickups here, mainly, as I know they are wired for 4 conductor and, in my experience, can be a bit much if one is looking for clarity and a vintage sound.
However, I have rarely heard of a phase switch on basses, especially PJ and PP models (I'm not even sure it can be done due to how a P bass pickup is built--I assume the E and A coil would be put out of phase with the D and G coil, or perhaps one entire split P with the other split P in a PP setup).
To my ears, a soapbar bass is the most bland sounding. It seems to try to emulate a Jazz bass without hum and an MM but sounds completely like neither. I would be interested in trying series/parallel/phase on these mainly because they are so common. I more or less think of them as a bass version of a guitar humbucker. I regret that more and more new basses seem to be going this way in terms of construction, probably due to reduced costs of construction.
To my ears, an MM sounds fullest, especially a dual MM. My understanding is MM pickups generally can be wired a lot of ways. Most of the possible switching options are demonstrated here:
In the first video above, the Jazz bass didn't sound as different to me out of phase as a guitar does (I associate out of phase and parallel sounds with funk guitar). In fact, it sounds like a phaser could be dialed in to produce the exact same sound by notching out certain frequencies. Going series/parallel just seems to thin out the sound, almost like turning up a tone knob to treble.
In short, my conclusion is you could put series/parallel and phase switches on a bass, but the results wouldn't be as noticeable as on a guitar.
I would appreciate everyone else's thoughts/advice on this, as I'm sure I'm probably wrong.
Thanks all.
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