would you do this on a Custom Bass!?

[FIXXXER]

Hey Folks!

i am currently thinking about getting a new Custom Bass looking at the specs at a guitarist!
I like my gear simple as i use it @home for recording exclusively, means i do not need fancy looks
or extreme tonal versatility but i want a solid tone in terms of, clear punchy, defined etc.

I am thinking about a single pickup bass with one volume knob only, means, pickup wise
i need to find the best possible solution for this.

any ideas/suggestions?

 

[BearOnGuitar]

I always had best results when blending between bridge and neck pickups, anywhere from 70:30 to 50:50 bridge:neck, to get a well balanced frequency response and a usable full sounding tone, both DI and through an amp. Bridge pickup only would almost always result in a lacking low end to me, with the only exception being the Sandberg Terra bass which also had great electronics. It still needed a relatively huge boost to the bass frequencies though to not sound weak in the low end.

 

[FIXXXER]

to be honest i never used anything else than the bridge pickup on a bass
but i can fully agree on what you said about the lack of low frequencies!

maybe going with two pickups but leaving out the "tone" knob would be a good idea.
i want this to be as simple as possible with a great source tone that i can recall any time.

 

[newamerikangospel]

I would suggest you look up ideas using two outputs, one per pickup. You can record each pickup, and use the bridge for you clank and/or dirty track and the neck for a DI or clean amp for your low end, or you can automate the track levels, like changing the mix knob through out the song.

Blending pickups on bass always seems to introduce a phase type of thing, but not necessarily in a bad way. For metal, I prefer to use all bridge, or 80%-ish bridge, 20%neck for metal. But I would hate to not have the option of a neck pickup, especially on a custom instrument, for clean passages.

 

[FIXXXER]

two outputs would be too much hassle, i want to keep this as simple as possible.
as for metal i always used the bridge pickup only, so my idea was to get a single,
but extremely good sounding pickup that can deliver a great tone, but i have
absolutely no clue when it comes to bass pickups...

 

[BearOnGuitar]

What you could of course also do is to use one pickup only but have it moved further away from the bridge and more towards the neck, so that you get a good balanced sound from this one pickup that includes enough low end. That would work out just fine and you'd still be able to shape the tone to your liking using the on board preamp. I don't have much experience with bass pickups, but I usually prefer to use passive pickups with active electronics. I'd look at Nordstrand or Bartolini pickups. I really liked the electronics in the Sandberg basses I used, which is the Glockenklang 3-band preamp. When you keep all knobs in their default position you can switch between the active and passive electronics without any change in tone, and it also sounds really good and musical.

 

[The-Zeronaut]

if its a 5 string make it a 35" scale at least...your low B string will forever thank you.
I would make it a 35" even if its a 4 string....
When I hear "clear, punchy and defined" I immediately think of active pickups and electronics on bass.

 

[FIXXXER]

@BearOnGuitar
that's an idea, but then again, the pickup position is very crucial for the tone so chosing the right position
would be a big gamble. i guess it's better to go with a classical two pickup setup but then chosing some unique pickups.
just checked out nordstrand pickups, if i see right they make the pickups for dingwall basses or at least they have some
pickups designed together, need to check some YT on this!

i'd like to avoid too many knobs and switches, in general the more choice i have the more i will play with these which
in my case always kills my creativity, that's why the "as simple as possible" idea came from.

maybe going with two pickups one volume and one blend pot would be a good idea. leaving out the tone know, which i
never use anyways. it should also give a little bit more clarity to the bridge pickup, so blending the bridge and neck 50/50
could sound a bit more agressive but full of low end which would be the perfect tone!

btw, is the evertune bass anywhere close to a point where it would be reasonable to wait some more time?

@The-Zeronaut
i am definitively going for a multiscale on this and yes i want the low strings to be quite tense, what would be
the perfect multi scale ratio for this?

active PU's and electronics sound tempting but i want it as simple as possible, also i do not like any EQ options on the instrument
i rather dieal this on the "amp"

 

[BearOnGuitar]

You will definitely need some kind of tone shaping even before going into an amp, even more so if you plan on using the DI output with software amp emulations. A 3 band built in EQ will not make you go crazy, especially since most of them have fixed frequency points, so at most you will give the signal slight tweaks to shape the sound depending on your playstyle and preference of tone. So far every bass I played I always had to turn up the bass EQ in order to have full and solid low end. With the glockenklang pre you can actually turn off the active EQ, switching to passive mode, where only the volume and blend knobs will be active, so you have both options.

We aim to release the bass bridge this year, however we are not able to tell exactly when it's finished. I wouldn't wait for it, simply because the installation is much easier compared to our guitar bridges, if you decide to retrofit it later on.

 

[FIXXXER]

i need to check out what the custom shop has to offer, i might go for something like...

-2 nordstrand/dingwall or maybe delano pickups
-2x volume for each pickup instead of a blend
-3 band electroinics (bass, middle, treble)

would be passive pickups with active electronics, if this makes any sense, not sure
if this will work that way. the idea is having the passive pickups and being able to add
something to them using the 3band eq.

as for the evertune, it's the best thing ever, so i might actually wait, retrofit is nice but only if
it's possible without leaving "marks" to the body, everytime i see a FR guitar retro fitted with the evertune
and the FR cavity being filled with some different wood i die a little bit inside!

however if i go with multiscale evertune won't be an option anyway so i might think about it and wait