Show us your rig!

[andy67]

My wee practice rig. 

[Piers_Williamson]

On 20/03/2022 at 12:31, jazzyvee said:

Last night's gig rig.

Alembic F1-X and SF-2 into a Synq 1K0 power amp and Barefaced Big Twin II

 

 

Nerdy Alembic question for you Jazzy....if you have all that filtering goodness on-board your Alembic, do you need an SF 2 rack as well, or do you leave one set flat?  And what does the top element in your rack do?

 

Thanks...and beautiful basses and tasteful playing from you!

[studiobubny]

My recording rig :

 

 

[jazzyvee]

13 hours ago, Piers_Williamson said:

 

 

Nerdy Alembic question for you Jazzy....if you have all that filtering goodness on-board your Alembic, do you need an SF 2 rack as well, or do you leave one set flat?  And what does the top element in your rack do?

 

Thanks...and beautiful basses and tasteful playing from you!

Hahaha, well i am an alembic nerd so here goes. No, i don't need the SF-2 for most things, so generally it is in passthrough with the filter gain off.  The alembic onboard low pass filters have an operating range of 350hz to 3khz. So once you set your frequency on either of the filters, everything above is filtered out at 12db/octave and below is untouched. So for reggae, even with the filter closed down, that bass is so bright the sound can be twangy a can't take control of the lower frequencies i want to emphasise. So that is where the SF-2 comes in, i can pick the punch frequency which for me is around 80 to 110hz depending on the room, then i can raise everything from that frequency and below with the  filter gain and using the reciprocal damping knob i can emphasise the punch frequency. That gives me overall a clean articulate heavy and punchy bass sounds without the mud.

For non reggae it's hardly used but sometimes i have used it in a low volume gig just to increase the low end density

I suppose i could use a regular bass amp. 🤫😉

 

The top unit is the mains external power supply for my series bass. They connect  via 5 pin neutrix connectors which send 36vdc to power the bass and returns individual pickup outs which  go to your pre amp or the two rear out jacks can go to another stereo or mono bass rig. Btw, series basses also have 2x9v batteries inside for backup or if you prefer to use a standard jack lead.

Edited March 25, 2022 by jazzyvee

[Piers_Williamson]

Thanks Jazzy....and for completeness, is the top rack unit a stereo splitter??

[jazzyvee]

8 minutes ago, Piers_Williamson said:

Thanks Jazzy....and for completeness, is the top rack unit a stereo splitter??

Sort of but only for series basses, gives the choice of individual pickup out or single mono out.

[Piers_Williamson]

Without hijacking a marvelous thread....Jazzy I am now almost an ex-Alembic owner ☹️  Beautiful, beautiful basses....but a bit impractical and too precious for playing gigs where they might get damaged.  So a question for you....if you were playing, say, a vintage Jazz or Musicman through your rig, can you recreate some, or all of the same flexibility that Alembics have on-board...through the pre-amp/super filter?

[jazzyvee]

3 hours ago, Piers_Williamson said:

Without hijacking a marvelous thread....Jazzy I am now almost an ex-Alembic owner ☹️  Beautiful, beautiful basses....but a bit impractical and too precious for playing gigs where they might get damaged.  So a question for you....if you were playing, say, a vintage Jazz or Musicman through your rig, can you recreate some, or all of the same flexibility that Alembics have on-board...through the pre-amp/super filter?

Interesting question, though one i can't answer from personal practical experience. From my understanding, one of the differences between alembic pickups and most other pickups is they are designed to only pick up what the strings are doing instead of being wound to emphasise or impart a particular tonal character. So since the SF-2  is more versatile in tone shaping than alembic basses generally have on board, my assumption would be that the rig would give you the same way of tone shaping but not the same tone.

[jazzyvee]

12 hours ago, Piers_Williamson said:

Without hijacking a marvelous thread....Jazzy I am now almost an ex-Alembic owner ☹️  Beautiful, beautiful basses....but a bit impractical and too precious for playing gigs where they might get damaged.

What do you mean by ex alembic player, have you sold it or planning to sell yours? what model is it?

[Piers_Williamson]

1 hour ago, jazzyvee said:

What do you mean by ex alembic player, have you sold it or planning to sell yours? what model is it?

Technically I swapped my Mark King (for an early Wal) and my 5 string fretless epic is up for sale at the Gallery at the minute.  I am a leftie though Jazzy, so they wouldn't have interested you!  I did it with a heavy heart though!  I still have the t shirts 🙂

[three]

11 hours ago, jazzyvee said:

Interesting question, though one i can't answer from personal practical experience. From my understanding, one of the differences between alembic pickups and most other pickups is they are designed to only pick up what the strings are doing instead of being wound to emphasise or impart a particular tonal character. So since the SF-2  is more versatile in tone shaping than alembic basses generally have on board, my assumption would be that the rig would give you the same way of tone shaping but not the same tone.

I hope this isn't a further thread derail but I'd agree entirely with Jazzvee.  We use pretty much identical rigs, though I use a Warwick Hellborg pre as I prefer SS to valve pres.  I'd sort of hoped (ridiculously) that the SF2 would make non Alembic basses - I use Spectors fairly frequently - sound more like an Alembic.  For many reasons, not least the pickups in Alembics, the SF2 doesn't do this.  It's pretty good, with a bit of messing around, at making an Alembic sound like a non-Alembic bass (Fender etc.) but it doesn't do the reverse.  That said, the tweaking options with the SF2 and any bass are pretty much infinite.  As with Jazzyvee, in pretty much all practical circumstances, I use the on-board filter on the bass rather than the SF2.  I find that Series basses interact very nicely too with the Hellborg PR40 - I dial in a base setting on the PR40 (according to the room/circumstances) and then use the filters and q on the bass - pretty sparingly.  Piers, your Alembic fretless looks lovely - beautiful body facing

Edited March 26, 2022 by three

[Stub Mandrel]

11 hours ago, jazzyvee said:

they are designed to only pick up what the strings are doing instead of being wound to emphasise or impart a particular tonal character

 

I'd love to know how they do that. I find it very hard to believe one (or a few) companies have discovered a way to make characterless pickups.

 

Increasing magnet strength increases the sensitivity, but potentially interacts with the string/strings. So older, weaker magnet types tend to be more neutral.

 

Coils have two key properties - inductance, related to the number of coils, and resistance, related to the number of coils and wire gauge.

 

Coil placement - obviously.

 

Coil physical size also has an effect, wider coils cover more string, changing the harmonic content as they 'average' the signal over a longer length of string.

 

Varying these factors will change the 'tonal character' of the sound.

 

I suppose you could use individual pickups per string, small, very low number of windings to minimise the contribution of the pickup. But these would still only tell you what one point on the string was doing, and would have a poor signal-to-noise ratio because of the additional gain required.

[jazzyvee]

I'm no expert on the electronics or magnets, coli etc, but my understanding from what i have read on the alembic site is that the resonant frequency of their pickups is outside the frequency range of the bass so no bass frequencies are enhanced or subdued. Most other pickups by other makers are wound to give some kind of baked in sound influence over certain frequencies. For example to make them more bassy, punchy, high output ir vintage sounding etc. etc. The low pass filters then allow you to attenuate frequencies above the filter setting and apply a lift to the cut off frequency. This affects mainly the attack of the note rather than the whole sustaining note.  

[Kiwi]

18 hours ago, Stub Mandrel said:

 

I'd love to know how they do that. I find it very hard to believe one (or a few) companies have discovered a way to make characterless pickups.

Not characterless so much as adjusted.  Manufacturers who claim flatter response pickups will typically engineer the pickups so that the inherent peak that all pickups have is shifted to a part of the frequency spectrum which isn't as audible.  Alembic soapbar pickups (AXY but also Fatboy) also have low windings for a flatter and broader response and, while it means lower output, the idea was that the lack of gain would be boosted by the onboard active electronics.  Flatter response pickups are also ideal for filter based eqs so it all kind of ties together in a well thought out package, even if the actual engineering approach and some of the parts they use are getting a bit long in the tooth. 

[Merton]

Got new grilles from Barefaced today. Oriented right for the stack and with the new logo. Nice 😎

[funkypenguin]

On 27/03/2022 at 06:22, Kiwi said:

Not characterless so much as adjusted.  Manufacturers who claim flatter response pickups will typically engineer the pickups so that the inherent peak that all pickups have is shifted to a part of the frequency spectrum which isn't as audible.  Alembic soapbar pickups (AXY but also Fatboy) also have low windings for a flatter and broader response and, while it means lower output, the idea was that the lack of gain would be boosted by the onboard active electronics.  Flatter response pickups are also ideal for filter based eqs so it all kind of ties together in a well thought out package, even if the actual engineering approach and some of the parts they use are getting a bit long in the tooth. 

A bit long in the tooth perhaps, but there is still nothing that sounds like those Alembic series basses  

 

[jazzyvee]

10 hours ago, funkypenguin said:

A bit long in the tooth perhaps, but there is still nothing that sounds like those Alembic series basses  

 

They have a formula that works, and I suppose they only change things when there is an actual need to or if some of the "long in the tooth" parts are no longer available. 🙂🤣

 

[Kiwi]

15 hours ago, funkypenguin said:

A bit long in the tooth perhaps, but there is still nothing that sounds like those Alembic series basses  

 

It wouldn't be that much of a deal for them to update the op amps they use and it wouldn't impact on the sound at all. Jazzyvee is probably right, they don't fix something that ain't broke.

[stereoplayer]

Thanks to all that post in this thread.  
A long past rig I used to rock.

 

 

Edited April 4, 2022 by stereoplayer

[knirirr]

Last rehearsal with drummer using full kit. For small outdoor gigs and jams without a full drum kit the amp is usually omitted.

 

[Salt on your Bass?]

Went pretty loud at rehearsal tonight. Volume over talent, but thunderous and great fun!

 

 

 

[glassmoon]

8 hours ago, Salt on your Bass? said:

Went pretty loud at rehearsal tonight. Volume over talent, but thunderous and great fun!

My ears are hurting and I wasn't even there!!!

[Rich]

Ohhh yes. 

[jazzyvee]

I remember trying out a used one of those Genz Benz heads through a couple of 12" Aguillar cabs a few years ago when I was looking for a lightweight bass rig and loved the sound. 🙂

[hankhill]

My old and new rigs.  I lucked in to the Scott Dixon 2x10 cabs on eBay last week, I’ll be selling the Ashdown rig once I’ve done a couple of gigs with the SD’s and they’ve passed the acceptance test.  My goal (aside from just GAS) was light weight, I’d bought the Ashdowns a few years ago for their low-ish weight, but they’re still heavy – luggage scales put the combo at 20.5kg (Ashdown claims 18kg) and the 1x15 cab is 17.4kg.  The Scott Dixons are 11.4kg each without the lids!  Bliss!