minty fresh death Posted April 12, 2011 Share Posted April 12, 2011 I'm new to sludge/down tempo/doom but a friend wants me to play in his band, I found my standard pups are mudding up quite easily with my custom fuzz pedal. So I was wondering what I should go for, something passive and mid heavy? I don't really want to go active unless it's a really good idea... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gust0o Posted April 12, 2011 Share Posted April 12, 2011 I installed Wizards when I went down the same route, and they're still in my '87 ST which does the business in that respect. I can find no faults with the. Cheapish, British, can't say better Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomBassmonkey Posted April 12, 2011 Share Posted April 12, 2011 I'd take a look at your pedal first, there's not a lot of good fuzz/distortions available for bass. Most will either sound thin or muddy. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
minty fresh death Posted April 12, 2011 Author Share Posted April 12, 2011 (edited) Nahh it's definitely the pickups, there is something wrong with them since there's not a huge difference between 0 and 10 on the tone pot. Could be the pot itself but I doubt it... I suppose I could change both but i've never done either before so it'd be a little adventure [quote]I installed Wizards when I went down the same route, and they're still in my '87 ST which does the business in that respect.[/quote] Which model? Edited April 12, 2011 by minty fresh death Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomBassmonkey Posted April 12, 2011 Share Posted April 12, 2011 (edited) That could be down to all kinds of things, I'd definitely try out your pedal with other basses and amps. Anything from knackered pickups to dead strings can reduce the difference your tone pot will make or make your bass sound muddier. If you have any way of doing it (i.e. two amps), you could try bi-amping your signal too and sending your clean to one amp and distorting the other signal, that way you should keep the clarity of the clean but have a distorted sound too. What kind of bass/pickups do you have at the moment (that you're trying to distort, your Sandberg should sound fine distorted, I distort my JJ5 all the time and it sounds great and you shouldn't have any problems with a Streamer Jazzman either)? Edited April 12, 2011 by ThomBassmonkey Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hillbilly deluxe Posted April 13, 2011 Share Posted April 13, 2011 Changing the pickups wont make the tone control any different,but changing the tone control will probably make the pickups sound better.I personally would change the tone control first,then think about the effects pedal. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mcnach Posted April 13, 2011 Share Posted April 13, 2011 [quote name='minty fresh death' post='1197370' date='Apr 12 2011, 09:38 PM']Nahh it's definitely the pickups, there is something wrong with them since there's not a huge difference between 0 and 10 on the tone pot. Could be the pot itself but I doubt it... I suppose I could change both but i've never done either before so it'd be a little adventure Which model?[/quote] if you are after a little adventure... go ahead, by all means but if the tone control does little, it would make sense to check the tone control I'd also second the suggestion of checking your pedal. You may want to change picup in the end, regardless... but bass distortion is notorously hard to achieve without sounding muddy or thin... so that would probably be my course of action: check tone pot (wired correctly? maybe replace? it's cheap... what value is the capacitor?) and try as many pedals as you can, to find the sound you want. I personally went on a shopping spree on eBay and bought all sorts of pedals over a period of several months, selling again the ones that didn't do it for me. I ended up keeping a couple I liked. Recently I "discovered" the Ashdown Hyperdrive (James Lomenzo signature). It's cheap (about £40-45 used) and I think it will probably give you some great sounds for the music you're wanting to play. Just don't go by the youtube videos, none of the ones I've seen really capture what the pedal does. And it can do a lot. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mikey R Posted April 14, 2011 Share Posted April 14, 2011 you could try bypassing the tone pot altogether Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AttitudeCastle Posted April 14, 2011 Share Posted April 14, 2011 [quote name='Mikey R' post='1199666' date='Apr 14 2011, 05:43 PM']you could try bypassing the tone pot altogether[/quote] Just like steve Harris! DiMarzio are great for overdrive etc too! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Protium Posted April 14, 2011 Share Posted April 14, 2011 [quote name='minty fresh death' post='1197335' date='Apr 12 2011, 09:12 PM']I'm new to sludge/down tempo/doom but a friend wants me to play in his band, I found my standard pups are mudding up quite easily with my custom fuzz pedal. So I was wondering what I should go for, something passive and mid heavy? I don't really want to go active unless it's a really good idea...[/quote] Doesn't sound like a pickup issue tbh. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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