Mike Dirnt pick up advice

[Bungo Mike]

Hi

 

I have a Squire Mike Dirnt and would like to upgrade to pickups to the same spec as the Mexican bass

 

What are they or what would be a great replacement?

 

Thanks in advance

[neepheid]

Why do you want to do this?  Not trying to pick an argument, just curious.  What do you want to gain/achieve from this pickup change?

[Bungo Mike]

Hi. I used to own a Mexican version that I remembered sounding great

[neepheid]

Well, the obvious answer would be to procure that exact pickup, or any split P pickup found in a MIM P bass of that era.  Not the easiest thing to find, as I'm sure you've already found - not something you can just rock up to a shop and buy, is it?

 

It's actually making it harder, that you have a specific type of sound in your head.  I've swapped pickups many times (probably too many times) but it has always been from the point of view of wanting something "different" but still "good" as my ears define it.  My last P pickup swap was from some barely functional garbage in a G4M bass (one half of the pickup was microphonic for a start) to a Lace Aluma P, because I wanted to try something a bit different.  In no way would I suggest such a pickup in your case, that's a completely different beast.  My upcoming P pickup swap (again going into a super cheap bass) is going to be either an Entwistle PBXN (Neodymium) OR a Tonerider Duke because I fancy trying some high output P pickups and these two achieve this in different ways - the Entwistle by using stupidly powerful magnets (don't get the two halves stuck together - they're a nightmare to pull apart, in fact you have to slide them apart because the magnets are stronger than the glue holding them in place!) and the Tonerider by overwinding the coil.

 

Sorry for the shaggy dog story, I got sidetracked.  TL:DR, I'm no help here whatsoever, and hopefully someone will be along shortly to tell you the name of a readily available aftermarket pickup which is a dead ringer for a MIM Fender job.

[Lozz196]

Well the one in the Dirnt is Fender Custom Shop 59, which they don’t sell separately. However I did recently see a vid on YouTube with MD discussing his sig bass and he mentioned that the Fender 63 pickup was similar sounding, so may be worth checking out.

[dudewheresmybass]

Maybe Kent Armstrong have an equivalent to the '59CS or '63 ?

A lot of the pup makers will do what they can to help out

[jezzaboy]

As Lozz says you can`t buy the 59 pickup in the older Mexican MD but I have always had great sound from Tonerider pickups, not a lot of cash and sound great to me.

[PaulThePlug]

Tonerider do a new-ish 'hotter' Duke model

[Bungo Mike]

Chaps a BASSCHAT member very kindly got in touch with me as he had an original set of 59's in his parts draw and I bought them from him so I'm dead chuffed

[Bungo Mike]

On 31/03/2025 at 16:36, Lozz196 said:

Well the one in the Dirnt is Fender Custom Shop 59, which they don’t sell separately. However I did recently see a vid on YouTube with MD discussing his sig bass and he mentioned that the Fender 63 pickup was similar sounding, so may be worth checking out.

I saw that yesterday which is an interview with his Guitar Tech and he does fit 63's in his newer basses 😊👍

[NancyJohnson]

Send the bass over to me and I'll put in an old bit of junk from my spares box and fudge up some pickup covers from somewhere.  I'll tell you I've installed exactly what you want and you'll be none the wiser.

 

That's how it works 😅 

 

 

[FugaziBomb]

On 04/04/2025 at 07:40, NancyJohnson said:

Send the bass over to me and I'll put in an old bit of junk from my spares box and fudge up some pickup covers from somewhere.  I'll tell you I've installed exactly what you want and you'll be none the wiser.

 

That's how it works 😅 

 

 

 

This reminds me of something that happened to me.  Behold this Washburn Bantam XB-100 POS Edition: 

 

 

Years before the application of all of the stickers and various modding nonsense (which culminated in just ripping all the wiring out and soldering the pickups right to output jack),  I decided to put a nicer set of pickups in it.  I swapped the stock Asian Sweatshop Specials for a nice set of Seymour Duncan SPB-2 Hot P Bass pickups.  You know what they sounded a lot like?: the original cheap pickups that came in the damn thing.  It was an early lesson that different ≠ better.

Edited April 7 by FugaziBomb

[BigRedX]

12 hours ago, FugaziBomb said:

Years before the application of all of the stickers and various modding nonsense (which culminated in just ripping all the wiring out and soldering the pickups right to output jack),  I decided to put a nicer set of pickups in it.  I swapped the stock Asian Sweatshop Specials for a nice set of Seymour Duncan SPB-2 Hot P Bass pickups.  You know what they sounded a lot like?: the original cheap pickups that came in the damn thing.  It was an early lesson that different ≠ better.

 

I had exactly the same experience with another Washburn. I swapped out the stock pickups and pre-amp for a set of very expensive EMGs that were about half as much as the bass originally cost. I couldn't detect any difference in sound before and after at all. So either the original pickups were very good or the difference in sounds between pickups or the same form-factor is less than the manufacturers of after-market pickups would like us to believe.

[NancyJohnson]

For some time, I've advocated that we shouldn't be so obsessed with the swapping out of pickups/hardware; sure if something is broken, too difficult to repair or non-functioning, then fine, pull it out and replace.

 

I could stick any pickups in any bass and so long as they fit the rout and I told you they were wax potted Vintage '62s (or some other nonsense) you be happy as a pig in sh*t and off you'd toddle, none the wiser.  I just wish more people would realise this.  There's also zero correlation between price and performance.  A Timex watch will tell the time as well as a Patek Philippe.

 

Seriously.

 

 

[neepheid]

NJ coming in hot!

 

[Lozz196]

I`ve recently got a Fender Player Precision, really nice bass but the pickup does sound a fair bit different to my fave US Precision which has the Custom Shop 62s, the 62s having more lows and a mid-scoop. Adjusting the eq I can get near but not exactly the same. But this is at home. I`m not going to make any changes until I`ve used the bass with the band this week, who knows, in the band setting I may well prefer the sound of the Player.

[police squad]

1 hour ago, NancyJohnson said:

For some time, I've advocated that we shouldn't be so obsessed with the swapping out of pickups/hardware; sure if something is broken, too difficult to repair or non-functioning, then fine, pull it out and replace.

 

I could stick any pickups in any bass and so long as they fit the rout and I told you they were wax potted Vintage '62s (or some other nonsense) you be happy as a pig in sh*t and off you'd toddle, none the wiser.  I just wish more people would realise this.  There's also zero correlation between price and performance.  A Timex watch will tell the time as well as a Patek Philippe.

 

Seriously.

 

 

I'm gigging a Harley Benton PB-50

The stock pickup sounds absolutely perfect
I sort of agree with you here

[FugaziBomb]

1 hour ago, Lozz196 said:

I`ve recently got a Fender Player Precision, really nice bass but the pickup does sound a fair bit different to my fave US Precision which has the Custom Shop 62s, the 62s having more lows and a mid-scoop. Adjusting the eq I can get near but not exactly the same. But this is at home. I`m not going to make any changes until I`ve used the bass with the band this week, who knows, in the band setting I may well prefer the sound of the Player.

 

I read somewhere recently that no pickups have a mid scoop - and to the contrary, all pickups by the nature of their design have a resonant peak somewhere along the frequency spectrum.  I thought that was kind of interesting because I've always attributed Seymour Duncan's Quarter Pounders as having a somewhat "scooped" sound over typical pickups (my comparison being solo'd Jazz Bass pickups).

[tauzero]

3 hours ago, BigRedX said:

I had exactly the same experience with another Washburn. I swapped out the stock pickups and pre-amp for a set of very expensive EMGs that were about half as much as the bass originally cost. I couldn't detect any difference in sound before and after at all. So either the original pickups were very good or the difference in sounds between pickups or the same form-factor is less than the manufacturers of after-market pickups would like us to believe.

 

I put a DiMarzio pickup in my Precision. I couldn't hear any of the much-vaunted difference.

[Lozz196]

49 minutes ago, FugaziBomb said:

 

I read somewhere recently that no pickups have a mid scoop - and to the contrary, all pickups by the nature of their design have a resonant peak somewhere along the frequency spectrum.  I thought that was kind of interesting because I've always attributed Seymour Duncan's Quarter Pounders as having a somewhat "scooped" sound over typical pickups (my comparison being solo'd Jazz Bass pickups).

That is interesting as I also thought that the QPs were scooped - rather massively so to be honest - maybe it`s more a case of certain areas boosted then? 

[neepheid]

I think it's dangerous to deal in absolutes when dealing with a subjective, opinion based thing like what something sounds like.  You're just going to pee someone off because they'll take it like you're calling them stupid for having an opinion.  They heard what they heard, just leave it.

[FugaziBomb]

20 minutes ago, Lozz196 said:

That is interesting as I also thought that the QPs were scooped - rather massively so to be honest - maybe it`s more a case of certain areas boosted then? 

 

I had the same theory - that maybe by designing a pickup with it's resonant peak either down deep into low-mid territory or up into the high mids, it creates the sonic effect of a "scooped" EQ to our brains.  I wish I would have delved into the science of electric guitar earlier in my life as I'm finding a lot of what I took as fact is really myth.

[NancyJohnson]

4 hours ago, neepheid said:

NJ coming in hot!

 

 

You know it.  Bwahaha!

 

[tauzero]

1 hour ago, FugaziBomb said:

I had the same theory - that maybe by designing a pickup with it's resonant peak either down deep into low-mid territory or up into the high mids, it creates the sonic effect of a "scooped" EQ to our brains.  I wish I would have delved into the science of electric guitar earlier in my life as I'm finding a lot of what I took as fact is really myth.

 

There's an interesting article on the subject here. The resonant peak is also linked to the frequency that the 2nd order low pass filter takes effect and cuts treble, so presumably if you wanted to retain treble you wouldn't want to drop the resonant peak too far. It does make me wonder what the difference in effect of cable length would be between an active and a passive bass, as the pickups are isolated from the cable in the active bass but not the passive one. While the capacitance of the cable would be the same, there would be no interplay between that and the pickups on the active bass, but presumably it would directly affect the resonant peak on the passive bass.

[NancyJohnson]

I think these are lovely.  People rave about that vintage tone from these old Musicmaster basses.

 

Have a guess what's under the pickup cover on most of these.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ta daa!