dlenaghan
Member
mgod said:
Practice, we all know. This last part.. this needs to be immortalized. Mind if I sig quote this?
Nu Sonic pickups...
- Thread starter chefothefuture1
- Start date
Practice, we all know. This last part.. this needs to be immortalized. Mind if I sig quote this?
henry norton
Junior Member
Here's a link to a sound sample. This was recorded on Audacity through the 'clean' setting on a Behringer Bass V-Amp set flat. The NuSonic was wound to 7.5K, has 2 AlNiCo magnets and is mounted around the 'sweet spot' on a short scale solid body strung with Pyramid Gold flatwounds. The passage was played fingerstyle.
I'm no recording engineer but I hope this'll give some idea as to how they sound. https://soundcloud.com/lhnbornbassesandpickups/bss4
I can post more samples up using different styles and positions but would be interested in any feedback.
I'm no recording engineer but I hope this'll give some idea as to how they sound. https://soundcloud.com/lhnbornbassesandpickups/bss4
I can post more samples up using different styles and positions but would be interested in any feedback.
mellowgerman
Senior Member
from what I can hear it sounds good, but i can't hear much! the track is very very very very quiet... i don't think it's my computer or speakers
dlenaghan
Member
I heard a sample on TalkBass recently of a G&L that had been modded with Darkstars and a Redeemer preamp.. now I'm pretty much against active electronics across the board, but hearing some A/B tracks of the same bass with the Redeemer preamp made me seriously consider adding it. Not sure I've got any room left in my control cavities though, not after installing the onboard tuners.. But I wouldn't doubt that the Redeemer will push any Bisonics or Darkstars further into the 'Alembicized' Guild tone that was part of some of the later Dead music.
PS - what's your 'Holy Grail' bass tone? I'm hard pressed to pick examples that are really similar, but whatever Lesh did on American Beauty really came to define the sound of an era for me. (Other examples are totally divergent, like Ira Tuton's tone on his fretless G&L (Yeasayer), or Dylan Keefe's stuff with Marcy Playground, especially on the album Shapeshifter.)
PS - what's your 'Holy Grail' bass tone? I'm hard pressed to pick examples that are really similar, but whatever Lesh did on American Beauty really came to define the sound of an era for me. (Other examples are totally divergent, like Ira Tuton's tone on his fretless G&L (Yeasayer), or Dylan Keefe's stuff with Marcy Playground, especially on the album Shapeshifter.)
chefothefuture1
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mellowgerman said:
For some odd reason, my computer speakers weren't all that audible, but through head phones, the sample sounded much louder...
Not sure why...
bassmanpatsfan18
Member
dlenaghan said:
Pickup sounds good! I also had trouble hearing it though.
Dan, good call on Ira Tuton. This video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gVLuOUeo1Ss made me realize just how much of a beast he is. I honestly didn't even know he was making some of those sounds. Any idea what effect he's using in the intro?
henry norton
Junior Member
Thanks for the feedback. I'm glad developing the pickup wasn't as fraught with trouble as getting some decent sound samples onto the internet has been 
I might just have given up! The samples come out fine on my computer but I'll take a look and see if I can get a louder one on there.
At the risk of sounding very patronising, there's an extra volume control at the top right of the screen on Soundcloud which seems to be set quite low by default?
I might just have given up! The samples come out fine on my computer but I'll take a look and see if I can get a louder one on there.At the risk of sounding very patronising, there's an extra volume control at the top right of the screen on Soundcloud which seems to be set quite low by default?
dlenaghan
Member
bassmanpatsfan18 said:
Tuton uses an Electro Harmonix HOG for a lot of his work, especially the upper-octave stuff. He mentions it in a few interviews and he's actually the reason I bought a HOG myself a few years ago.
mellowgerman
Senior Member
henry norton said:
Even with the extra volume control cranked all the way up, it's still very difficult for me to hear much... seems like there's some kind of funky, really intense compression going on
dlenaghan said:
my holy grail bass tone is definitely Jack Casady in '68... here's a shining example... listen to that monstrous chord at 0:55!!! but the entire tune is unbelievable... oh and that run at the very end... mmmmmm 8)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=777OLZzfurc
mellowgerman said:
You'll like this one then. His solo is indeed monstrous!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=udSlm0KKLqA
mellowgerman
Senior Member
Hangman said:
MMMMMM yes. That's actually one of my favorite ballad performances. I remember when I first got this recording... I was so excited and showed it to a bunch of my friends... they just more or less said "I can't listen to this, the recording quality is horrible." Talk about missing the point :lol: :roll:
fronobulax
Bassist, GAD and the Hot Mess Mods
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henry norton said:
FWIW, after reading the comments about the volume, I just DL'd it as an MP3 from Soundcloud. I played it back locally and used decent headphones and the volume and sound were on par with recordings I make of myself playing. So the volume issues may be related to whatever Soundcloud is using to stream and not the recording itself.
That said, my initial reaction is that the clip does not make me think of my Starfire as much as I would hope. But there is definitely something there that I only hear on my Starfire so it may be my expectations and not the pickup. I realize how hard it is to describe tone so the tone comments are less than helpful ;-)
henry norton
Junior Member
fronobulax said:
Thanks for the comments.
Yeah, there's a volume control at the top right of the Soundcloud page that's often turned right down - apparently they've put this 'feature' on quite recently which may be the reason for the low volume playback in some cases.
Construction-wise, the pickup is closer to one of Fred's than a Bisonic, having 2 magnets and a relatively low impedence coil, which may explain why maybe the 'timbre' is close to your BiSonic'd Starfire whilst not having the same 'tone'. I'll put some more sound samples up once I've made a few more pickups, different positions and maybe some livelier preamp models, and will soon be able to experiment with a spec closer to the original BiSonic. Watch this space...
I find I'm always correcting the history, but some of the earliest Bi-Sonics had two magnets. How do I know this? I have them.
fronobulax
Bassist, GAD and the Hot Mess Mods
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mgod said:
That's why we are so glad to have you hanging around :wink:
henry norton
Junior Member
Well I'm not surprised the original Bi Sonics started out with 2 magnets as they wouldn't have made the bobbins the way they did if they were only going to use one. Maybe Hagstrom tried 2 magnets in the earlier versions but ended up taking one away because the pickups ended up a little too hot for the tastes of the day. Either that or, (dare I say it), your pickups could have been modded at some time before you got the bass??? Either way, it's good to have a choice. I tried both one and two magnets and found they did make a difference to the output, but it was more subtle than I thought it would be. Can't wait to try out some ceramic magnetsmgod said:
2 magnets were used in the bridge pickup, one in the neck pickup.
henry norton
Junior Member
Ah cool! I'll give that a go myself next week :wink:
Hagstrom's basses, not Guild.