Help choosing Jazz Pickups with strong low-mid grunt, but less high-mid honk

Lucca

Lucca

Aug 30, 2022
250
406
1,151
Scranton, PA
#1
Hi Bass Friends, I need your sage advice regarding Jazz pickups!

My gigs require me to play fingerstyle 99% of the time. In search of my desired feel and tone, I have accumulated a number of passive 4-string Warmoth P necks consisting of various woods and loaded Warmoth/Fender Jazz alder/ash bodies. I'm thrilled with how the Warmoth P necks feel on the Jazz bodies (wide, thick, heavy Precision necks with steel reinforcement bars and properly functioning truss rods), but the pickups in all of them provide too much "honk" and not enough low-mid grunt.
I'm looking for the right pickups that will provide:
* Strong, clear, thick low end (avoiding mud)
* Stronger, thick low-mids (adding grunt and growl)
* Average or subdued hi-mids (avoiding hollow-sounding honk)
* Smooth, warm highs (avoiding harsh or glassy highs)

I typically keep both pickups on full blast and add just a little from the tone knob, right when the treble begins to clear the tone up. To my ears, my amp EQ alone isn't making enough of a difference to the high mids without a disappointing loss of depth in the tone.
Jazz sets I've been considering include the Kloppmann JB 61 for a thicker yet vintage tone, along with DiMarzio, Fralin, etc. but I'll happily also consider more modern sounding pickups as well. Also, I'm open to adding a preamp (onboard or not) that will help me achieve my desired tone.
Any guidance you can provide will be greatly appreciated! :)
Thank you!!! :)
Lucca
 
#6
Thank you Ctmullins, Yahboy, Killing Floor, and 5StringBlues for kindly replying and for your recommendations! Wow, it seems like Lindy Fralin is your unanimous choice, so I'll definitely reach out as you recommend. :) I had been using an amazing set of strings which a great TBer put on a bass I bought from him right before we connected in person for the transaction. He said it was around a 20-year-old set of new, unopened Carvin strings, made by Labella. That set provided very nearly my ideal bass tone in every amp I tried, and on a couple different basses I strung them onto! :) It proved to me that strings can have an immense role in overall bass sound, and nothing has come close since. I actually bought a few old unopened Carvin sets I found online, hoping to recapture the magic... but none even came close in tone. That original set's E, A, and D strings were tapered, which made them different from the other Carvin sets I bought afterwards... I think LaBella is known for making special sets now and then, and I wish they had still made that particular type.
 
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#7
I only play fingerstyle, so for more clear low end, Aguilar AG-60. To get a little more aggressive, and what I am currently using, Tom Brantley Geddy Lee Jazz pickups. Can't go wrong with either.
Cheaper route: Without even changing pickups, try a gauge change. Assuming you are using 45-105, try a set of 40-100. You will hear and feel the difference.
 
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#8
Another vote for Fralins. I have a set of standard wind single coils in my Roadworn and that bass is now my standard of how a J should sound in my hands.

I've heard the tone of Fralin single coils described as a little raw and "rusty" with a slightly loose low end, which I would call an accurate description. The highs are nice without getting sharp or harsh...fantastic sound when hitting the strings hard and getting some fret clank.
 
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#9
Overwound is the way to go. ... I have a set of 15% overwound Fralin Jazz bass pickups that I just love and I'm surprised he doesn't offer them, but I'm sure he'll take a order for them. ...
 
#12
There are so many great options out there. I recently had Dimarzio Model J's installed in my jazz bass and it was exactly what I was looking for. The stock PUPs were ok but a little bland. The Dimarzio's recommend 500K pots but I left the 250K's in it and it was great for me. Less high end clank and great low and low mids. But, there are so many other's to go with too.
 
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#13
Lucca said:
Hi Bass Friends, I need your sage advice regarding Jazz pickups!

My gigs require me to play fingerstyle 99% of the time. In search of my desired feel and tone, I have accumulated a number of passive 4-string Warmoth P necks consisting of various woods and loaded Warmoth/Fender Jazz alder/ash bodies. I'm thrilled with how the Warmoth P necks feel on the Jazz bodies (wide, thick, heavy Precision necks with steel reinforcement bars and properly functioning truss rods), but the pickups in all of them provide too much "honk" and not enough low-mid grunt.
I'm looking for the right pickups that will provide:
* Strong, clear, thick low end (avoiding mud)
* Stronger, thick low-mids (adding grunt and growl)
* Average or subdued hi-mids (avoiding hollow-sounding honk)
* Smooth, warm highs (avoiding harsh or glassy highs)

I typically keep both pickups on full blast and add just a little from the tone knob, right when the treble begins to clear the tone up. To my ears, my amp EQ alone isn't making enough of a difference to the high mids without a disappointing loss of depth in the tone.
Jazz sets I've been considering include the Kloppmann JB 61 for a thicker yet vintage tone, along with DiMarzio, Fralin, etc. but I'll happily also consider more modern sounding pickups as well. Also, I'm open to adding a preamp (onboard or not) that will help me achieve my desired tone.
Any guidance you can provide will be greatly appreciated! :)
Thank you!!! :)
Lucca
Click to expand...

I would recommend contacting Mike ‘Smitty” Smythe of MJS custom pickups-

MJS Custom Handwound Guitar and Bass Pickups – Handwound Custom Guitar & Bass Pickups
 
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#15
I'm going to recommend a John East J-Retro Deluxe on top of whatever pups you are using. The sweepable mid is the nicest part of these preamps. The whole thing is thought out really well and was designed to work with the Jazz Bass design. There is one caveat. It does not have a true bypass in the sense that you can't operate it like a passive jazz bass with the pre turned off. AFAIC the passive mode on a J-Retro is an emergency 'oh crap my battery just died' mode. But if you have the opportunity to try one you will not look back and you will not miss passive mode.
 
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#16
BobKos said:
I'm going to recommend a John East J-Retro Deluxe on top of whatever pups you are using. The sweepable mid is the nicest part of these preamps. The whole thing is thought out really well and was designed to work with the Jazz Bass design. There is one caveat. It does not have a true bypass in the sense that you can't operate it like a passive jazz bass with the pre turned off. AFAIC the passive mode on a J-Retro is an emergency 'oh crap my battery just died' mode. But if you have the opportunity to try one you will not look back and you will not miss passive mode.
Click to expand...

Consider the J-Tone because he wired it so that passive mode operates exactly like an unmodified bass. Also one of the things you can do with JOhnEast is that you can chnage the tone caps. He does not sell them but you can get then from Mousser or Digi-Key. I may have the email where he explains what to expect. Even though the J-Tone does not have a mid-control, the bass and treble EQ points are musical. There are voicing controls that you can experiment with and then set and forget. Another pre-amp I recommend is Lusithand filter. Moves the resonant frequency around. Lusithand also sell a Gallien Krueger 800RB derived preamp onboard. I have both but not using the 800JP jazz plate as I sold that bass and do not want to bore a side hole on my jazz basses for now. I am keeping it though.
One that surprised me if you are open to active pickups is the EMG JAX -- Alnico Magnets and the X pre-amp which they engineered to function with more headroom like a passive pickup. I think what they meant to sayis that it is not compressed. The included tone control works fine like a passive tone control but with more useable sweep. That's what I use now on my workhorse bass.

I really like Lollars but admittedly do not have experience with Fralins except for Gibson guitars. Some folks who have compared both say that Fralins are too hi-fi and may not meet your high frequency requirement. Longtime Bartolini user but those don't get much TB love anymore, but they do rolled off highs very well, in fact probably their trademark sound

I met a pickup maker from Tucson in the Albuquerque guitar show, WarpCore and I thought his demoed jazz was grunty. Not my taste but definitely rock and roll
 
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#19
Lucca said:
Hi Bass Friends, I need your sage advice regarding Jazz pickups!

My gigs require me to play fingerstyle 99% of the time. In search of my desired feel and tone, I have accumulated a number of passive 4-string Warmoth P necks consisting of various woods and loaded Warmoth/Fender Jazz alder/ash bodies. I'm thrilled with how the Warmoth P necks feel on the Jazz bodies (wide, thick, heavy Precision necks with steel reinforcement bars and properly functioning truss rods), but the pickups in all of them provide too much "honk" and not enough low-mid grunt.
I'm looking for the right pickups that will provide:
* Strong, clear, thick low end (avoiding mud)
* Stronger, thick low-mids (adding grunt and growl)
* Average or subdued hi-mids (avoiding hollow-sounding honk)
* Smooth, warm highs (avoiding harsh or glassy highs)

I typically keep both pickups on full blast and add just a little from the tone knob, right when the treble begins to clear the tone up. To my ears, my amp EQ alone isn't making enough of a difference to the high mids without a disappointing loss of depth in the tone.
Jazz sets I've been considering include the Kloppmann JB 61 for a thicker yet vintage tone, along with DiMarzio, Fralin, etc. but I'll happily also consider more modern sounding pickups as well. Also, I'm open to adding a preamp (onboard or not) that will help me achieve my desired tone.
Any guidance you can provide will be greatly appreciated! :)
Thank you!!! :)
Lucca
Click to expand...

if you get one of the pickups above with separate positive/negative (and possibly separate ground) and wire it in series like the schematic here (Wilde j bass diagram), that should get you very close. Wiring in series helps that low mid bump (that’s part of the p bass magic though not all of it)
 
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