What Alembic best compares to a fretless P?

[jimbobv]

I just picked up a maple-neck 78 fretless P 3 months ago, and absolutely love it.   Been playing a 70's J for 20 years, and '90 Elan for 4 years.  What Alembic would best compare to the fretless P?

[bob]

I won't be able to answer your question, but to save us all some time and space, it might help if you explain what you mean by love it.
 
Are your J and Elan also fretless, or is that a factor? Do you like the feel of the P? The sound? Probably both, but let's assume that it must at least sound good to you or you wouldn't be so enthusiastic. (If it's mostly the feel, then you could closely approximate at least the neck shape and string spacing on any custom.)
 
What is it about the sound that interests you, and how would you compare it to the sound of your J and Elan?
 
Also, tell us a bit more about the construction of your J and Elan, in particular the woods (i guess i didn't know you could get Fenders with a neck made of something other than maple, but your Elan could be almost anything).
 
I've never played any of these outside of a guitar shop, but there are plenty of others here who will be able to make useful comparisons - as long as they understand what you're looking for, and why.
-Bob

[dean_m]

Hi Jim,
 
I've got and Elan as well.  It is a 5 with AXY p/u's though.  Maple body, Bubinga top, and wide Purpleheart stringers in the neck.  I can actually get a pretty cool hot-rodded P sound by rolling to the neck p/u and rolling off the filter just a bit.  That seems to work for me.
 
Good luck!!
 
Dino

[s_wood]

Alembics sound nothing like P-Basses, thank God  
 
Seriously, a P-Bass has a bolt on neck, an ash or alder body, a low-mass bridge, a narrow apeture pickup and passive electronics.  Most Alembics use neck-through construction (except for the Epic, Orion and Excel which are set necks) and have maple, mahagony or walnut bodies (again, the Excel is made of ash).  All Alembics have medium or high mass bridges, wide apeture pickups and active electronics.  Given these profound construction differences, there's no way an Alembic can sound much like a Fender - thank God!  
 
I think the biggest factor of all is the fact that Alembics don't have bolt-on necks.  The tone produced by a bolt-on neck is unique, and IMHO you can't really copy it with a set neck or (especially) a neck through bass.  

[bigredbass]

I'll run with the assumption that you really want to sound like a fretless Precision.
 
Simple.  Get an EXCEL, ash-bodied, stick with a pau ferro fretless neck (you WOULD hear ebony), and get it with a P Activator.  I'd also get a SPOILER circuit with it (Vol, Tone, QSwitch) instead of the VTB circuit of the usual EXCEL. You can leave the Qswitch turned off for a passive sounding tone, kick it in when you want another type of tone.
 
(If it were mine, I'd have it built to a PJ setup and add a balancer to the circuit, and be sure Mica adds the modification spoken of elsewhere to make sure the realtive gains are more even.
My favorite nonALEMBIC tone is that P beef with J articulation added in on top.)
 
As my fellow travelers have pointed out, it WON'T sound exactly like a Precision for the many reasons listed.  But I DO believe the recipe I concocted will keep all of the tremendous ALEMBIC advantages while detouring around some of the more obvious sonic signatures, and giving you one hell of a P-based instrument.
 
J O E Y

[811952]

I've gotten an extremely believeable P-bass sound out of the neck pickup on my cocobolo series I.  Q-switch off and tone about 3/4ths of the way up.  Through a tube preamp it sounds like a processed (light compression and limiting) P-bass.  I've had many an engineer smile when they see me on the session ;-) and I would have to believe you could get the same out of a fretless series I.  As for noticing the ebony fingerboard, I think it would sound the way your precision sounds in a studio setting with comp/limiting and probably pretty close in a live setting if you tend to run your amp hot, especially if you're using tube power (I do).  The one difference that you would be dealing with with ALL Alembics is that unlike the Fender, when you play it harder it actually gets louder instead of growlier (is that a word?).  Having typed all that, I agree with Joey that an Excel with a pau ferro board is probably the cat's azz for what you want to do, and considerably less money..  Another interesting thing- I just watched Standing in the Shadows of Motown and is that a mute on Babbitt's P-bass?  Great video that I highly recommend..
john

[dean_m]

Hey John,
If you are referring to the foam under the strings, yes, it is a mute.  Basically just a piece of insulating or packing foam stuck underneath the strings.  You can't have those flatwounds sounding too bright now can you. HA!!  It works really well on round wounds too if you need a nice flatwound sound.  I do have to say that the sound he gets especially when they show his solo piece is amazing.  Yes Steve, there are some P-Basses that do sound great. HA!  But that is THE Motown Sound.  Highly recommend this video as well.  It pretty much defines what bass playing is all about.
 
Peace,
Dino

[alembic76407]

this Question is wrong, thats like asking which Rolls-Royce best compares to a Volkswagon beetle, the whole ideal is moot. The only Alembic I can think of would be A beat up bass with the active electronic missing, but that still may be better than a Fender.  
David T (alembic Snob)
sorry, I just wanted to use the word MOOT

[bassplaynmatt]

I think that its already clear that Alembics don't make great Fender mimics due to construction mismatches but I will agree that the set neck Alembics on the neck pickup get pretty damn close. My Epic will do a relatively realistic impersonation of The Pink Floyd Money bass sound when paned all neck and played near the bridge. Again, an Epic or Excel will run much less than your Elan and way less than a Series I.  
 
Matt