Hello!
Ok - I am this bad guy who ?hates? Alembic and Alembic inspired ?modern? neck thru body sandwich constructions with active low impedance pickups.
After long telephone talk with basstard (this time very friendly because we believe that this discussion can learn us something and open our ears and mind) and reading all of the post I decided to write here my point of view.
Being big fun of them in the beginning of my career as an engineer after more than twelve years of working as an engineer and producer and recording a lot of material from film scoring to heavy metal (acoustic jazz fusion and indie rock and pop also) I must sadly say that those basses are not useful for more than 80% of studio work.
I am not type of lazy engineer. I used to reserve 9 to 12 track for bass guitar I tend to mix signal from different preamps miking a lot of cabinets and even tweeters. Sometimes if music call for it I even record stereo ambient pair for bass guitar. For typical session I usually hire more than ten different amps and speakers to choose from. If somebody comes to me with Alembic and said thats it is his voice I would spend same times to find combinations of recording technicques and setup to make this guitar audible in mix but 90% times it will end up with destroying or at least heavy compromise sound of other instruments...
I am not endorser of anything. I play at least 20 years old Fenders and fender inspired instruments (mostly from 70ties) because wood on those old instruments are simply better and after being played for many years it has changed its molecular structure and became more vibrant. During many years of research I never find a new instrument with tone as resonant, vibrant, sparkle and musically sounding as an old one made from the same or similar materials.
Alembic Basses are very beautiful and extremely well build thats a true. As opposite Fender mid seventies and sixties basses with I consider the ultimate tone basses were build very poor quality. They need to be refretted, sometimes You have to straighten the neck, You have to remove lacquier and papers stamps from the neck and neck pocket. Usually You also change pickups because old ones became to be very microphonic and thin sounding and also change the bridge to baddass II. Thats True. But those beautifully constructed Alembic Basses have only one problem - The Idea is bad. Alembics are constructed to be extremely wide sounding basses. It is Great idea if You play alone but it is also the worst idea if You play with the band. Many says thats Alembic is the ultimate bass for bedroom players. A lot of very experienced players sad to me that during late seventies and early 80ties they buying Alembic basses because those instruments sounded extremely wide in the shop and after some time they stop playing them and came back to fenders because fellow bandmatess and engineers said that the rhythm section lacked punch and feel.
Bass is extremely hard to mix. Every room has a different frequency response in the bass frequencies. Every speaker system also. Your mix have to be car proof and disco smile boom box proof also. It is almost impossible to mix well wide sounding instruments because every instrument need his own sonic space. Please consider in mind that classical acoustical instruments are build to be part of the team like all Orchestra instruments (they do not have extremely wide frequency range) and to be alone instruments like organs. Psycho acustics proofs as that to be well heard on all systems bass guitar need to have a lot of energy in lo mids - about 120Hz - 250 Hz and in Hi mids area 1250 Hz to 4000Hz (note clarity and definition. Our ears has ability to recreate lows when hearing to low mids (think about phone - which frequency starts at 300Hz and You recognize low male voice without a problem). Typical passive Fender Jazz has a peeks in those critical frequencies which makes this instrument easy to mix loud without stepping on anybody's heels. Thats why fenders cut through even densest mixes. Neck thru design tends to accent first fundamental frequency for example 44Hz for low E tone, bolt ons accents the harmonics (88Hz and 176 Hz for low E). In the typical mix bass drum energy is in the 40Hz to 70Hz area - so neck thru bass guitar fights with kick in the most important frequency area for kick and lacks punch and its percussiveness in lo mids area. Of course You can compensate for it playing with heavy attack. Thats why I think that Alembic neck thru are great for slapping. But to be honest I must say that slapping is last think needed for more that 90% percent of music recorded those years...
Active electronics that a bad think. The signal chain is as weak as it weakest element. You have great ears, great hands, great instrument, great pickups, and weak active buffer and great recording pre. Why ruin Your tone and dynamics with buffer amplifier made from cheap op amplifiers or transistors with +-9 volts of power when You connected Your instruments to a extremely high quality studio gear like Millennia Media Neve or Avalon made of military spec tubes resistors and capacitors with power of at least 275 Volt for tubes (with made extremely high headroom) with a great cable. It was good 30 years ago when stage equipment and cables were poor quality but things changed especially in studio... Passive electronics give You more articulation - If You do not believe me connect your instruments to auto wah or distortion pedal and after this connect a passive instrument. It is very hard to drive auto wah with active electronics because of it evenness and lack of articulation. Play line like ?come on come over? with passive every dead note is really dead with rather percussive character and lack of high and low end and not as reach in harmonic structure like ?normal? played note. With active electronics the dead note sound almost the same like normal but it is only quieter.
Typical Fender like single coil have a lot more harmonic distortion and a lot of higher resonant peak than low impedance pickup but it is not a disadvantage - because of this high impedance pickups cut through the mix a lot of better then low impedance. It is also psychoacoustics.
In my opinion Alembic family basses are great tools slappers or for soloist in small assembles who can compromise sound of the other instruments because of his ego and sound (nothing bad with this) but played with fingers they are completely useless in the dense rock or pop mix - they either disappear or made mix dull with lack of punch. Thats my point of view (and also point of view of many session and famous bass players I have pleasure and honor to work with. Of course tone is in our hands and with great player and a lot of work of engineer You can use Your Alembic in any musical situation but typical ?Fender like? bass do the job with less effort and much better results.
If You do not have great dynamics and articulation with passive fender like everybody will notice it with active Alembic You can hide it. Also with fender like bass (or stratocaster guitar) You sound like You (JPJ, Jaco, Marcus Miller, Anthony Jackson Geddy Lee and many more all sound different because passive fender like instruments are very sensitive to articulation. With Alembic it is more a sound of Alembic than the player itself. Even very different players sound similar on those basses.
Best Regards for All of You
Blazej
