Touring with an Alembic Series 1

[Picure]

I am currently days away from recieving my 1980 Alembic Series 1 that I plan on using it on an upcoming 2 year tour with a pop artist. We recently just finished a tour where we played mostly arena shows in China and this new tour should be no different. However, I noticed that I get alot of noise from stage lights, sometimes positioned directly in front of my position. I was wondering if the hum cancelling procedure would get rid of noises from stage lights. Also, the bass I got does not have the RF noise upgrade.

I would like to know if any club members have took an Alembic Series 1 on tour before and can share what to look out for. Also I would like to know how reliable is a Series 1 on the road (my bass will fly ALOT). Because I could not afford to send my bass back to Alembic for a repair mid tour.

Thanks!

[garth4664]

Hello Picture,


Welcome to the club. I can vouch for the series basses as likely the most reliable instruments around with the small caveat that you are buying a 40 year old instrument and it’s hard to know exactly how it has been treated in the past. Mine have been with me all over the world and never let me down. I have a 76 custom series, a 78 series 1, and an 79 series 2 fretless.


For reliability, firstly, the necks are rock solid. My long scale 76 series two custom can move ever so slightly from the depths of winter to scorching summer but my medium scale series one does not move, ever, unless you adjust the truss rods. Travelling internationally, I’ve always found my action the be mm perfect after each flight without adjustment.


Secondly, the pots in the basses which are another usual source of pain in other instruments, are several grades above anything I have in other basses. These are self cleaning and normally dead silent as they are rotated when plugged in.


In my experience the hum cancelling circuit has worked for me perfectly, without the famous upgrade, on stages in China, Australia and in Ecuador. It has never hummed under lights. I have heard that some others have had some noise due to mobile phones etc but haven’t experienced this myself.


In your position I would certainly purchase new 5 pin cables (at least 2) and check the voltages in the countries you are touring. You will need to use the power supply and the old ones are not voltage switchable. I have used the 110v one for years with a small 240v:110v travel transformer without any issues so this may also work for you. Alternatively investing in a new switchable voltage power supply may be a good option for you.


Batteries in the series basses only power one pickup, and last for about 20 hours of play. You need the power supply to unleash the full potential and you will almost  certainly want to use one on stage for big gigs. Oh, and get a really wide strap, they are heavy.


I’m sorry to say you are most likely about to go through a transition where you won’t want to play  your old favourite basses anymore. For me the  series 1 was that much clearer and more articulate than my others that included PRS basses, Warwick, Pedulla, musicman etc. - it’s really hard to go back.


Post some shots of you on stage with your new bass: we like to see pictures around here.


Cheers, Garth

[Picure]

Thanks alot for the info! Ill definetly check out a voltage switchable power supply and cables. When we play China, the stage guys usually have step down transformers from 240v to 110v. But I think a switchable power supply should be more stable.

I had no idea that using batteries would only power one pickup only. I thought that if you used a stereo cable, you would get both pickups regardless of power supply or battery power. Because I am thinking about making a stereo male to mono female cable as per "must read" tutorial. Because sometimes we might have to use wireless packs and I dont want to have to use 2 channels via 2 wireless packs.

Here are some pictures of our last tour.







I still love my Sandberg VM4, I just want to put flatwounds on her permanantly and use the new Series 1 as my rock/pop bass.

[hammer]

Whether or not one gets RF interference and hum seems to be pretty much unique to each bass. I have three Series I basses all from the late 70s and none of which have thus far had the noise canceling upgrade. Two of the basses, after hum canceling adjustment, are as quiet as anything I've ever played. The third and most recent acquisition is noises in certain conditions (lots of lights) no matter what I do and an adjustments that make things tolerable in one situation do nothing in others. That one, which is my only fretless  is soon going back to Alembic for the upgrade.


Your first course is to try the hum canceling procedure, playing around with it in a live like situation and seeing if quiet in one venue/set-up generalizes to others. This may solve your problem.  If not, the only way to fix things will be a trip back to Santa Rosa to let Ron work his magic or a trip back in time to days when we didn't have so many darn things that cause interference.

[garth4664]

Ok wow...stadium gigs - looks good. Going to have to track your band down for a listen.

You are probably right on the stereo cable (getting both pickups), I haven’t tried this method since I always use the power supply. I have also read that you can drive a pair of headphones from the output jack so this would make sense.

Best of luck. Mica at Alembic might have some voltage switchable power supplies in stock. Best give them a quick call if you need one.

[Picure]

Cool, Thanks for you guy's responses! Ill definetly post updates and my experiences about touring with the Series 1 under the Fun Stories section when we start our tour. I just hope the rest of the band gets used to my new sound. Haha

[Picure]

Going to have to track your band

Oops, we are not really a band. We are session musicians who play for pop singers. But we cat like a band

[StephenR]

You will definitely get both pickups though the 1/4" jack if you use a stereo cable but the battery life is so short that it isn't really a reliable option unless you constantly replace the batteries before they start to run down. Second the advice to get a switchable power supply. Look forward to your impressions of the bass!

[JimmyJ]

Hello Jack and welcome to the club.

Congratulations on the new bass, we all hope you absolutely love it.  Post some pics when you get it so we can make the appropriate noises.

I've been touring with Series basses for many (many!) years and can vouch for their reliability.  Despite being substantially more complicated than your average bass, Alembics are built for the road and extremely solid.  I do carry spare parts with me and recommend at least having spare cables. But the truth is, in 40+ years of touring I have only had one failure which required immediate action.  In that case, I was carrying a spare preamp card and swapping it in did the trick.  You could consider investing in a spare card... but again, that was an extremely rare situation.

As Garth said, since your "new" bass is from the 80s we would recommend the first thing to do is exercise all the switches and pots.  Sweep and switch them each about 50 times to clean them up and all should operate as expected. 


The 1/4" jack will send audio from both pickups but may be a stereo jack.  If so, the bass itself can be modified to run in mono, or you can use a stereo-mono cable.

Wireless: in my opinion, the best way to do this is to build a strap with a wireless pack and either four or six (or eight) 9v batteries.  You can wire the batteries to produce +/- 18v and then wire the whole thing to run the bass through the 5-pin connector, summing the audio output to mono and into the wireless pack.  The pair of onboard batteries can only give you about 20 hours but a rig like this would probably give you 40/60/80...


Get used to switching the bass to "standby" before plugging and unplugging it. In standby mode, the outputs are shorted so you can plug and unplug the 5-pin cable on the bass with no noise.  (If the bass is on and you plug that cable in, it will send a bang down the audio lines).


Regarding Ron's magic noise reducing mod, it does seem to vary from bass to bass.  Before I had it done to my studio bass there was one specific room I worked in which was difficult.  The bass would pick up RF from the studio's office copy machine, and straight up hum from the utility pole transformer just outside the wall of the 2nd floor place.  I wasn't alone, guitar players all hated the room too the same reasons.  And by adjusting my playing position I could find the quietest spot and keep the neck pointed in the quietest direction...  Ron's mod made that bass quite a bit quieter and more in line with normal hum-bucker levels.  That studio and a couple clubs (with neon signs) were problematic but not usually larger venues.  If your LD puts a vari-lite on your music stand, well, he deserves to get yelled at!


Best of luck.  Post bass pics when you can.  And keep the questions coming, good bunch of folks in here with a lot of experience.


Jimmy Johnson

[Picure]

You will definitely get both pickups though the 1/4" jack if you use a stereo cable but the battery life is so short that it isn't really a reliable option unless you constantly replace the batteries before they start to run down. Second the advice to get a switchable power supply. Look forward to your impressions of the bass!

Thanks for the advice! About the batteries. If I were to go wireless, it will be only for a few songs. On our last tour, our setlist consisted of about 37 songs and about 4 songs I had to go wireless. I am thinking that when I am not going wireless, Ill use the power supply. That way, I think the batteries should last longer.

[Picure]

Hello Jack and welcome to the club.

Congratulations on the new bass, we all hope you absolutely love it.  Post some pics when you get it so we can make the appropriate noises.

I've been touring with Series basses for many (many!) years and can vouch for their reliability.  Despite being substantially more complicated than your average bass, Alembics are built for the road and extremely solid.  I do carry spare parts with me and recommend at least having spare cables. But the truth is, in 40+ years of touring I have only had one failure which required immediate action.  In that case, I was carrying a spare preamp card and swapping it in did the trick.  You could consider investing in a spare card... but again, that was an extremely rare situation.

As Garth said, since your "new" bass is from the 80s we would recommend the first thing to do is exercise all the switches and pots.  Sweep and switch them each about 50 times to clean them up and all should operate as expected. 


The 1/4" jack will send audio from both pickups but may be a stereo jack.  If so, the bass itself can be modified to run in mono, or you can use a stereo-mono cable.

Wireless: in my opinion, the best way to do this is to build a strap with a wireless pack and either four or six (or eight) 9v batteries.  You can wire the batteries to produce +/- 18v and then wire the whole thing to run the bass through the 5-pin connector, summing the audio output to mono and into the wireless pack.  The pair of onboard batteries can only give you about 20 hours but a rig like this would probably give you 40/60/80...


Get used to switching the bass to "standby" before plugging and unplugging it. In standby mode, the outputs are shorted so you can plug and unplug the 5-pin cable on the bass with no noise.  (If the bass is on and you plug that cable in, it will send a bang down the audio lines).


Regarding Ron's magic noise reducing mod, it does seem to vary from bass to bass.  Before I had it done to my studio bass there was one specific room I worked in which was difficult.  The bass would pick up RF from the studio's office copy machine, and straight up hum from the utility pole transformer just outside the wall of the 2nd floor place.  I wasn't alone, guitar players all hated the room too the same reasons.  And by adjusting my playing position I could find the quietest spot and keep the neck pointed in the quietest direction...  Ron's mod made that bass quite a bit quieter and more in line with normal hum-bucker levels.  That studio and a couple clubs (with neon signs) were problematic but not usually larger venues.  If your LD puts a vari-lite on your music stand, well, he deserves to get yelled at!


Best of luck.  Post bass pics when you can.  And keep the questions coming, good bunch of folks in here with a lot of experience.


Jimmy Johnson

Thanks alot Jimmy! I will definetly post many pictures here for you guys to see. I would like to ask, what symptoms were you getting from your Series 1 that prompted you to change out the preamp card? My buggest fear is getting random, uncontrollable noieses from my bass somewhere down the line like this bass...

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=qbRLw68jiVA

Thanks again! I never thought about getting an extra preamp card as a backup but I think I will get one just in case!

[JimmyJ]

Yep, internal batteries should be good for a few songs per show.  Just remember to keep them fresh because when they go flat it sounds pretty nasty!  If the bass has the original stereo 1/4" wiring you will still need to either mod the bass or build a short stereo-mono summing cable for the wireless pack. 


The chirping sound on that clip is a symptom of dirty pots which simply need exercising.  My one issue with the preamp card (in 40+ years with no problems) happened when I lost one component and the output was suddenly extremely loud.  This was such an odd failure (Mica had never heard of it) that I shouldn't have even mentioned it in this conversation.  Only to make you aware that these instruments do have more components than most so if you ever need service for any reason it is a bit specialized.  And that's why I carry spare parts.  If I'm on a tour that allows me to bring my trunk, I have an entire backup Series II bass.

Jimmy J

[mica]

Low-frequency hum (or the harmonics of it) will be eliminated by the humcancelling procedure. If you are getting high frequency or directional noise, then you need to get the upgrade to the electronics. You can start by replacing all three pickups with a new hyper-matched set. This is a big part of the upgrade, and if you are not able to get the bass here, it could go a long way in reducing the problem with high frequency noise sources.

About 30% of older basses that are not upgraded have a tolerable level of noise, but all will be improved with the upgrade procedure. The main variable is the amount of high frequency noise sources. SO your bass can sound very quiet in one location, but you move to another venue and it sounds terrible.

[Picure]

Low-frequency hum (or the harmonics of it) will be eliminated by the humcancelling procedure. If you are getting high frequency or directional noise, then you need to get the upgrade to the electronics. You can start by replacing all three pickups with a new hyper-matched set. This is a big part of the upgrade, and if you are not able to get the bass here, it could go a long way in reducing the problem with high frequency noise sources.

About 30% of older basses that are not upgraded have a tolerable level of noise, but all will be improved with the upgrade procedure. The main variable is the amount of high frequency noise sources. SO your bass can sound very quiet in one location, but you move to another venue and it sounds terrible.

Cool! I might get the upgrade in the future. If I was to get the full electonics upgrade, is it possible to ship only the electronics to Alembic for the upgrade, because it costs quite alot to ship the whole bass to Alembic from Taiwan.

By the way, how much does it cost to purchase a spare preamp card and the hyper matched pickup set?

Thanks!

[FC Bass]

I'm pretty sure you must send in the bass, also for the spare card it would be best to send the bass in. (the upgrade is on that card.)

I've had no problems with my 1979 Series I this far, but I also never stood in front of a huge led wall like that. Looks awesome!
I have the 1/4 wired mono for use with wireless: http://club.alembic.com/index.php?topic=270.0 and I always put in fresh batteries for each show. (our shows are 2 1/2 hour max) We use the "old" ones in our wireless beltpacks.

Jason Newsted (Metallica) used a battery powered power supply as JimmyJ described above, if you have a bass with leds that's the way to go.
He also used two wireless packs to keep things "stereo", that cat had a lot of extra weight on his belt! :-)

Very blurry pic: