Looking for the right bass pickups

[Kevward]

Alright, I've got a 1981 Peavey T-40 with two humbuckers and it sounds pretty sweet, I can get a bunch of tones.
http://cel.echoes.hu/Peavey.jpg



But I still can't get that perfect tone that I'm looking for. Like something similar to the tones of Thrice's Ed Breckenridge (The Artist in the Ambulance album) or RATM'S Tim Commerford (If humanly possible).

I belive that tone depends on the type of pickups and just wondered what people had to say. I even found out how to make your own pickups but I'd probably screw it up and set my bass on fire trying to re-sodder the wires.

Any tips?

[Tristan Needler]

That is one pretty looking machine.

You'd have to solder to replace pickups too haha. I don't know much about bass pickups though.

Your amp has a huge deal to do with your tone too.

[The Boathouse]

That bass is BADASS. Anyway, like sir Tristan said, your amp has a LOT to do with it. Outside of the difference between single coil and humbucking pickups, it's the biggest tonal difference you can make with one piece of equipment (blah blah pedal argument ensues). So check out what those guys are using for amps, check what you're using. Then make adjustments. Speakers too, how many you're using, what size, etc.

[Kevward]

Thanks to both of you.
I do realize that my amp has a lot to do with it, but I'm broke and can't afford anything decent for a while. I've got my eye on a Mesa Boogie M6 Carbine combo amp, it sounds freakin' incredible. I'm getting a Boss GEB-7 equalizer pedal for Christmas and I'm hoping that it will get me closer to my desired tone. Thanks for the help!

By the way, I just realized that the bass in the picture I posted doesn't have a maple neck, mine does.

[Taniam]

I just put EMG actives in my ibanez gsr 200 and it sounds beautiful, granted my ibanez uses single coils and not humbuckers, but I'm pretty sure that EMG makes humbuckers. Yeah an amp i quite important as well I play out of a Fender Rumble 100 watt 210 combo..so that helps, but get EMG's you wont regret it

[patrickhowell]

Those basses actually have very nice, and fairly sought-after pickups. I wouldn't recommend changing them. Do you know how all of the circuits in your bass work? It's a fairly complicated setup with TONS of different options. Here's the manual: http://www.peavey.com/media/pdf/manuals/80370017.pdf but I'll give you a very quick overview:

The 2-way switch is a phase switch. Up is "In Phase" and down is "Out Of Phase." This only affects your tone when both pickups are on together. It's a strange hollow sound. Probably not want you want. If I were you, I'd probably keep it in the up position almost all the time.

The 3-way switch is the standard 3-way switch. The volume controls are regular volume controls with a treble bleed circuit.

The tone controls control the tone AND the coil selection. With the tone on 10, you have just the outside coils - two single coil pickups like a Fender Jazz Bass. When you roll the tone back to around 7, it adds in the middle coil for a humbucker sound. The bridge humbucker will be similar to a Fender P-Bass and the neck humbucker sounds more like a Gibson bass.

Tim from RATM plays a Jazz Bass through a Marshall Guv'nor distortion pedal into an Ampeg SVT2 Pro and two Ampeg 810 cabinets

Eddie from Thrice plays mainly a Gibson Grabbers and P-Basses through a Z-Vex Fuzz Factory distortion pedal into an Ampeg SVT Classic all-tube head and an Ampeg SVT 810 cab

Probably what you're missing in your tone is the distortion pedal and amp rig (especially the 810 cab). I'd recommend keeping your pickups and grabbing something like a Tech21 SansAmp Bass Driver or an MXR M80 Bass DI. I think that will do a lot better things for the sound you're going for. By the way, what amp are you playing through right now?