Baloney Balderdash

You forgot to mention that they are absolutely dead silent, even in basses without additional shielding, no electromagnetic interference noise whatsoever. And they even continued to be so after I accidentally pulled out the bridge ground wire in the bass where I had them installed. These pickups are shielded internally and the connection wires are also shielded, as in the ground running as a braided shield all along the insulated hot wires.

I edited the last paragraph of my last reply, about how to set the drive control of the American Sound, to be a bit more thoroughly explained, like this: One thing to be aware of though is that boosting the [Drive] control on the American Sound starts to introduce overdrive a lot sooner than the [Drive] control on the VT Bass, so if you want a clean tone you need to keep it fairly close to it's minimum position, though I found you get the best clean tone result if you still have it opened just a little, just a slight smidge above the minimum position, exactly low enough for it to stay clean even when you dig in the hardest, which in my case seems to be about the 8 o'clock position, though this will depend on how hot the output of your bass is, as well as how you otherwise set the EQ of the pedal, especially the pre gain stage [Voice] control, as in the more you cut it the more [Drive] you can dial in while still keeping it clean, and the more you boost it the less [Drive] you can dial in before it starts to get into overdrive territory, as I mentioned earlier me having the [Voice] control boosted a bit till about the 2 o'clock position, and the output of my bass being fairly hot for an otherwise completely passive bass, using a DiMarzio Model P, which is considerably hotter than the most common, closer to vintage speced, P pickups.

This thread got me curious of trying to implement my Joyo American Sound in my current setup, placing in the other effects loop of the always on Boss LS-2 that got an always on Orange Juice (seriously sized down clone of the Tech 21 Oxford, Orange amp style preamp/overdrive, but with simplified EQ controls and without cab sim) in the other loop set to a low gain overdrive with it's [Tone] control, basically acting as a standard LPF passive tone control, slightly cut to around the 11 o'clock position and it's [Voice] control slightly boosting a broad curve around the center frequency of 800Hz pre gain stage till around the 2 o'clock position, now instead of just blending the Orange Juice overdrive with clean in parallel, blending it in parallel with the American Sound instead, which I have set to a clean tone, the [Drive] control being set just slightly above it's minimum position, with the [Low], [Mid] and [Voice] control boosted to around the 2 o'clock position, and the [High] control cut till around the 11 o'clock position. And the result is actually really good, a considerably more focused and balanced, slightly rounder, tone, than just the Orange Juice blended with clean signal, with overall slightly less low bass frequency content and slightly less high treble frequency content, but overall a bit more mid frequency content, all across the mid frequency spectrum, from low mids to high mids. I actually thought I had managed to perfect the tone for the current application of my bass setup, but adding the Joyo American Sound did actually manage to improve on that quite a bit. Can't speak for how it would work on it's own, but my best bet is that it actually could very well actually work great, at least if you have an additional cab sim added towards the end of your chain, or if going through a regular bass cab. I personally got a simple sort of faux, EQ based, cab sim at the end of my chain, which I actually prefer to a more detailed, and therefor intrusive, IR based cab sim, using the bass specific fully parametric equalizer model in my Zoom MS-70CDR, set to [Freq=4.5 Q=0.5 Cut=-2dB] ; [Freq=10kHz Q=1 Cut=-20dB] ; [Freq=20kHz Q=0.5 Cut=-20dB], in an always on patch, that additionally is used for an always on subtle plate reverb, as well as some minor additional EQ'ing for fine adjustments of my tone, for the latter also utilizing the bass specific parametric equalizer model of the MS-70CDR, set to various specific center frequencies, with various specific Q values, that all, except for one of them, which has been boosted +2dB, has been boosted with just +1dB. Beside that, placed right before the LS-2, used to blend the Orange Juice low gain overdrive with the clean American Sound, as the very first thing after my bass in the signal chain, is an always on TC Electronic SpectraComp, loaded with a thoroughly customized toneprint, followed by an always on TC Electronic Sub'N'Up Mini, also loaded with a thoroughly customized toneprint, giving me as an natural sounding 1 octave up effect as possible, blended with clean signal, to give me an effect similar to that of an 8 string bass, with pairs of respectively bass and octave strings. And that is practically all that makes up my main basic, core "clean" tone in my "ampless" setup, beside the Art Tube MP Project Series tube preamp placed as the very last unit in my "ampless" setup, right after the Zoom MS-70CDR (simple faux, EQ based, cab sim, additional EQ'ing, and subtle plate reverb), with the build in HPF, fixed at 40Hz, activated, and the gain set to just on the verge of the tube breaking up when digging in the hardest. Sorry for the wall of text, with what seems to be off topic information, but really just meant to give an idea of what else I use to obtain my main basic, core "clean" tone, beside the Joyo American Sound. But as said my best bet is that the American Sound potentially could very well work well as a main preamp on it's own in a bass setup, at least if followed by some sort of additional cab simulation, or of course if going through a regular bass cab. One thing to be aware of though is that boosting the [Drive] control on the American Sound starts to introduce overdrive a lot sooner than the [Drive] control on the VT Bass, so if you want a clean tone you need to keep it fairly close to it's minimum position, though I found you get the best clean tone result if you still have it opened just a little, just a slight smidge above the minimum position, exactly low enough for it to stay clean even when you dig in the hardest, which in my case seems to be about the 8 o'clock position, though this will depend on how hot the output of your bass is, as well as how you otherwise set the EQ of the pedal, especially the pre gain stage [Voice] control, as in the more you cut it the more [Drive] you can dial in while still keeping it clean, and the more you boost it the less [Drive] you can dial in before it starts to get into overdrive territory, as I mentioned earlier me having the [Voice] control boosted a bit till about the 2 o'clock position, and the output of my bass being fairly hot for an otherwise completely passive bass, using a DiMarzio Model P, which is considerably hotter than the most common, closer to vintage speced, P pickups.

The Joyo American Sound's Mid frequency control is tuned to a center frequency of 400Hz, unlike the Tech Blonde, also the pre gain stage Voice EQ control on the American Sound cut 400Hz bellow the 12 o'clock position, but boost 800Hz above the 12 o'clock, also unlike the equivalent Character control of the Blonde. Other than that the consensus seems to be the the American Sound is slightly brighter and slightly more open sounding than the Blonde, a fair share of guitarists at least owning both actually preferring the tone of the American Sound over the Blonde, even if arguably the Blonde is of better build quality. https://www.tdpri.com/threads/joyo-american-vs-tech21-blonde-comparison-many-graphs.786013/

The Norwegian singer/songwriter St. Thomas (R.I.P) :

I've properly posted this song before, but man, those lyrics, just absolutely sublime, such a beautiful song :

Most recent picture of my Ibanez GSRM20 Mikro Bass, after a successful GSRM20B Weathered Black body transplant :

Don't worry, I got small nuts too.

A merry funeral song by They Might Be Giants :

Added some white stripes :

So I decided to swap out the neck of my black battered Ibanez GSRM20 Mikro Bass, which is my main, to the body of a newer GSRM20B Mikro in Weathered Black finish that I have had for quite a while, since I bought it, due to it having a terrible neck with terrible fretwork, unlike this old neck which has as good as perfect fretwork and being the most stable neck I ever had on any bass or guitar. The holes for the neck screws in the new body being positioned slightly differently I had to fill out the old holes in the neck with wood glue and wood plugs and drill new pilot holes for the screws. Went really well, and I am really happy with the result. The new body should be Mahogany like the old one, but it is much lighter, and, I guess thanks to the lack of the insanely thick poly finish on the old body, and likely the much tighter neck pocket on the new body as well, much more resonant, which overall results in a more open and sort of more full range tone with more sustain. I also decided to install a regular front mounted output jack socket in the first pot hole, instead of the stock barrel one, only having to make the hole ever so slight bigger, since I, like it was on the old body, only have a P pickup installed wired directly to the output jack socket. For now I used the DiMarzio Model P, which I found out wasn't faulty any way, but might swap it for my EMG Geezer Butler P instead at a later point. So here is before and after shots : Before : After :

The Knife, from their opera "Tomorrow, in a Year" :

"Pissing" from Low's 2005 album "The Great Destroyer" :

From Love's 1967 album "Forever Changes" : The Morrígan : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Morrígan

The Jerry Jones Longhorn that I once owned, but unfortunately was stupid enough to sell, sounded great, especially with the stock option on the pickup selector rotary switch putting the 2 lipstick tube pickups in series.

So I used to have a P/J set of EMG Geezer Butler pickups installed in my main Ibanez GSRM20 Mikro bass, both permanently full on wired in parallel directly to the output jack socket of the bass, but swapped them about a year ago or so for just a single DiMarzio Model P pickup. I loved the tone of how that single Model P pickup sounded, but a couple of months ago I started getting huge random occurring fluctuations in my tone, and after much frustration trying to find the source of this mystery I finally manage to isolate it down to the fact that somehow the pickup must had gone faulty. I suspect that the pickup poles in my Model P pickup gets slightly connected with the lead somewhere, as there's an increasing loud buzz noise when I touch the pole pieces, and that after I tried to shield the pickups a while ago, swapping out the thin single core wires with shielded ones and attaching conductive copper tape to the bottom of the pickup touching the pole pieces and connected to the ground, the pickups hardly had any output when I tried them out after this procedure, and what little output there was was very noisy, buzzy and scratchy as well, which changed back to normal as soon as I removed the grounded copper tape from the bottom of the pickup. Anyway, so with the issue having been identified I planed to buy a new Model P P pickup, but as it happened to be all the dealers in Europe are out of stock at the moment, and Thomann, where I usually buy my gear, lists an estimated waiting time of approximately 6 weeks before they will have them back in stock, so I thought what the heck and went to install the old EMG Geezer Butler P pickup, from the P/J set that I used to have installed in my bass, instead, never really having tried it out on it's own, without the J also being full on in parallel. And I got very positively surprised, after having balanced the pickup for approximately even output from the strings, dialed in my EQ, an always on patch of stacked fully parametric equalizers on my Zoom multi effect, to suit the Geezer pickup, previously having been dialed in to fit the Model P, and made up for the less hot output of the Geezer by turning up the input gain of my EHX Black Finger, tube driven optical compressor, that I really use more so as a tube preamp stage than a compressor, I discovered that the Geezer P on it's own sounded even greater than the Model P. Perhaps slightly less fat and full sounding, but in exchange much more responsive to playing dynamics, articulated and defined, but, with the EQ dialed in right and with the less hot output made up for with more gain dialed in, every bit as aggressive, punchy and snappy as the Model P, but with an added nice bite to it's tone, and a beautiful open sounding clarity, that while it sounds slightly less fat and full than the Model P, make it's tone just as big sounding, and personally I discovered that I actually personally prefer that open clarity to the more compressed fat fullness of the Model P. As said I have it connected directly to the output jack socket, with the J pickup still siting there, from back when they were installed as a set, but currently disconnected and lowered considerably. Damn, I am glad I went for trying this out, stupid of me not even having thought of trying the Geezer P out on it's own before, such an amazing sounding pickup. I could have saved the money and trouble with the failing Model P, even if I'd say that is still a great pickup (that is if it works as it supposed to), as it turned out I just personally prefer the Geezer P. Another added bonus to the Geezer is that it is dead quiet, even without having the bridge grounded, as it unlike the Model P that comes with thin single core wires, is shielded internally and got shielded wires as well, with the ground running as a braided shield all along the insulated lead wire. In comparison the Model P was horribly noisy, though some of that noise might had been due to mine being faulty. But what an outstanding great pickup the Geezer P is! Don't get me wrong, I loved it back when I had it wired in parallel with the J from the set, both full on, too, through the old Trace Elliot rig I owned back then, but as far as I am concerned where it really shines is the P pickup on it's own. And here the old Geezer is installed in my Mikro Bass (the big blemish above it near the neck stems from a haphazard attempt to drill (Doh! ) an extra far neck pickup cavity, that then subsequently in similar haphazard hack style was filled up with filler mass and painted over with black paint and a couple of layers of clear varnish): PS: The bass on the track in the video linked to in my signature by the way was recorded with this Mikro Bass back when it had the EMG Geezer Butler P/J set wired in parallel directly to the output jack socket, though a lot of post production magic was applied to this first take improvised bass.

I love that design! Here's a picture of the black version with the Musicman style humbucker pickup, for those too lazy to click links : Wonder if an Ibanez Mikro Bass neck would fit the neck pocket, that would be a dream come true for me. Way too expensive to buy one in case it won't though. Man that design!

The sound of it or the looks of it, or both, and in what way? What does that word evoke in you and what does it reminds you of that makes you like it? I would have to agree though, actually, no doubt it has a nice round fat ring to it, but slightly counter weighted by the second syllable, that while still having a quite voluminous quality got a sharper character to it thanks to the over representation of consonants, in particular the F and T, while the O, and in particular because it is followed by an R, contributes to it still balancing nicely with the round quality of the first syllable, all in all making it an extraordinarily wholesome word, in many ways sort of the Yin/Yang of English words.

I realize you have to play the notes that fits the music you happen to play, but what is the scale that you enjoy the sound and mood/character of the most and loves to noodle, jam in, and eventual to use when composing music, the most? Mine absolutely has to be the Dorian Scale, love that somewhat folkish/medieval character of it that also can get quite jazzy, depending on how you chose to combine it's notes, to me there is something very warm and organic to it, an almost ancestral familiarity (I guess sort of solemn in a very down to earth and grounded way), that makes me feel good, although it is also lends it self to more melancholy moods. Another top favorite of mine is the Double Harmonic Scale, also called the Byzantine Scale, which is pretty close to the Phrygian Major Scale, also called the Flaminco Scale or the Spanish Scale, but has an even stronger oriental character, which to me gives it sort of a mystical and slightly psychedelic vibe, beside obviously leading the thought onto Indian, but especially Middle Eastern, music.

The saying stems from a guy who once commissioned a custom 5 fret bass, thinking his custom order was in safe hands he let the luthier finish his work without bothering him further. But when the man went to pick up his custom order it turned out that the luthier had used a 24 fret neck for the bass anyway. The guy who ordered the bass got furious and demanded 19/24 to be cut off the initially agreed on price. The luthier had no way around admitting to his mistake and give the man his demanded discount. And such the saying "There is no money above the 5th fret" was born.

The TC Electronic SpectraComp is an amazing compressor, but when that is said I liked non of the pre-made templates and artist toneprints, so at first I kind of just had it lying on a shelf, that is until I decided to give it a second chance and delved deep down into the Toneprint editor and discovered how detailed you can customize you compression with this, now I absolutely love it and couldn't imagine my pedal setup without it. So with a little basic knowledge about how compression work, a good amount of patience, trial and error, listening carefully to the result of your tweaking and readjusting accordingly, and not least the Toneprint editor that makes it all possible, you can get the compressor to act almost however you want it to. Do yourself a favor and do it, you won't regret spending the time needed. The 3 band crossover, parallel clean blend and the detailed customizeable compression parameter for each of those 3 bands really allow for some thorough detailed customization. The compression I have dialed in enhance the punch and snap of my tone beautifully but while largely leaving my playing dynamics intact, just smoothing out the upper most edgy spikes off it slightly, overall really enhancing my tone.