Fun stuff for fretless Precision's

[BioBiro]

A while ago I bought a Japanese 70's-made fretless P copy, which still had the original split-p pickup and electronics in it. The wiring has now failed (the tone pot no longer works at all), and I bought a Seymour Duncan SPB-1 as a tasty replacement pickup. After finding out I wasn't as clever as I thought I was with a soldering iron, i'm taking it to a tech to put new passive wiring in and sort it all out, but I also want to add another pickup(s) to give it something extra.

So - any recommendations on good additional pickup(s) for this thing? Most people put a jazz pickup in at the bridge for more 'mwah', but what happens if I add a second precision pickup at the bridge instead (and what if it was turned round the other way, if you know what I mean?). Do musicman-style pickups sound good for this type of thing? Could I add a set of jazz pickups at the neck and bridge - is the neck jazz pickup too redundant if this is the case? Also, what sort of fancy series/parallel switches and knobs and things could I have in the bass - giving maximum tonal options but keeping it all passive?

[wateroftyne]

[quote name='BioBiro' post='336456' date='Nov 25 2008, 05:15 PM']what happens if I add a second precision pickup at the bridge instead[/quote]
Hmm... I think that would be a bit unrewarding. The last thing a fretless P needs - or any P, for that matter, is more thump. IMO.

If you're intent on adding another pup, and you can face dropping a battery in there, I'd add a piezo... a Graphtech Ghost, maybe? That would sound fab.

FWIW, I toyed with doing 'something' to my Fretless P for a while now, but in the end I replaced the flats with halfs, and decided it's just fine.

[BioBiro]

[quote name='wateroftyne' post='336488' date='Nov 25 2008, 05:48 PM']Hmm... I think that would be a bit unrewarding. The last thing a fretless P needs - or any P, for that matter, is more thump. IMO.

If you're intent on adding another pup, and you can face dropping a battery in there, I'd add a piezo... a Graphtech Ghost, maybe? That would sound fab.

FWIW, I toyed with doing 'something' to my Fretless P for a while now, but in the end I replaced the flats with halfs, and decided it's just fine.[/quote]

Cool idea! - i'd never thought of putting a piezo pickup in, but having had a look at the 'Ghost' it seems like a nice bit of kit to have. It's especially interesting that it calls itself an acoustic-amp, as the bass always had a nicer tone unplugged than amplified.

Having had a bit more of a sniff around, I noticed some talk over this great clip from a [url="http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=iYOVxK-6ZSE"]Lou Reed performance in 1982[/url]. Fernando Saunders' fretless P sounds amazing IMO, and i'm guessing that rubbery sound is mostly coming from the (single coil?) bridge pickup.