Had my eyes on these shiny blink blink pickups from Dimarzio since a year-ish ago when they first announced the new signature models for Billy Sheehan and Les Claypool . very catchy but never get to seen them in local store .. until a week ago, I finally pulled the trigger when Dimarzio.com was celebrating Larry Dimarzio's bday and had the sales site wide ... oh well .. . new toy day ..
I had been having this part-bass project for a 59 style precision, had the bass assembled and loaded with the Fender 63' pure vintage pickup and was very happy ... but of course shinyer is always better ...
Big shout out to UPS , they freaking charged me another $60 on this $150(cad) pickups .. the tax itself is about $2x.xx, and another $3x.xx on handling ... such a rip off .. . oh man ..
Anyways, was able to put in the pickup last night and did 2 quick test drives between the 2 pickups .. and here we go:
Thoughts:
Both pickups are wounded to the 60s specs .. both got the Alnicol 5 magnets, DP124 is wounded slightlly hotter on paper but it's hard to tell by ear . The 63pv is vintagely made with the cloth wiring, where the dp124 is made to 2023's spec with pcb board, 3pin quick release connectors. it's very nicely made / well engineered . very happy to see long time reputuable companies still innovating after all these years.
Here's the detal about the instrument and the signal chain:
All Parts body and neck (unfinished/unshielded Alder body/ Maple neck), PICKUPS, 250k vol/tone, 0.047uf tone cap, Labella low tension flat into Leleh Basswitch IQ DI with moderate compression (1176 style) -> RME UFX -> Apogee jam -> iPhone built in recorder.
The setup is a bit different as I'm also trying out the new compressor pedal (uafx 1176)
One side note is that this bass is not finished and not shielded at all .. the 63pv pickups some natureal shielding hums where the dp124 is totally DEAD quiet ...
To me the 63'PV has a rounder lowermid and slightly bigger bottom end .. which is favourited to player's ear .. the DP124 still has the overall 60s warmth, the uppermid is a tad more focus, and I think out of the box it will fit into the jamming situation a bit better as the bigger bottom end can easily become overwhelming. The DP124 is a bit noticeably cleaner but I i think that hair of noise/dirt they got rid of is part of the classic P sound. My ear is still tunned to the 63pv a bit more, but the dp124 is just prettier .. and I'll bring it to a few gig to verify my thoughts ..
Cheers!
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