tjon901 « Alumi-tone more like tin can tone »
Publié le 18/05/11 à 02:43
(contenu en anglais)
Lace has recently introduced their Alumitone line of pickups. It is an extreme departure from the traditional pickup design. It features an aluminum frame stating that electrons flow through the aluminum better and this enhances the tone and nuances of the guitar. Lace states that it is possible for the Alumitone series to offer a broader band response. The chrome areas on the Alumitone pickups act like a giant single turn of wire in the magnetic field. This helps the pickup work with 95% less wire which decreases the amount of background noise you get when playing. This low amount of wire explains the listed output of 3.4k. Lace says even with this detected output the tone is just as big as any high output pickup. In the Lace Helix bass the pickups have quite a distinct tone, but not in a good way. The tone seems to be trying to replicate the tone found in the cheap Danaelectro basses of the 60s, really low end basses, and they succeeded. The problem is none of those basses sounded any good. Those guitars and basses were made that way to save money not to sound good. The classic Danaelectro lipstick pickup design was actually made from unused lipstick tubes to save money. You can really hear the Aluminum in the tone and it is not pleasing to the ear. When playing slap bass the strings hit the pickups often. With normal plastic pickups this isn’t much of a problem. With the Aluminum pickups the string hitting the pickup makes a loud noise. The pickups are extremely bright on the high end. They also have really a really obnoxious mid-range quality. It really does feel like you are playing a tin can or something. I can hear why the only basses that come with these pickups are Lace basses. No one wants their product to have this kind of tinny obnoxious sound.