Nordstrand NJ4SV

Spilt-coil humbucking pickups for 4-string Jazz bass. ALNICO 5 magnets which are grounded.

Fender Crafted In Japan '62 reissue Jazz bass. Also installed is a Audere pre-amp.

I play in an R&B band and a classic rock band. For the R&B band I usually play one of my P-Basses, for the classic rock band I play my Jazz bass almost exclusively. I play with my fingers on the neck pickup and slap and pop for a very occasional fill here or there. I only use fender pure-nickel strings on this bass after trying many different strings. I tend to favor the neck-pickup slightly.

Output is medium. Tone is warm with a little 1 kHz grind to it, but not too much. Very clean sound with good articulation as you would expect from a good Jazz bass. The highs are mellow but with good definition. The lows are fat and tight. I really look forward to playing this bass because of the great sound I get. Both pickups sound good with their own unique voice and very minimal eq-ing is required. The pickups sound great with no eq at all which is the way it should be. The string-to-string balance is actually very good considering it is a Jazz bass due to the raised pole pieces for the A and D strings. With a 7.25" radius neck, it is essential to have some radiusing of the pole pieces or you are required to use a lot of compression to tame the string balance. Trust me on this, I actually wish it had slightly higher pole pieces for the A- and D- strings but the height of the pole pieces is good enough to warrant minimal compression.

As mentioned above I installed a Audere pre-amp in the bass. Prior to installation of the pre-amp I was a bit dissapointed in the pickups, the sound was not very warm and the grind was too much. I had to cut the 1kHz signal by about 10 -db to get it warm. Once I switched out the pre-amp the pickups came alive. Is the great sound I get now a result of the a great pre-amp and O.K. pickups, or great pickups and a great pre-amp? I don't know, but I do know I have a great sounding bass (pre-amp reviewed separately on harmony central). My pocket book took a hit, but you get what you pay for.

Great pickups that are dead quiet and have very good string-to-string balance. The pickup covers that come with these are also top-notch becasue they have rounded corners and have a great broken-in feel (very big bonus). Also the pole-pieces are grounded which is a very underated component of exposed pole pickups. Why all pickup manufactures don't do this is beyond me. Grounding of the pole pieces should be done on all pickups.

As far as construction goes, all components are constructed beautifully except for the pole-pieces on the pair I received. This is my only complaint with these pickups, and it bums me out a bit. It probably doesn't effect the sound, but shouldn't each pair of pole pieces be the same height? I think this should be the case, or at least have them consistently radiused. On my pick the two pole pieces associated with both pickups on both the A- and D- strings are little off in height from each other. Take for instance the two pole pieces for the D-string on the neck pickup. The pole piece on the G-string side is taller than the pole-piece on the A-string side. Is it that hard to get pairs of pole-pieces the same height? This is my only complaint and it bugs me a little bit everytime I look at them. But they sure do sound good. I would buy these again but I just noticed that the cost went up by $40 in one-year! Wow! I also noticed the Fender '60's custom shop pickups raised in price dramatically too. What is going on? As is likely the case, cost is dependent on demand, not manufacturing and distributing costs.

I had looked into all the top brands of replacement pickups available. Also had owned a pair of Fender 60's custom shop pickups on a previous bass which sounded good. In the end I chose these because of the vintage sound it was supposed to emmulate, and most-importantly the radiused pole-pieces. To my delight, the pole pieces were grounded, the pickup covers were rounded, and the pickups were humbucking. To my dissatisfaction they sounded harsh with the stock control plate and pots, and the pole-pieces were cut unevenly.