MOTS Newb Question re: BFR JP6 w/Piezo

[tfbattag]

Hi Everyone-

I just purchased my first EBMM. It's a BFR JP6 w/Piezo in Tobacco Burst. It plays beautifully, and the craftsmanship is awesome! So, now on to the new dumb guy question(s).

I've been experimenting with the multitude of combinations for routing. First of course, I just wanted to plug it in and let it rip. The first question is: using just a mono cable from the magnetic output straight into amp produces a really muddy tone. Shouldn't I be able to just play mono with the bridge pickup and have "normal" dual-humbucker functionality? It literally sounds like a Les Paul in bridge pickup with the tone knob set as low as possible-- no matter what I do.

So, I've tried routing the piezo out using a mono cable to my PA while using stereo to my mixer, then to my guitar amp. The piezo is amazing! No matter what the panning I choose, I still get nothing but the toned-down Les Paul sound out of the magnetic output.

The only way that I get a "normal" bridge pickup sound is using the mono cable direct to amp, while inserting only partially into the magnetic jack.

Any thoughts, guidance to the newb?

 

[tfbattag]

Here's a pic of my new BFR.

 

[petruccirocks02]

Sick. Any chance we could get a brighter pic of that?

-Phil

 

[TNT]

Wow!!!! That guitar plays itself!!

 

[DJ.]

That's a great looking top!

 

[fogman]

nice - welcome

 

[colinboy]

very impressive.try and take photos of it out in the sunlight.

 

[banjoplayer]

Is this a peepshow or what? does anybody answer the question or are all just drooling over the pic?

Sorry, I can´t help you, tfbattag. No piezo experience

 

[Lou]

There should be NO audible difference in magnetics tone no matter which jack you use.

 

[lumberjack]

Killer dude!!! Freakin' killer.

And welcome to the forums.

Scott

 

[ScoobySteve]

Wait, is this solely for Piezo?

 

[Beth]

Welcome, TF!

We've got some instructions on how to use the piezo system (or not use it) on our FAQ, but for convenience I've copied and pasted it here:

Q: What is the best way to hook up one of your guitars equipped with the piezo bridge?
A: The Music Man models with piezo are designed to run out to two separate systems. That's what we consider the best option - the electric goes through the regular on-stage rig and the piezo runs direct through the house mains. To do this, you can either use both outputs at once with mono cables or you can run a single stereo cable out of the "magnetic/stereo" output and use a stereo-to-mono splitter box (such as our Ernie Ball catalog # 6190). Then, you take each respective lead where it is to go. Or, instead of running the piezo signal through the house mains, you could use an acoustic amplifier first and then run it to the house mains - or not.

Of course, you can always just run the signal out of the "piezo/mono" output jack and have it run to to a standard guitar amp and mix the signal on your guitar alone - but to get the real potential of the piezo bridge, we know that running it through separate systems as described above works best.

Again, welcome to the forum! Let us know if you have any more questions and we'll do our best to help.

-Beth

 

[brasco68]

WOW!!...and welcome.

 

[tfbattag]

Hi All-

Thanks for the kind comments. As far as the tone, still no luck. I've tried the recommendations from the FAQ, but the tone is still stuck sounding like a Les Paul in Neck/lo-tone mode no matter what cabling I use. Still, the only thing that produces what I would expect for a bridge-located humbucker is partially inserting a mono cable into the mag/stereo out.

Any more insight would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.