Holy cow, you guys are awesome! Due to an overwhelming amount of requests and inquiries, the current order queue is quite long.

As I am a one-man operation and it takes a bit of time to hand-build each unit, the current lead time for shipping is approximately 2 weeks until further notice.

Please provide your best email address with your order, as I will be contacting you directly with your approximate shipping date within a day of your order. I appreciate your patience and support as I work to get every preamp built to the highest standard!

Who or what are these for? Do you prefer the sound of a natural upright bass resonating every note? A sound that can only truly be captured by the perfect placement of microphones? That’s cool… but you’re on the wrong page.

If your style is playing on a stage (or in a band practice room) amplified with a drummer and guitars.. read on.

These preamps are for players who need to be loud on stage and need a way to quickly and easily dial in a good tone without the feedback issues as volume is increased.

Please read below for further information. Im happy to answer any emails if I haven’t covered anything that answers your questions.

Also, if you purchase either preamp unit, you will be in direct communication with me as I build each unit as they are ordered. I don’t like taking anyones money unless they are sure of the product they are getting.

Amplifying your upright doesn’t have to be rocket science, but it might as well be with all the information out there. I’ve put a lot of time into making a product that has been thoroughly road tested in many different live environments. You may have used other preamp brands… and so have I.

I took away all the crap I didn’t like about them.

You have two choices here:

• If you do not need to hear a “click” sound when playing your bass and prefer to simply run a bridge pickup that can be properly processed and you don’t want to fight feedback issues. You want a single channel Bridge Wing Preamp.

• Does your playing style involve slapping and you prefer to have a “click” sound when playing percussively? You want a dual channel Bridge & Slap Pickup Blender. This two channel preamp blends two pickup inputs into one mono out.

The more junk you cut out of your upright basses pickup sound before it hits your bass amp head… the easier it will be to dial in your sound on your bass amp. That is why one of these boxes will be useful for you.

On stage or even at band practice, fighting feedback is a common issue when amplifying an upright bass. Piezo pickups without a buffer be can harder to process with just your bass amplifier eq alone. Not only do you need to control the output of the pickup, the louder you go on the bass amp head, the more the resonances you must cut or else your upright bass will want to howl, and not in a good way.

  I’ve developed a dual channel preamp blender and a single channel preamp that has solved these sound issues for me. As well as made dialing the tone I like much easier with any bass amp backline I may come across.

Features:

• My pickups and preamps work with any type of upright bass string.

• Each channel is first buffered by a TL072 preamp with output gain controlled by the knobs on the top of unit.

• The single channel preamp takes a 1/4” input from a bridge wing mounted pickup. It will work with other types of pickup designs. But, save yourself the headache and just use a single bridge wing pickup. Doesn’t matter if it’s one of mine or not.

• The two channel mixer blends a bridge wing pickup with an under the fingerboard “slap” pickup. The slap and bridge pickup plug into their own 1/4” inputs which then allow you to process the two signals into a 1/4” mono output to your amplifier.

• While this blender box has been designed for use with Vic’s Upright Bass Pickups, which are piezo pickups, there are adapters available (or can be custom made to order) to fit whatever pickups you may be using. Such as stereo wired (TRS) slap and bridge pickups or 2.5MM micro jack pickups. Magnetic pickups can also be plugged into the bridge input.

• Both preamps use a single 9 volt battery located inside the unit.

• A 5V USBC charging port connects to an internal pigtail that can plug into a rechargeable 9 volt battery. Making so you can change the battery without removing the back. Continuous run time is confirmed for at least 24 hours with real world testing. Use good quality rechargeable or standard 9 volt batteries. Battery not included.

• An on/off switch is located on top of the unit with an oraange led letting you know when the power is on. Leaving the pickups and amp cable plugged in will not drain any battery power.

• The preamps have been “tuned” so that with all knobs set at 12 ‘o’clock will have the unit outputting a safe signal level with approximately 6db of attenuation on the low and high mid knobs. I recommend starting your amp at a moderate volume and increase or decrease the output of each channel as necessary to find the blend you like. Then check your tonal options with the knobs and switches.

• The unit is designed to mount on the front or back top of your tailpiece. A fixed Velco strap with a foam rubber pad on the back of the unit allows for quick on and off when placed around the strings at the top the tailpiece with a firm grip to stop any sliding. This placement does not affect the sound of your strings. A second optional strap with adhesive clips is included if you wish to lock the unit down even more.

• The unit also comes with optional thumb screws for quicker removal of the back. The fixed velcro strap can be removed for pedal board placement as well.

Bridge Wing Channel: Red Knob

The bridge channel allows you to control some key areas that can help reduce feedback. The red knob on top of the unit controls the output of the bridge pickup. A polarity switch controls how your pickup reacts to speaker sound waves and can be an instant feedback killer in loud environments. A 70Hz high pass filter switch cuts out stage rumble and boom. The low mid knob is focused around the 350Hz area of the signal, which, on an upright bass can often be too congested. Without reducing this area before you increase volume, you can introduce more mud and boxiness into your sound. As well as groaning low feedback. Turning the knob clockwise reduces these frequencies and can clean up the sound. The upper mid range, especially when using piezo pickups can be harsh. The high mid knob is focused around the 1.5k range and reduces this area which can often sound “clacky” or “brittle.” A key feature of the high mid range is that everything above 5k frequency is not effected by the knob. This preserves the presence of the pickup and allows you to have more control over the definition with you bass amp eq.

Slap Channel: Black Knob

The slap channel is only available on the Dual Channel Version.

The slap channel is filtered to only allow the “click” from your under the fingerboard mounted slap pickup. As you increase the black knob on top clockwise, the more 5k frequency and higher is introduced into the blend and the  “clicky”  percussive elements of your playing become more apparent.

Note: This channel is fixed in its upper frequency range. The low mid and high mid eq knobs, as well as the polarity and HPF switches have no effect on this channel.

The preamps have been “tuned” so that with all knobs set at 12 ‘o’clock will have the unit outputting a safe signal level with approximately 6db of attenuation on the low and high mid knobs. I recommend starting your amp at a moderate volume and increase or decrease the output of each channel as necessary to find the blend you like. Then check your tonal options with the knobs and switches.

The unit is designed to mount on the front or back top of your tailpiece. A fixed Velco strap with a foam rubber pad on the back of the unit allows for quick on and off when placed around the strings at the top the tailpiece with a firm grip to stop any sliding. This placement does not affect the sound of your strings. A second optional strap with adhesive clips is included if you wish to lock the unit down even more.

The unit also comes with optional thumb screws for quicker removal of the back. The fixed velcro strap can be removed for pedal board placement as well.

Fulfillment, Warranty and Returns:

Preamps are shipped worldwide via UPS

All pickups and preamp units are hand built by me, Vic, at my workbench. They are kind of “old school” analog with some point to point wiring if youre into that kind of thing. They do take a little while to make and are released in small batches. If they are out of stock… Im either on tour or working on more.  It’s been a long road of real world on stage testing and a lot of tweaking to get these things to where they fix all the issues I’ve had with upright bass pickup signal processing. Hopefully this system can do the same for you!

If you find the unit to not be useful or effective: returns are accepted up to 30 days from receiving product.

All pickups and preamps have a lifetime repair warranty. You send it back to me and I fix it. Only cost is shipping.