Mudbucker is to the best of my knowledge not a brand but just a nickname given to a very particular type of pickup.
The mudbucker originally gets its name from the early-1960s Gibson EB series; a bass usually with only one pickup, being this absolutely gigantic thing in the neck position and absolutely slammed right up against the fingerboard.
This pickup to most player’s ears sounds just plain awful and very “muddy”, hence the nickname mudbucker.
The mudbucker does have a distinct tonal personality. And no, this is not exactly what you would classify as “warm”, but rather, well, muddy; that’s just the way it is.
What’s the problem with the mudbucker? It’s next to impossible to find one. Sure, there are custom builders who make a pickup that looks like a mudbucker (usually with a shiny chrome dress on top), but it doesn’t sound anything like a mudbucker.
Players who seek out mudbucker pickups usually do so because they’re rebuilding/restoring an EB bass for collector’s value, and to that I say this:
If you have an EB where your current mudbucker is dead, you’re better off having that dead pickup rewound than trying to seek out a replacement.
Gibson to the best of my knowledge will not sell you a mudbucker even if you ask for one, so you can’t go to them to direct-order it (although I may be wrong here, and if I am, please feel free to post a comment and correct me). And as said above, trying to find an exact-replacement new one by a custom builder that both looks and sounds like the original is very difficult to come by.
The best (worst?) example of the EB mudbucker sound is, of course, Jack Bruce from Cream fame with his EB-3:
…and that’s pretty much the exact tone you’ll get out of a mudbucker. Throw enough power at one and you can “force-blare” an overdriven sound for that 60s psychedelic tone, and not much else. 🙂
Yup, you’re pretty much right with all that. I had an EB3, Like Jack Bruce is playing here. Gibson added a mini Humbucker near the bridge which on its own was quite cutting. There was one setting which must have been just the mudbucker with bass boost which basically you could feel but not hear.
I still have my EB0 and yes it still has the mudbucker on it. I agree that it has a muddy sound to it but I feel that it is a decent mimic of an upright double bass sound which I love.
Played an EB3 for several years. Primary pickup was Mini with a little MUD if needed. The Mini had all the output and high end I could use, Rotosounds helped. Slipped on ice in Vail and broke the neck off. Wish I still had it. I think Bruce primarily used the Mini and not the Mudbucker. Oh yah,and Marshalls.
Aftermarket mudbuckers are available from Artec, Gotoh and Curtis Novak. A lot of folks add them to a P or J bass to add some depth. I’ve done 4 projects using them.
i altered the Epiphone Mudbucker on my EB-1 fretless violin bass by removing the pickup’s ceramic magnets and attaching Alnico II magnets in their place. the G string’s formerly twonky sound was very much improved and all the strings now have a fuller sound. $5 cost.
I put one in my Vox Apollo IV back in 1972. I glued a block to inside and mounted the attachment plate to that. and then screwed the pickup to the plate. The original single coil was thin and prone to feedback at volume. BTW, the Apollo IV model was the type Snorky of the Banana Splits played. Mayba a bass of the week canidate?
@Tim Cassidy: We’d be happy to see it! Send some photos and a short story about the bass to feature-me@bestbassgear.com
I think Gibson called that pickup the ” Sidewinder “, but I may be wrong.
I have my original ’64 Epiphone Newport that had a mudbucker. In my 18 year old wisdom and a friend who was a woodworker we made it a “eb3” with new ’68 pickups that I ordered from Gibson. The ’68 mudbucker has “gibson” stamped into the top of the cover plate. I would love to send pics.
Now, Eric Clapton’s Gibson SG tone in that clip, on the other hand, is quite awesome. 😉
@Pat P.: Feel free to send pics and a story to feature-me@bestbassgear.com, we’ll be happy to take a look!
i have both a ’65 and a ’69 EB0, and a ’65 and ’69 EB3, all unmodified
played through a Marshall tube amp, i would not describe the sound as muddy, or blurred, or indistinct
played through a Marshall solid state amp, the sound is even more discrete
suspect the “muddy” rep came from turning up the volume and tone controls to max or near-max, and doing same on the amp
i know from contacts at the time that Jack Bruce basically turned up everything to the max, likely responsible for the distortion that was his at the time trademark, and much to Ginger Baker’s consternation
with proper amping and control the EB0 is a great bass
cmnjr
A true mudbucker is a sidewinder as someone noted. Sidewinder means that there are two humbucking coiils but only one set of shared pole pieces. The coils are on both SIDES of the poles, thus the name. The deep tone comes from placement and from the 8000 miles of wire typically wound on these. The single set of poles gives them something of a single coil nature, but it can get lost due to the placement and the many windings. Some folks remove one of the two pairs of magnets or undo some of the windings to tame the beast. The Gotoh is relatively tame. The Artec is a beast like the original. The Curtis Novak is not a real sidewinder, nor is the Dimarzio Model One. They are humbuckers made to fit an EB route and give a more balanced tone. Still a real mudbucker can be very useful when the bass has another pickup or two on board. 🙂
I think Lace makes a sidewinder strat pickup (humbucking with single coil tones). SGD Lutherie makes them for bass in a few different configurations I think.
Nice to see these basses highlighted!
I will offer a counterpoint in that the sound of Gibson EBs can be put to some very effective use, in my opinion. I have a couple old EBs, and gig my ’68 EB-3 regularly. Yes, it does take some EQ to coax the best out of it, but it sounds FANTASTIC in the rock and R&B settings in which I’ve used it. I’ve even received unsolicited compliments on the tone. It’s really fun to play – diminutive size with a fast slender neck. All in the hands and eyes of the beholder, I suppose.
I also use other basses – Alembic, Rics, early BC Rich, Fender, other Gibsons (Triumph and Thunderbirds), etc… I take them all for what they are, and look to each of them for their own respective strengths. Kinda fun to change it up sometimes and try something different!
At any rate, thanks for the article.
Cheers,
Joe
The guy that invented that pickup for Gibson also designed one for fender. They can be found in early 70s tele basses and also on some new squires and fenders. Chrome top with the fender logo etched in. I tried to get a little more high end out of it by switching out the 250 pots for 500s and finally 1 meg pots. Nothing really helps. Maybe an active preamp would help. They just are what they are.
New Gibson basses still sound like they have mudbuckers.
Can anyone suggest what kind of mudbucker I should Install into my rickenbacker? I’m trying to mimic Cliff burtons Rickenbacker with the DiMarzio J-style pick up by the bridge and a mudbucker by the neck. Any recommendations? I’ve spoken to multiple stores about this and they say it’s fine for me to switch pickups since my bass is only 11 years old.
I put an Artec mudbucker on my EB0. It’s 30k dci, like the old EB pups. The Artec’s weak magnets I replaced with ferrites on top and neodymium underneath. The sound now is very strong, fat but focused, and classy.
Wow, memories. Greatest bass I ever owned. Slick smooth easy to play neck. I guess I was just lucky (I never would have done it myself), but when I got it someone had routed in a Fender Jazz Bass pick-up into the bridge position. I took it and eliminated the “tone pot” and basically wired it so each knob was a volume for each pickup. Turn the “mudbucker” up to about 6 or 7 (10 to make thunder!!), then turn up the J knob to control tone. Best bass I’ve ever played. That thunder from the Mudbucker was the key though, without that it would have sounded like… any other bass.
guys….transform your ebo with a simple varitone switch..a british guy on ebay sells good handmade ones for about £15..six sound settings, two wires to solder. my bass now sounds fantastic!…..
FYI – Curtis Novak makes a genuine Mudbucker reproduction with same hardware and output.
Many comments here regarding Jack Bruce’s tone are incorrect; You get his sound mostly from the mini-humbucker in the bridge position of an EB-3, maybe together with the neck ‘mudbucker’ but you won’t get the sound with the neck pickup alone, even if you plug into a distorted Marshall amp. You may get a similar sound to that of Felix Pappalardi of Mountain with a mudbucker in neck position into an overdriven amp, but that’s quite different from Jack’s sound with Cream in the 1960s (at the 2005 Cream reunion shows he sometimes used his EB-1 ‘violin’ bass, which only has a neck mudbucker, and the sound is NOT the same). You also need flatwound strings.
I got my first bass at 12 years old and spent countless hours trying to mimic Jack Bruce and almost as much, Felix Pappalardi. Within a couple of years I had a Gibson bass and a Marshall Amp (although I thought Ampeg would’ve helped with the Pappalardi stuff). There are a lot of very skillful and dextrous bassists these days but those guys were innovators and some of the first to bring the bass guitar out of the shadows.
I have a Mudbucker from my 70-72 Gibson EBOL. I had the Mudbucker replaced in the late 70’s by Master Luthier / Les Paul partner in crime, Tommy Doyle. Tom installed two of his custom wound bass pickup’s, replaced the bridge with a Badass and redid the electronics. He mad a custom pickup surround that integrates with the original pickguard and a custom plate underneath the bridge. The bass is very light mahogany and has the slotted headstock. When outfitted with tape wound strings gives you a very clear but mellow sound, reminiscent of an upright bass. Too bad this site does not allow the posting of pictures. Does anyone have an idea what my Mudbucker might be worth ??? Thanks for Listening………
Hi can anyone please help me understand or source a diagram how a Gibson
Mud bucket is installed. , how screws and springs go ? I am putting one in a hollow body bass I made.
Thanks,tony
I picked up a 6 month old Epi EB0 for $100 (with hard case) just because I always wanted to try a short scale bass. Now it’s all I play. No modifications. I play through a Bose B2 system and I can go from a trebly crunch to a warm, full cello sound. Granted, it sounds like crap through my Fender BXR 100 that I practice at home alone with. I’m considering adding a bridge pickup but I’m leaving the Sidewinder alone!
Mel Schacher put that beast on his Fender bass back then when GFR were big. Together with his West amps and cabinets it gave him an absolutely murderous bass sound which still makes me crank up the volume on the stereo and dance like there is no tomorrow when I listen to it.
What will I need to buy to install a EB3 Mudbucker sidewinder neck pickup into a Epiphone Viola hollow body bass guitar can you help me please.
My recommendation is if you are a bass player that struggles with articulation the mudbucker is not for you. However, under the right hands and amp they have a beautiful tone. I played a jazz bass for years and could never get the right tone I wanted under my fingers; I chopped off notes, and struggled to calibrate the sound according to the group I was playing in. Now I only play three basses: my upright, my gibson midtown and my epiphone rivoli and I have never received so many compliments on my tone and my ability to fit in the ensembles I play in. Picking a bass really comes down to a few factors: what compliments your style and technique (tone is from the fingers), what feels good in your hands, what is practical for the groups you play in, and to a certain extent what your influences use. Another thing is I’ve found Gibson’s don’t pair well with ampegs in my opinion, I’d highly recommend Hartke.
Hi guys iv”e been investigating pickups designs and especially sidewinders and I have a couple of modification ideas that you could do easily without many costs at all.
For instance you could modify The magnetic Field by putting one of two magnets in the middle where the pole pieces are, and remove the other magnet and the pole pieces, then you will have only one place where to pick up the sound instead of three (the magnets are also poles) Much more transparent and more treble. Je could also use neodymium magnets that you can buy online for cheap.
Also considering that so many windings cause a very high impedance cutting out very much of the treble you could also wire the coils in parallel instead of series or just single coil it. I remember an Ibanez wiring humbucker with a 3 way switch for series, single coil or parallel. You can then half or quarter the impedance.
Those are easy mods anybody could do using the original parts and are worth trying before you put something else in. Good luck trying and let me know .