LR Baggs anthem pick up

Mr Blues · #1 06-29-2014, 06:26 AM

Any fans of the LR Baggs full anthem pick up,?
Would you say it was similar to the Fishman matrix or better.

I am thinking of having installed on my Blueridge dreadnought.

The Blueridge has a Fishman T4 eq pick up which has eq presets which I am not too keen on .

Dave

jseth · #2 06-29-2014, 11:51 AM

Hey Dave;

I have the Anthem SL system in both my Mark Angus 6 and 12 string guitars; those are the two guitars that I use on stage, primarily...

I've had the systems installed for several years now, and I like them a lot. Mostly I play through my Bose L1 PA, using the T1 Tonematch mixer. Pretty easy to dial in a good sound with that rig, although it does take a bit of tweaking to get the tone where I want it to be. Far superior to the Fishman Matrix Acoustic Natural UST pickups I had in those guitars previously...

I also use those guitars through my little AER Compact 60/2, and they sound great through that amp as well, although the 12 string needs a bit more "cajoling' to get the sound I want to hear.

If you play "out" a bunch and need a good pickup system in your guitar, the Anthem is a wonderful pickup with a very workable sound. I opted for the SL version after spending a bunch of time on the phone with Brian, the tech at Baggs; for my use (mostly solo acoustic guitar and voice) he recommended the SL rather than the Full Anthem, saying that the "full" version has so many different ways to adjust the parameters between the Element (UST) and the True-Mic that it may be more confusing than helpful for my purposes.

If you plan on playing with a full band, or in really loud applications, the full version will give you a lot more ways to both tame feedback and have your guitar heard through the mix...

Petty1818 · #3 06-29-2014, 03:31 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jseth

Hey Dave;

I have the Anthem SL system in both my Mark Angus 6 and 12 string guitars; those are the two guitars that I use on stage, primarily...

I've had the systems installed for several years now, and I like them a lot. Mostly I play through my Bose L1 PA, using the T1 Tonematch mixer. Pretty easy to dial in a good sound with that rig, although it does take a bit of tweaking to get the tone where I want it to be. Far superior to the Fishman Matrix Acoustic Natural UST pickups I had in those guitars previously...

I also use those guitars through my little AER Compact 60/2, and they sound great through that amp as well, although the 12 string needs a bit more "cajoling' to get the sound I want to hear.

If you play "out" a bunch and need a good pickup system in your guitar, the Anthem is a wonderful pickup with a very workable sound. I opted for the SL version after spending a bunch of time on the phone with Brian, the tech at Baggs; for my use (mostly solo acoustic guitar and voice) he recommended the SL rather than the Full Anthem, saying that the "full" version has so many different ways to adjust the parameters between the Element (UST) and the True-Mic that it may be more confusing than helpful for my purposes.

If you plan on playing with a full band, or in really loud applications, the full version will give you a lot more ways to both tame feedback and have your guitar heard through the mix...

jseth, you point out the fact that you use the Anthem on your "stage" guitars. Whenever someone mentions stage guitars I automatically figure that they have more expensive guitars at home. Would you not install the Anthem in your higher end guitars?

Mr Blues · #4 06-30-2014, 06:32 AM

Thanks Jseph. Much appriciated

jseth · #5 06-30-2014, 11:37 AM

@Petty - No, I would not put an Anthem into my Goodall, as I feel it detracts from the natural tone and volume of the instrument.

Backstory: I was living in Fort Bragg, CA., and had made the acquaintance of James, his wife Jean and his son Luke... I used to go to the shop and hang out a few times a week, playing whatever Goodall guitars were laying around (!). At that time, James was installing the Anthem in his guitars when people wanted to amplify them...

I had the Anthem SL installed into my 2 Mark Angus guitars, a 6 string and a 12 string. I had a bit of bother with the 6 string pickup; it was installed with a shim and those pickups DO NOT play well with shims! James was kind enough to cut a new saddle for me for that guitar.

Both those Angus acoustics are guitars I have played for over 30 years, and I was intimately familiar with the volume and tone of each. After the Anthem was installed, the difference in both volume and tone on the 6 string Angus was so marked that James immediately ceased using those pickups in his guitars!

I was chagrined by the shift in the sound of my old buddy... but I really liked the tone of it when plugged in, so I waffled about "what to do?". This was in 2010/early 2011; I finally decided to have James make me a guitar in early Spring of that year... but I was not about to put anything inside that guitar that could compromise the tone, plus I didn't want a battery in that guitar.

I had a K&K PW Mini put in the Goodall, after about 6 months of thinking I would not put any pickup into it. I considered the Duncan Mag-Mic, as well as the MiSi unit, but felt that, with a redwood top, the chances were too good that the sound hole pickup would "leave a mark" on the top...

Update: after a year or so, the volume and tone have returned mostly to "normal" on that Angus 6 string. I don't know what would account for that, but the Element (UST) portion of the pickup has a soft, "squishy" braided covering; my suspicion is that, after a period of time, the pressure of the saddle "settled" that braided covering completely and became a better conduit for the vibration of the strings>top...

But I still wouldn't want all that "stuff" inside of my Goodall!

Petty1818 · #6 06-30-2014, 12:24 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jseth

@Petty - No, I would not put an Anthem into my Goodall, as I feel it detracts from the natural tone and volume of the instrument.

Backstory: I was living in Fort Bragg, CA., and had made the acquaintance of James, his wife Jean and his son Luke... I used to go to the shop and hang out a few times a week, playing whatever Goodall guitars were laying around (!). At that time, James was installing the Anthem in his guitars when people wanted to amplify them...

I had the Anthem SL installed into my 2 Mark Angus guitars, a 6 string and a 12 string. I had a bit of bother with the 6 string pickup; it was installed with a shim and those pickups DO NOT play well with shims! James was kind enough to cut a new saddle for me for that guitar.

Both those Angus acoustics are guitars I have played for over 30 years, and I was intimately familiar with the volume and tone of each. After the Anthem was installed, the difference in both volume and tone on the 6 string Angus was so marked that James immediately ceased using those pickups in his guitars!

I was chagrined by the shift in the sound of my old buddy... but I really liked the tone of it when plugged in, so I waffled about "what to do?". This was in 2010/early 2011; I finally decided to have James make me a guitar in early Spring of that year... but I was not about to put anything inside that guitar that could compromise the tone, plus I didn't want a battery in that guitar.

I had a K&K PW Mini put in the Goodall, after about 6 months of thinking I would not put any pickup into it. I considered the Duncan Mag-Mic, as well as the MiSi unit, but felt that, with a redwood top, the chances were too good that the sound hole pickup would "leave a mark" on the top...

Update: after a year or so, the volume and tone have returned mostly to "normal" on that Angus 6 string. I don't know what would account for that, but the Element (UST) portion of the pickup has a soft, "squishy" braided covering; my suspicion is that, after a period of time, the pressure of the saddle "settled" that braided covering completely and became a better conduit for the vibration of the strings>top...

But I still wouldn't want all that "stuff" inside of my Goodall!

Thanks for the reply! That's honestly my biggest concern with the Anthem. My problem is that my expensive guitars are also my stage guitars and I am looking to buy another guitar soon so I would like to use the same amplification for all of them. The K&K seems like an awesome choice (I have it in one guitar). However, it's just too warm for the type of strumming that I do. I would love to try the K&K + lyric set up but not enough people have tried it for me to feel confident enough and I feel like feedback would be an issue.

simondylan · #7 07-02-2014, 04:58 PM

I'm gonna go ahead and chime in on this. I strongly recommend the Anthem SL as well! I've used it in 2 guitars for a couple years and I don't think you could do any better. I wouldn't think combining a Lyric with K&K is the best idea though. They're both full range so they'll be fighting each other for the same space; this generally creates a feedback machine. Whereas the Anthem is designed with a cross over that separates both sources so one handles the low's and the other handles the highs. All I know for certain is once I got mine dialed in they perform perfectly in all situations. No feedback issues that I can't easily handle plus they even record well!

guitaniac · #8 07-03-2014, 05:38 AM

I recently installed the Anthem SL in a friend's '78 rosewood/spruce Guild jumbo. He specifically wanted the Anthem SL because he likes the way in sounds in my cedar/mahogany OM.

So far, so very good. Last night we tested it in a very noisy and difficult setting where many other amplified guitars have tended to have boominess problems. We had plenty of volume, excellent balanced tone and no boominess problem at all with the EQ flat. Interestingly, a later player's much smaller UST-equipped Martin did have the muddiness problem which we were concerned the Guild might suffer.

Has the Guild's acoustic tone been compromised. Possibly, but it still sounds great acoustically. One of our mutual friends, who's played it acoustically after the Anthem SL was installed, is already attempting to buy it. LOL.