Best preamp for Lyric

Doug Michaels · #1 04-09-2015, 12:13 AM

I just took delivery of my new Custom Shop Custom build Charis SJ. I love it. Now I am looking for the best preamp with eq for this guitar. As many others, I don't want to sacrifice its tone since its amazingly good. I have installed the Lyric in it for now to see if I can make that sound like I want. I need awesome sound out of this new guitar. It deserves it. Any ideas on a great preamp for the Lyric. We all know that different pickups and amplification systems need different preamps to sound their best. Any ideas are appreciated. Thanks.

jseth · #2 04-09-2015, 12:44 AM

Doug;

Doesn't the Lyric have an internal preamp (with battery) as part of the system?

I have the Anthem SL pickups in both my Angus stage guitars... and they need a bit of tweaking but not that much... and they sound great straight into a mixing board.

Seems the easiest thing to do would be to try and dial in a nice sound without any additional pieces in the signal chain... ANY pickup is going to sound a bit "purer" all by itself, run through good quality sound equipment.

What are you playing this guitar through? PA? Acoustic amp? In what type of circumstances? At home, on stage... you know, give us all the information for more educated replies!

Congratulations on the Charis, by the way... pictures, please!

Doug Michaels · #3 04-09-2015, 01:09 AM

Great questions. Here are some answers. I play through two (2) Shertler Unico amps, very top end and awesome sound with two. I like the mic tone, the sound of the guitar body when I play. I don't like the a UST or a sound hole pick up. Not enough depth and warmth. I play nearly full time professionally for folks who have an ear for good acoustic tone. Many are musicians.
The preamp is key to my sound and I use other preamps for my other guitars such as the Dtar Solstice, Tonebone PreZP and a Raven Labs. Good stuff but the combo of the Lyric and these preamps just don't quite cut it. I have tried everything here but from my guitar with the Lyric into the pre and then the Shertler Unico's leaves a good amount of the actual body tone out of the mix. No amount of eq seems to bring it back. Therefore, I am after a top end preamp for acoustic that has eq, sweepable mids, notch, gain and volume, etc. I also want two channels for dual source which I usually do have running. Internal mics are nice too and I use them. Hope this helps some. Thanks.

rockabilly69 · #4 04-09-2015, 01:43 AM

Like you, I play acoustic music for 95% of my income, and I would use your Solstice, but use an Equinox in the loop. It pairs extremely well with the Lyric and has enough flexibility of EQ to get the job done. It's the best thing I found for the Lyric. Without the Equinox I found the Solstice useless, it just doesn't have the EQ necessary to notch the two mid frequencies that seem to plague the Lyric. That said, I couldn't rip the Lyric out of my guitar fast enough as it didn't pair well with my Gibson 50's reissue J45. The B-band system that I replaced it with (XOM 2.2) is better all the way across the board for the J45. I've never heard a Lyric that sounds good live up at a room filling volueme, all the ones I've heard have a somewhat boxy and artificially compressed sound which lacks bass, BUT, I've heard the Lyric does pairs well with some guitars. Although, I think that the people that say that, are gentle fingerpickers. I think pickups/preamps show more of their true color when the volume comes up, especially when playing with a flatpick! I can pretty much make any well known pickup sound good while fingerpicking.

I also use a Schertler rig, the Jam 400, and I recall you had one too, and sold it, from some of your other posts. But the Unico still has the "SCHERTLER" sound so I'm familiar with what your facing here. And one thing I do know for sure, is that, getting that Unico up in the air on a stand will improve the overall sound, and make it easier to EQ that pickup. It seems to help tame the low-end runaway feedback stuff.

When I'm single sourcing, my favorite "Pre" is a Empress Para EQ which IMNSHO is the most musical and easy to operate 3 band Parametric EQ on the market, it just works, and it also provides an additional clean boost section that is very transparent!

Good luck on your search!!!

Vancebo · #5 04-09-2015, 04:23 AM

Hi Doug. If you haven't done this already, over on the Baggs user forum the question has been brought up a lot. If you are dealing with a boxy sound or excessive low mids Caleb has recommendations for you. One involves moving the Lyric to one side or another. He has a diagram posted. He will send you extra sticky tape. Also, he can make eq recommendations as well.

If you are willing to go dual source, I had great results with the K and K/mic combo through my SPS-1. My Lyric does well for me as a simple set-up but the K and K dual source was better. If you are playing solo, that's what I would go with.

buzzardwhiskey · #6 04-09-2015, 08:23 AM

I have two Lyric equipped guitars, a CA GXi and a Martin CEO7. I've tried the following preamps with my Shertler Unico:

Fishman Aura
Fishman ToneDeq
Old Fishman DI (don't remember it's name)
LR Baggs Venue
K&K Pure

All of them produce "good" sound but all of them are essentially unnecessary with the Unico. Into a board when on stage can be a little different (maybe).

The best sound I've gotten into a board used a graphic eq. Were I really driven, I'd use a nice one like the Yamaha Q2031B.

MaurysMusic · #7 04-09-2015, 08:29 AM

I'd go with something like a Dtar Equinox or similar... to my ears, that pickup needs surgical sweepable midrange EQ. ymmv

Doug Michaels · #8 04-09-2015, 12:18 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MaurysMusic

I'd go with something like a Dtar Equinox or similar... to my ears, that pickup needs surgical sweepable midrange EQ. ymmv

I see you do not carry the Dtar Equinox. Yet you recommend it for my issues in my AGF thread. Thanks for responding. I wasn't aware that the Equinox has sweepable mids. I have the Solstice and it doesn't. I asked what preamp goes best with my Lyric installed in my new top end Custom Charis SJ. I will seriously check out the Equinox. Sounds like it should be used after the Solstice. Thats two preamps. And then the Unico amp has a preamp as well.

jseth · #9 04-09-2015, 12:34 PM

Doug;

You might want to give Baggs a call and ask them... every time I have had any questions or issues with my Anthem pickups, they have been more than willing to go "above and beyond" to help me out!

I'm sure that one of the guys can steer you in the right direction!

MaurysMusic · #10 04-09-2015, 02:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Doug Michaels

I see you do not carry the Dtar Equinox. Yet you recommend it for my issues in my AGF thread. Thanks for responding. I wasn't aware that the Equinox has sweepable mids. I have the Solstice and it doesn't. I asked what preamp goes best with my Lyric installed in my new top end Custom Charis SJ. I will seriously check out the Equinox. Sounds like it should be used after the Solstice. Thats two preamps. And then the Unico amp has a preamp as well.

We do carry it, but I was making a suggestion as a fellow musician, rather than sending you a sales pitch.

Here's the link if you're interested:

http://maurysmusic.com/inc/sdetail/d_tar_equinox/6628

The Equinox has sweepable lows mids and highs. You can use it after or instead of the Solstice with great results.

rockabilly69 · #11 04-10-2015, 12:16 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Doug Michaels

I see you do not carry the Dtar Equinox. Yet you recommend it for my issues in my AGF thread. Thanks for responding. I wasn't aware that the Equinox has sweepable mids. I have the Solstice and it doesn't. I asked what preamp goes best with my Lyric installed in my new top end Custom Charis SJ. I will seriously check out the Equinox. Sounds like it should be used after the Solstice. Thats two preamps. And then the Unico amp has a preamp as well.

Not only does it have sweepable mids, it has sweepable lows and highs, and you can adjust the Q of all of those sweeps, and along with all that, it has two notch filters, and it sounds pretty good even without the Solstice, but with the Solstice, it is quite a formidable preamp/eq setup....

In operation. I like it best in one of the channel inserts of the Solstice. One Solstice and Two Equinoxs would be a very POWERFUL Dual Source unit.

Doug Michaels · #12 04-10-2015, 11:45 PM

I just bought a used Dtar Equinox off of this forum yesterday. That combined with my Dtar Solstice should make a good formidable pairing for great eq. But time will tell.
Thanks so very much to all who contributed here. Your input was very valuable in my decision process. Its just awesome to have this forum to lean on. And a special thanks to LR Baggs and their customer service tech team for crazy outrageous good service to me these past days regarding this issue. Just for fun I am adding a Presonus tube preamp to my chain for the Charis as well and see if it makes a good or bad difference. I like a warm tone and maybe this will help.

Thanks again........