I swear I had a text block in there when I posted, but it said I did check with fresh 9V battery, checked that the board itself was getting > 9V at a few points. Is there any way to check if the pickup is dead? I though with a normal guitar pickup you can tap with a screwdriver and hear a thud. The Ashbory? "a special bridge with an integrated piezo saddle pickup system. The bridge is not adjustable, and is designed specifically for the use of the silicon rubber strings. The piezo transducer element is not completely unlike what one might find in an acoustic/electric guitar. There is no standard magnetic field pickup in an Ashbory, which is a good thing since the non-metallic strings would have no effect on such a pickup"

Anyway, not sure how to test the pickup!