Vintage or hot?

[markb]

Anyway, I sent messages to both Lenny Kravitz and Eric Johnson that part of the secret to getting great tone was using weaker pickups and coil cables.

ShortBusx quoted this from Cesar Diaz in the cable thread and I was taken with this first sentence. So, what do you say? Do you prefer the sound of original spec 50s/60s pickups (let's say single coils of around 6K, humbuckers about 8K) or hot overwound modern units. I'd be interested in people's thoughts one way or another.

PS: let's leave magnet materials out of this, that's another question

[Spudman***]

I used to be more of a fan of hotter pickups then I realized I get more variety of tone from lower output pickups. Occasionally I still like something that will plaster me to the far wall of the club, but mostly I'll stick with lower output from now on. It seems like I can hear more of the guitar's character with lower output pickups.

[Ch0jin]

I don't have much personal experience to go on, but FWIW my favorite PU at the moment is the SD SH1 which their take on a '59 PAF. I use it in the neck of a maple solid body and it's exactly what I expected a "vintage" PU would sound like. For punk and hard rock I'll flick back to the far more modern sounding SH4 JB in the bridge, but 80% of the time I'm digging the blues tones from the "vintage" neck PU.

Also FWIW I compared my Maton with the SD's to a LP Standard and the irony was the SD equipped Maton sounded more like a 50's Gibson than the Gibson to my ears. Not a totally fair comparison because obviously the Duncan is intended to give that sound where the LP I think had burstbuckers in it.

[sunvalleylaw]

Prolly on the more vintage side, but maybe not all the way vintage. For instance, in strats, I want a little more oomph than the very vintage single coils, like the fender tex mex pups. Humbuckers I have less experience with but I understand my Hagstrom humbuckers are on the slightly hot side of vintage and I like those a lot so far. Of the two choices, I vote vintage, but I really want a "vintage modified" choice.

[Duff]

Personally, I use vintage pickups and hot pickups and like the differences in sound.

I like hot pickups like the SH-4 JB humbucker, pasive, because of it's great tone even though it's high output.
And I like other high output pickups, like the "hot rails" and the 'lil 59, as well as duncan designed and other unidentified hot pups.

One thing I noticed though concerning really hot pickups is that I tried putting them in an inexpensive Epi LP II or Special and they worked like microphones to magnify the noise that was present in the circuit. I didn't like that and took them out put the old ones back in and returned the guitar for something else at GC like a trans cherry '66 SG Epi copy called a "SOR" for the movie Sound of Rock. That turned out to be a great guitar. Pickguard all the way under the pickups like on a strat. Fabulous tone guitar. Played like five SG copies and a Gibson SG that day and it sounded noticeably better than the other four, maybe more. That's why I say guitars are dynamic things, there are a lot of things that go into the sound of any single guitar all the way from individual parts, to joint matching, to individual wood quality, to neck wood quality and grain, bonding of the fretboard, strings, nuts, bridges, saddle material, pickup assembly, completed assembly, set up, grounding, wiring and electrical component quality, soldering and solder joints, neatness, attention to detail, etc.

That partial list is a long list and every element, in my opinion, contributes to how the guitar will ultimately sound. Maybe even some mistakes along the way contribute to that guitar we think sounds so great: the one.

Back to the subject. The Epi inexpensive LP Special or II sounded noisy with the high output pickups in it and the wiring and soldering looked good. Maybe it just need different capacitors to handle the higher output, but the pickups magnified the electrical noise, hum, etc., of the guitar to the point that I felt I'd have to take it to a tech and have it completely rewired. I could probably do it myself now, with the added experience I now have. It sounded like a grounding problem. Something I probably could have tracked down. Plus on an inexpensive guitar like this I should have replaced the pots and switch anyway. How's that quote go: "Experience teaches us things we wish we didn't know". Not sure if I got that right.

I think I'll get an inexpensive project guitar and see if I can turn it into something that sounds really good. Maybe another inexpensive LP or LP copy. Or a cheap flying V or Explorer type, these are hard to find inexpensively.

I really enjoy fixing up guitars and changing out pickups and things like that.

So, experience taught me that you can't just buy a cheap guitar and throw great pickups in it and have it sound great, all the time. You might get lucky, but if the rest of the rig isn't up to it the hot pickups will work like microphones to magnify the noise that the low output pickups didn't detect or reproduce anyway.

A great sounding set of hot pickups is really a thrill though, I must say that.

On the other hand some of my guitars have low output humbuckers and single coils and they sound really great and tonefull; not that a good hot pup can't sound toneful - try a SD JB or '59 or Jazz.

Duffy

[wingsdad]

Vintage all the way. You can always boost artificially and often actually enhance tone. It's not impossible, but it's kinda tough to go the opposite way. Like driving a Ferrari through a school zone at 7-8am without getting a ticket.

[duhvoodooman***]

With the exception of music styles that require consistently high/extreme distortion levels, I read again & again that top name guitarists seem to prefer vintage-style pickups. They seem to give more tonal flexibility.

I guess I'd make an analogy to spicing food. It's easy to add salt, pepper, etc. to bland food, but difficult/impossible to remove it when it's already there. Amplifier gain, pedals, etc. are the spices here and can be used "to taste". But taking a "spicy" pickup and making it "bland" again so that the subtleties and natural qualities can come through would be nigh on impossible.

EDIT: I see that while I was typing this response, Wingsdad made much the same point. Well, you know what they say about "great minds"....

[marnold***]

I'm of a divided mind on this. I like higher output passive pickups, like the Atomic II in my Fender. Add gain to the inherent middy-ness of the pickup and you're really cooking. Add a switch to wire the coils in parallel and you've got a pretty decent, vintage-output pickup, albeit still with more mids. I've often said that my Fender is a one-trick (or two-trick) pony, but it's quite a trick.

With my Floyd I went on the high end of vintage. The Area 61s are ~6.5K and are more "Texas-style" singles than pure vintage. My Screamin' Demon is ~10K but definitely sounds more like a growly PAF than a high-output metal pickup. I like this "middle ground" kind of thing.

The problem (for me) with vintage single coils is that they sound awesome clean but as soon as you start adding gain you lose definition and get fizziness. Blech. Then you throw in single coil hum and you've really got a mess. The Area 61s are noiseless so hum isn't an issue. They aren't as shimmery clean as vintage but they really come to life with a little gain. Even with metal-level gain they still retain definition and drive. The Demon plays nicely with the singles. So I've got a guitar that can go from very good clean to awesome distortion before you even start with effects.

So for the type of stuff I like to play, if given only the choice of one extreme or the other, I'd prefer high-gain passive stuff (never been a fan of EMG 81/85). I don't think I'd really enjoy a guitar with only vintage single coils in it. P90s might be a different animal, but if I'm going to go there I'd rather head into PAF territory for humbucking purposes.

[ShortBuSX]

Duff quoted this from Cesar Diaz in the cable thread

Actually that was me, but that is un-important...Im jus sayin...

Im more of a fan of vintage tones.

[warren0728]

vintage for me....i'm not much of a high gain/distortion kinda of guy though....

[Andy]

I prefer vintage.

[markb]

Actually that was me, but that is un-important...Im jus sayin...

Im more of a fan of vintage tones.

Whoops, my bad. Edited to give credit where it's due. Blame my age

[hubberjub***]

I like the sort of clarity that I can get with lower output pickups. If I need more drive I step on my Lovepedal or Analogman.

[Tone2TheBone]

Vintage wound single coils for me. They enhance that bell tone I love so much.

[tunghaichuan***]

Personally, I like hotter than vintage single coils. For humbuckers, I like vintage, not too hot.

One of my favorite pickups is the Bill Lawrence L-90. Bill Lawrence discribes it as a cross between a P-90 and a humbucker. It combines the fatness (and noiselessness) of a humbucker but with the clarity and high end of a single coil. It isn't overly hot.

Bill Lawrence is making it again.

tung

[Algonquin]

Ideally I'd like to have a wack of guitars around the house with a variety of different p/u's in them... but if I had to choose, it would be vintage all the way :

[wingsdad]

....I see that while I was typing this response, Wingsdad made much the same point. Well, you know what they say about "great minds"....

: ... I like your analogy better, though, warr..: err.. : 'vood