Best Pickups (in your opinion)

[Marlinspike07]

MY favorite guitarist Paul Kantner (rythm player for Jefferson Airplane) played a Rickenbacker. What pickups (other than the Rickenbacker Toasters) would be close to that sound?

[Marlinspike07]

anyone?

[purple_hazer]

check GFS

they have alot of stuff

i think they have 'toaster' mini humbuckers in regular humbucker size

[Livewire]

Seymour Duncans are really good.

[Marlinspike07]

I want to replace the single-coils in my strat with something that sound the closest to Rickenbacker.

For that, I should be looking for high output, high gain, extremely bright, and in short, probably something pretty hot and really bright, right?

If not, please tell me what I should look for.

[mnemonic]

i think the amp would play a much bigger part in getting a sound close to his than the pickups in your guitar.

[modderdan]

Well, the thing is, guitar construction (especially scale length and neck joint) have a lot more to do with the sound than the pickup itself; the pickup just filters the sound. Strings play a very important role in this as well. Strats are very muddy guitars to begin with (can you tell I'm not big on strats?), but you can "jangle-ize" your guitar by using the right string and pickup combo. First off, ditch the nickel-plated strings and go with a light gauge of stainless steel; Fender stainless bullets in a 9 will definitely help clean up the sound. As for pickups, a high output pickup will be counterproductive, as you will be introducing more "fuzz," or midrange into your signal. Magnet choice is very important; neodymium magnets are the best magnet choice for your application hands down, as neodymium emphasizes highs while sounding clean and crisp. Are you absolutely sure need high output? How many Rickenbacker players play high gain? Duncans are notoriously fat sounding, so I'd stay away from those. I highly, highly recommend checking out the pickups from Ballurio guitars: excellent prices and excellent products: Ballurio.com. I hope this helps.

[Marlinspike07]

Well, the thing is, guitar construction (especially scale length and neck joint) have a lot more to do with the sound than the pickup itself; the pickup just filters the sound. Strings play a very important role in this as well. Strats are very muddy guitars to begin with (can you tell I'm not big on strats?), but you can "jangle-ize" your guitar by using the right string and pickup combo. First off, ditch the nickel-plated strings and go with a light gauge of stainless steel; Fender stainless bullets in a 9 will definitely help clean up the sound. As for pickups, a high output pickup will be counterproductive, as you will be introducing more "fuzz," or midrange into your signal. Magnet choice is very important; neodymium magnets are the best magnet choice for your application hands down, as neodymium emphasizes highs while sounding clean and crisp. Are you absolutely sure need high output? How many Rickenbacker players play high gain? Duncans are notoriously fat sounding, so I'd stay away from those. I highly, highly recommend checking out the pickups from Ballurio guitars: excellent prices and excellent products: Ballurio.com. I hope this helps.

Neodymium?

Also, what about Samarian Cobalt?

[Marlinspike07]

anyone? hello?

[Nick]

Well, the thing is, guitar construction (especially scale length and neck joint) have a lot more to do with the sound than the pickup itself; the pickup just filters the sound. Strings play a very important role in this as well. Strats are very muddy guitars to begin with (can you tell I'm not big on strats?), but you can "jangle-ize" your guitar by using the right string and pickup combo. First off, ditch the nickel-plated strings and go with a light gauge of stainless steel; Fender stainless bullets in a 9 will definitely help clean up the sound. As for pickups, a high output pickup will be counterproductive, as you will be introducing more "fuzz," or midrange into your signal. Magnet choice is very important; neodymium magnets are the best magnet choice for your application hands down, as neodymium emphasizes highs while sounding clean and crisp. Are you absolutely sure need high output? How many Rickenbacker players play high gain? Duncans are notoriously fat sounding, so I'd stay away from those. I highly, highly recommend checking out the pickups from Ballurio guitars: excellent prices and excellent products: Ballurio.com. I hope this helps.

strats are muddy? maybe compared to a telecaster, but 25.5 and singles are often too clear for many.


TVJones is reputed to make excelent filtertron style pups.

[modderdan]

strats are muddy? maybe compared to a telecaster, but 25.5 and singles are often too clear for many.

Compared to a Les Paul, yes a strat is bright, but bolt-on necks have the most complex tone, as the neck is not vibrating quite in sync with the body, as a neck-thru would. Strats have a lot of midrange, but also a lot of snap, which is probably what you're referring to. OK, so lets compare an SG to a strat; yes a strat will have more bite due to the 25.5" scale, but SG's actually have a more uncluttered sound, due to the glue in joint: just put a strat pickup in an SG and tell me the SG doesn't have a cleaner distortion. I'm not saying that strats are bad, but I just want to emphasize that Rickenbackers are much cleaner than strats, thus my emphasizing neodymium as the ideal choice.

About neodymium... look on the Ballurio site. In the pickups section there are explanations of alnico, ceramic, neodymium, and Samarian Cobalt. Samarian Cobalt are more similar to alnico than they are to neodymium. You can even call Ballurio and talk to Keith (the owner; he answers the phone; how many companies do that?) and he will explain anything you want to know about the pickups in excrutiating detail.

[Bag of Blues]

I have always liked the Lindy Fralin single coils. They are a bit pricey, but you will definitely hear a difference.

[Patrick O)))]

I like bareknuckles, in particular warpigs and miracle man models. Prolly not what you're after, but there's my two cents =]