Anyone have any experience with the Bare Knuckle Miracle Man?

[DrewJD82]

I‘m trying to figure out what’s going in the Edwards LP Custom I have on the way; initially I was thinking the Zakk Wylde EMG’s as I really want to stick around that No More Tears/Ozzmosis tone with that guitar, while the Orville will be more suited towards classic/hard rock (got an Aldrich pickup for that).

A buddy reminded me of the Miracle Man, which is aimed towards Zakk’s earlier tones and is a passive pickup, which makes me considerably more interested. I watched some demos online, but those are hard to find a baseline tone with.

 

[JiveTurkey]

How many guitars do you have incoming? Your cup runneth over

 

[DrewJD82]

How many guitars do you have incoming? Your cup runneth over

Just two!

 

[Stone]

I'm the same I like to have pickup correct pickups for my guitars based on what i plan to use them for

Fralin P-90's Godin CT Classic
Seymour Duncan Hot Rails & Custom Flat Strat SSL-6 Charvel DK-22 ProMod
EMG85/81 LTD EC-1000 Deluxe
Tonerider Alnico II PAF Yamaha Revstar
Dimarzio Area T For Upcoming Telecaster

Should cover all my Needs

 

[DrewJD82]

I'm the same I like to have pickup correct pickups for my guitars based on what i plan to use them for

Fralin P-90's Godin CT Classic
Seymour Duncan Hot Rails & Custom Flat Strat SSL-6 Charvel DK-22 ProMod
EMG85/81 LTD EC-1000 Deluxe
Tonerider Alnico II PAF Yamaha Revstar
Dimarzio Area T For Upcoming Telecaster

Should cover all my Needs

How is that SSL-6? I have the SSL-5 and man, when I put that thing in a Classic 50’s Strat it was instant Gilmour Black Strat tones. That pickup barely sounds like a single coil, in a good way. It’s closer to a low-output humbucker than a single coil!

 

[JerEvil]

I had a Miracle Man in my old PRS CE24. Sounded great for hard rock and metal. Can’t say it stood out over anything else I was using at the time though, if I’m honest.

 

[Stone]

How is that SSL-6? I have the SSL-5 and man, when I put that thing in a Classic 50’s Strat it was instant Gilmour Black Strat tones. That pickup barely sounds like a single coil, in a good way. It’s closer to a low-output humbucker than a single coil!

I've only used the Neck pickup for the Solo in Still of the Night, and it sounded really good
But its that Inverted Hotrail in the bridge that sounds amazing

 

[la szum]

Requesting pickup recommendations BEFORE you even play a guitar and know what it
does or doesn't sound like is full-on TGP-level behavior.

You a lost cause now, Drew???

 

[la szum]

I say if you want Zakk tones get the EMGs. I am not a fan of the Bare Knuckle marketing hype---which
is both genius and also misleading. Yeah, name a pickup after an iconic song (Holy Diver, Miracle Man) and
present the illusion that this pickup will offer up those tones when neither Zakk nor Viv used those
pickups, and what they ACTUALLY did use is widely available and also much cheaper.

Also, doesn't the Edwards come with some nice Duncans? You may like them.

 

[DrewJD82]

I say if you want Zakk tones get the EMGs. I am not a fan of the Bare Knuckle marketing hype---which
is both genius and also misleading. Yeah, name a pickup after a song (Holy Diver, Miracle Man) and
present the illusion that this pickup will offer up those tones when neither Zakk nor Viv used those
pickups, and what they ACTUALLY did use is widely available and also much cheaper.

Also, why not wait and check out the guitar before pulling the trigger on anything. You may actually like it.
Doesn't it come with some nice Duncans?

Yeah, Duncan SH-1 and SH-4.

I rarely dig stock pickups, as in I‘ve swapped them out on every guitar I own or am planning on doing as much (the Solar and the JEM are the only guitars with stock pickups out of the…15 or something?)

I already know these Duncans are more on the vintage/classic side of things and that just feels like a waste of an LPC to me.
I’ve watched a shitload of clips of the exact Edwards I’m getting, enough to get an idea of the pickups.

And damnit, man, don’t make me revoke your TGF membership card, try talkin’ me out of spending money on gear ONE MORE TIME, young man!

 

[TSJMajesty]

Requesting pickup recommendations BEFORE you even play a guitar and know what it
does or doesn't sound like is full-on TGP-level behavior.

Dammit. Stop reading my mind!

 

[DrewJD82]

If I didn’t have a specific thing in mind for this guitar, I‘d just stick with the Duncans, but the Orville is going to do the classic/typical Les Paul sounds, I want the LPC to be a bit more modern sounding, but not quite the djent kind of modern.

It’s like right now, I already have two Strats that do all the classic Strat tones, next I’m buying or building a big headstock/Floyd Rose Strat that I want to toss a humbucker into and make into a Joe Holmes/Mick Mars thing. If I found a fully loaded body that had just single coils in it, I’d already know I’m going to change the pickups because that’s not what I want to do with that one.

 

[kmanick]

I had a MiracleMan in my old Ibanez RG7620 and through a dual recto it sounded great. Kind of like an EMG but without the EMG "suck" not anywhere as near as "clangy". I guess I'd need to know what you're going for, the early Zakk tones? it nails, I was after a Nevermore tone with a little more versatility to it (not much) and it delivered in spades. I paired it with a Duncan Jazz in the neck and it surprisingly worked pretty well. it did not "tap/split" well at all though , so if that is important to you , I'd look elsewhere, you can throw gobs of gain at it though and it never mushes out.

 

[DrewJD82]

I had a MiracleMan in my old Ibanez RG7620 and through a dual recto it sounded great. Kind of like an EMG but without the EMG "suck" not anywhere as near as "clangy". I guess I'd need to know what you're going for, the early Zakk tones? it nails, I was after a Nevermore tone with a little more versatility to it (not much) and it delivered in spades. I paired it with a Duncan Jazz in the neck and it surprisingly worked pretty well. it did not "tap/split" well at all though , so if that is important to you , I'd look elsewhere, you can throw gobs of gain at it though and it never mushes out.View attachment 3950

Thanks man! I’ve got EMG’s in it now but for the 85% of the time I’m happy with them, that 15% definitely sticks it’s head out and says “You DO prefer passives…” and the Aldrich in my other LP is really, really making me confirm my bias with actives vs passives.

 

[la szum]

That's what is so challenging for me long-term with EMGs. They do that thing unlike any other pickup. Hard to
get there with something else. But then sometimes it feels to me like that is all they do and they box me and
deny me my freedom to explore other realms.

 

[DrewJD82]

That's what is so challenging for me long-term with EMGs. They do that thing unlike any other pickup. Hard to
get there with something else. But then sometimes it feels to me like that is all they do and they box me and
deny me my freedom to explore other realms.

Yeah, was messing with clean tones yesterday…..”Well….Metallica clean sound it is” cuz that’s pretty much the only usable clean tone I can get out of them. Thankfully, I’m finding lots of distorted tones to dig on with these, from crazy scooped modern tones to the older Zack tones and I’m not really looking for versatility from this one.

 

[la szum]

Yeah, was messing with clean tones yesterday…..”Well….Metallica clean sound it is” cuz that’s pretty much the only usable clean tone I can get out of them. Thankfully, I’m finding lots of distorted tones to dig on with these, from crazy scooped modern tones to the older Zack tones and I’m not really looking for versatility from this one.

You can be like that when you have like 37 different guitars!

 

[Steinmetzify]

The MM is supposed to be the BKP version of an EMG 81.

I’ve owned a lot of BKPs and to my ears the best are the Mules, the Warpigs and the Painkillers.

I really don’t see the point of a passive version of an 81, if I’m being honest.

This is more than likely going to be a similar version of what you already have, plus or minus 5%.

You might dig it more a little bit but they’re still going to fall flat where the EMGs do.

As a pickup guy, just keep the EMGs unless you’re going to change things up drastically.

All just my opinion, of course. Just trying to save you some $ sir.

 

[DrewJD82]

The MM is supposed to be the BKP version of an EMG 81.

I’ve owned a lot of BKPs and to my ears the best are the Mules, the Warpigs and the Painkillers.

I really don’t see the point of a passive version of an 81, if I’m being honest.

This is more than likely going to be a similar version of what you already have, plus or minus 5%.

You might dig it more a little bit but they’re still going to fall flat where the EMGs do.

As a pickup guy, just keep the EMGs unless you’re going to change things up drastically.

All just my opinion, of course. Just trying to save you some $ sir.

Yeah, if it’s THAT close to an 81 I’m less interested. If it’s basically an 81 without slamming the input of an amp the same, I might be more interested. That’s probably my biggest issue with it and really, I can settle that down in Fractal land by dropping the input gain down. We’ll see, while I have some gripes about the EMG’s, I also have a f*cking blast going pinch harmonic crazy on them.

 

[northern_fox]

Did you ever try them? I just grabbed one at a local shop for $100 simply because it was there and I had store credit. Haven't put it in yet. I really like the nailbomb I have though, but lately I've been using low output pickups (emg h2, dimarzio fortitude) and might prefer that over the tighter bottom end. I'll likely try it in a few days though just to see how it stacks up against those and the black winter for me