The Pickups Thread

[Jarick]

The EMG journey continues...

SLV / SLV / 85 set installed in my Ibanez AZ. Looks friggin KILLER in white with the tortoise guard and metallic blue. Like they were made for this guitar.

I'll have to mess around with it a fair amount, but out of the gate I like it more than the T set (SA style). These are noticeably louder and seem to have a sound in between the other EMG single coil and a big fat single coil (probably because of the alnico pole pieces instead of rail). Balance is alright with the 85 but I haven't messed with gain yet.

Installation was a bit of a pain. The Ibanez has a long barrel jack and the stereo Switchcraft wouldn't work, but luckily the stock jack was TRS. So I had to look up some info and then ended up clipping the wires off the EMG jack and soldering directly to the Ibanez jack. After that it was completely solderless. But fitting the wires was a bit of a pain and I had to carefully route them around in the cavity. Luckily everything more or less fits and works just fine, although I may need to mess with the pickup wires a bit as they are pushing up slightly on the bridge humbucker.

 

[Jarick]

Funny thing, after I installed the pickups last night I gave them a whirl through my Kemper Player. I hooked it back up as I wanted something plug and play to see how they would sound through something like a classic MBritt.

They didn't sound great honestly, I was surprised how bright they were. I turned the tone knob down to 5 and it was better. Thought I'd sleep on them and try again the next day. Well this morning same thing, just didn't sound all that good. Went to the output setting of the Kemper to check on the EQ as maybe I was messing around with that. Turns out I had disabled the cab modeling lol.

Playing through an amp model AND a cab model, sounds much better of course! Output is a notch higher than the Tele set as I mentioned before, a little hotter than vintage Strat pickups, which is exactly where I want them. SLV singles seem to blend well with the 85 humbucker...the singles are clearer and more scooped while the 85 has more mid push (like a milder Duncan JB with leaner/tighter bass). Neck is fat clear and balanced...middle is pretty spanky sounding which is actually useful. Neck/mid sounds cool, not as mushy and weird as Dimarzio Area noiseless but not super bright and scooped like vintage single coils. Bridge/mid is less useful as the bridge dominates the sound, but that's fine as I almost never use it.

Also with gain, there's good clarity without excessive high end. It's again pretty balanced sounding. Pretty much what I hoped for exactly when I ordered them.

Next up will be fully dialing in a range of sounds with them including mid gain classic rock. That's where the 85 in my drop C guitar wasn't doing great.

Might even continue the EMG journey with the Jazzmaster set which looks awesome as a drop in for my Squier J Mascis. That and a new tailpiece that doesn't rattle would be amazing.