Wednesday, June 5, 2013

Ibanez: FR420 (2)

The Ibanez FR420 is equipped with a pair of CCR humbuckers, ceramic-based but not as hot. They serve their purpose in giving the player a slightly more acute response in terms of output which could be heard more markedly in driven settings. In clean mode, these pickups possess a fat voicing making chords at the neck very pleasant.

However, these are not my kind of pickups despite being above average in many aspects. I need a thicker, more bass-inclined response from the bridge unit. I would also like a more reserved character from the neck (rather ironic as I depend on this pickup for solos, mainly) in terms of output & frequency response because from experience, I find these kind of pickups more distortion friendly- the more drive/ distortion I pump in, I can be assured that the adversity consideration won't be too disproportionate. Meaning- it won't sound awful at higher gain settings.

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