Gibson: Les Paul 50s Tribute (humbucker) Part 2

I told myself not to bother Beez yesterday so I bought the necessary spares for my Tribute LP's make over & decided to head home but Beez told me he had some spare time as his guitar lesson is cancelled for the day. So I headed East yesterday to have my Seymour Duncans installed:

• Neck: Jazz (SH-2)
• Bridge: Distortion (SH-6)

I respect what Gibson put into their guitars but I have no obligations to embrace what's not going my way. Don't get me wrong; they aren't duds but Gibson pickups just don't work for me (& countless others out there, I'm sure... Slash, you there?). I'm happy with the Duncans' performance in this guitar, in fact, I've yet to come across any down moments after installing them in any of my darlings. OK, so maybe the Invader wasn't that appealing, I'll revisit this one when the time comes (maybe when it stops screaming Synester...). 

The 50s Tribute humbucker, is a bright sounding guitar due to the following accounts:

• chambered body
• lighter overall due to the absence of a final lacquer overcoat
• maple fretboard

I thought these would counter the mushy 490/498 humbuckers but I somehow didn't hear that chemistry. The Duncan Distortion is there for a simple reason- I added it for power; more punch for distortion application but more importantly, more clarity. It does the job without loosing the PAF overtones; that's what the Distortion is all about, a souped up PAF without too much complicating extras. The Jazz serves as a reminder that it's a deserving neck pickup, the name's a little deceiving but it's worth reiterating the fact that it's adept to both clean & driven settings- with ease.

In my next installment, you'd see the extent of Beez's masterpiece in giving the electronics a  circuit board-free second life. Cheers & good night!

PS: Do you see the maple fretboard in this guitar?

Seymour Duncan: SH-2N (Jazz)

I used to dismiss the Jazz (SH-2) humbucker to be a one-trick pony; it's ony good for jazz. Back then, I was only interested in high output pickups because believeably, they are better for high gain/ drive music. Along the way, what became more important to me was achieving the end, regardless of the means; I should be checking the Jazz out because it might give me what I want to hear after all, regardless of its label, no harm trying, yes? So I swallowed some pride & bought the SH-2...

...which is now resident in my Ibanez RGA121 (neck). The Jazz sounds exceptional clean, I've heard it in use in a hollow body instrument & it's more appealing to me instead of the favoured '59 humbucker by many clean tone purveyors. The clean effect is indeed a bonus to me because in a driven setting (I rarely play without distortion), the Jazz is able to articulate individual notes very clearly which is what I wanted all along as I often solo in the neck position. So what I thought was a niche pickup is indeed pliable in other tonal settings. So the lesson learnt here- never dismiss a pickup by its label.

PS: For those of you who wish to have the Jazz in your RGA guitar, be informed that there is a need to round off the angular pickup mounting flap. As you can see in the pic above, the guitar's cavity necessitates such trimmings.