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?
12 comments:
No... doesn't loop maple to me! Hahaha... but I know it is.
ok course it doesn't it was burnt to mimic a rosewood look. the manufacturer calls it baked maple :-/
Dang... must be sleepy... "Look" not "loop"! Yes, I got you. It is baked maple.
Goodnight Sub!
LG
g'night my friend, hope there will be no typos should you be dreaming of typing in your dreams...
nope doesn't look maple to me at all! haha
it doesn't have body bindings right?
Hey guitar addict,
I have been reading your posts for several months. I have the same hobby as you, but I only have 6 guitars.
About the maple: I wish Gibson wouldn't bake it. I like maple and especially its look on the Gibson Les Paul Zakk Wylde.
About the pickups: my advise would be to fit a Dimarzio Norton into the bridge.
Keep your cool blog going!
Greeting from Amsterdam
I see you wrapped the D'addario strings around the bridge. Does this really work well for sustain and tone? Have you compared wrapped versus unwrapped/normal?
Rob: DiMarzios would upset me as much as the Gibson PUs... :-P
Ijau: No binding, less flash = less costly
hey sub, u mean the soderless system from SD?
Sub, I have been meaning to ask.
How would you describe the tone of mini-humbuckers?
Compared to P-90s.
I know there are many retro-fitting for players between the 2.
Cheers,
LG
freako, bro- solderless from Gibson. will show you full pics soon. i find it annoying :-/
LG bro, mini-humbuckers, i've only tried them once quite some time ago, they sound like astandard humbucker but could be lacking in the bottom end for some of us. this would be great if there's some single coil spank to the voicing but sadly, none was heard.
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