Review quickie: Seymour Duncan Red Devil

The Seymour Duncan Red Devil (RD) is a single coil sized humbucker which is nothing new in terms of design. The JB Jr & Lil '59, among others, look like the RD so without flipping the pickup to read the details on the chassis, there's no telling which pickup is which. This humbucker is a collaboration between Billy Gibbons & the manufacturer, proudly wound by MJ at the factory.

Likes

• clarity
• overdriven tones

Dislikes

• clean tones

A lot of how a pickup sounds like has everything to do with the artist's specification. In this case, Billy Gibbons was already in love with his Pearly Gates humbucker so the RD was spec'd out to manifest what he already liked in the PG. So in this aspect, the RD gives off plenty of midrange as documented by the manufacturer above. The difference here is that, at least to my ears, the RD is not excessively trebly like the PG. In fact, I would describe it as a hybrid PG - '59 & a lot of the '59 characteristics could be heard in crunch mode. If you are into some raunchy drive tones without having to deal with an overcooked top end, this is it. It simply loves distortion / drive / gain. In fact, the pickup sounds just OK in clean mode; nothing fantastic. Then again, I am only privy to the bridge model, it might be something else in the neck position. Recommended for a guitar that is not bright sounding in its unplugged nature.

Rating: 80%

Seymour Duncan: Red Devil

List: $135

Availability: Davis GMC

Pics: Seymour Duncan

Black guard

New guitar! Of course not. I'm barely employed, moving around looking wasted with hardly any cash in hand. That's how it is these days; tough times, tougher than what others perceived it to be. Anyway, I decided to mod the American Special Strat you see above:

• Pick guard: Black 3-ply with painted edges to make it look like a single ply
• Pickups: All Seymour Duncan affair - Psychedelic (n) / SSL-1 (m) / Red Devil (b)
• Electronics: A500K volume + 2x A250K tone, HOSCO .022uf capacitor + 5-way selector
• All plastic parts replaced with white version

Since I have a few Strats, I have assigned this one to sport an HSS config. The humbucking RD is not wired to any tone knob, it's giving off that raw, punchy tone which I really favour for aggressive music. The other single coils here are simply doing their job well; twang clarity under tremendous amount of gain / drive. This is my first experience with the Psychedelic (n), would give it a few rounds of tone rigour before a deserving appraisal. Initial impressions - positive.

Also, I have decided to black guard this guitar for a simple reason; the light background with a contrasting dark pick guard makes the instrument look a little bolder, especially with the edges blacked out.

Red 59

Might be an interesting weekend after all. 😁