electric guitar pickups

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Yesman

Member
I am looking to swap some pickups on an electric for something that is brighter. Can you guys let me know what are the brightest pickups you have used? I am really looking for an extended frequency range. I dont want a mid honky sounding pickup. I guess my point of reference would be the gibson 57 pickup. i remember it being pretty nice. it was sweet. i am wondering if there are any pickups that are even brighter than that? i was looking at the semour duncan zephry pickup. Supperrrrr expensive. any thoughts? list anything you might think could work for me.

Thanks!
 
There are many boutique manufacturers making accurate 50s humbuckers. Very articulate full frequency pickups. Somebody of the best in my opinion are OX4 Pickups, and Shed as well as Bare knuckles. All from the UK. For some reason the Brits have nailed that 57, 58, 59 PAF tone. Bit pricey however, but worth it.

If you’re specifically looking for clear and bright, as well as loud...... Bill lawrence L500.
Bill died some years back, but his family carried on. Sorry I don’t remember the business name. You’ll have to do some searching.
But don’t buy from the company named Bill Lawrence. A former partner of Bill, in some legal shenanigans, managed to get awarded the name and poor Bill couldn't even use his own name for his company any more.
He started then OBL which stands for Original Bill Lawrence . Then the current company.

Sorry for the lengthy story
 
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Aha!

I remembered the name. Wylde Pickups (Bill and Becky Lawrence)
Pickup is still the L500 made to the original specs in the USA.
 
Straight from the website

www.wildepickups.com

L500

L-500 The L500 was established in 1979 and the patent concluded in 1981. Bill wanted a high performance pickup that could be voiced in many ways. The L500 is used from lapsteel, blues, rock and heavy metal even jazz by a whole range of musicians. You color your sound with all your gear and...
www.wildepickups.com
 
Get a Telecaster with single coil pickups? If you can't tolerate the Fender necks, look for something like an LP special/jr with P-90s. Any humbucker, by design, is going to lose more highs, but the tradeoff is less noise. And in some cases, the noise can be very bad with single coils, though some of the "noiseless" ones do pretty well at taming that and still keeping close to the traditional tone. Depends on what you're trying to do, and whether you can set up in an environment where the noise is low enough to do what you want (recording, I'll assume).

Personally, I played LP with 57s for several years and it was very nice, and the bridge pickup was not bad - you could certainly push it into a bit of twang with some EQ, but, still, you can't boost what's not there.

$1k for electric guitar pickups, uh, well, I think it's ridiculous/nuts, because most of the time you're playing the *amp* plus maybe a pedal or two, and not the guitar, in a sense, anyway (IMHO).

p.s. If you have an existing guitar you like, I would consider "no-load pots" to try and see if getting those big resistors out of the circuit entirely helps.
 
You can also go with the Gretsch type pickups. FilterTrons are humbuckers, but have much more "jangle" than a typical PAF style. SD makes the Psyclone which fits into a standard PAF style setup, TV Jones also makes the TV Classic which is a Filtertron in a humbucker case.
 
I use L500's in two of my lap steel guitars and they are brighter sounding than 57's. I've had 57's before and didn't find them to be particularly bright TBH. You can also experiment with a different pot and cap to get more brightness which would be way cheaper than new pickups.
 
They might be costly but the T-top humbuckers on my '76 LP are very bright and clear with great tone. I know...sounds strange but its true. Not sure of any generic that is equal. Maybe there is though.

Mick
 
Tele's are plenty spanky but can growl too. That comes down to the amp. In the Humbucker world, in my experience, BurstBuckers are bright.
 
I have NO great experience of guitar pickups but I do understand some of the basic electrical facts.
As said, Hum Buckers are going to have a lower HF output because they have a higher inductance. Higher because that gets you a hotter pup and because most HBs are, AFAIK wired in series. Properly wired in parallel they will still 'buck' but deliver a lower output but with more HF.

Yes, removing resistive loads on the coils will improve the response. Load Rs, together with the inductance form a Low Pass Filter. Cable capacitance also does not help but often there is little you can do about that save using the shortest cable you can* But! The amplifier and especially the speaker has a great bearing on the HF response. Have you tried the guitar straight into a high Z input on an interface? That will tell you if it is the pup that is lacking in 'top'.

* A very high Z, 10 meg, buffer amp on a very short cable from the guitar would ensure maximum HF transfer and eliminate cable losses.

Dave.
 
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