Bare Knuckle Pickups Forum

Forum Ringside => Pickups => Topic started by: Liquid on December 15, 2006, 11:37:52 PM

Title: Cold Sweat for the Neck?
Post by: Liquid on December 15, 2006, 11:37:52 PM
I'm looking to get a new neck pickup sometime in the new year and everything seems to be pointing to the CS (Miracle Man already in the bridge, Looking for good distorted lead tone, want good cleans...)

I was thinking of getting a Mule but I thpought that it mightn't balance too well with a MM in the bridge. I'm kinda looking for a Paul Gilbert Style shreddy tone (Think Technical Difficulties) but also a Good Classic rock tone and great cleans aswell, And from what I've read on the forum, the CS seems to be the way to go.

My Main concerns are the cleans (I hear the CS has good cleans but I'm really looking for great cleeans) and that my tone is already pretty bassy and I hear the CS has a lot of bass too. I don't want my tone muddying up.

This will be going into the neck of an Epiphone Les Paul that already has a MM in the bridge and My amp is a Randall RG50TC. Anybody Have any input on what I should get?[/i]
Title: Cold Sweat for the Neck?
Post by: JamesHealey on December 16, 2006, 08:51:55 AM
just imagine a mule with a bit more air to the tone, a really warm bass and nice high end..

then just whack it into over drive and u've got this amazingly good shred neck lead tone.

I think the CS absolutly rocks, but it's cleans arent as good as say a VHII neck pickup but that doesnt shred aswell..
Title: Cold Sweat for the Neck?
Post by: stuckin93 on December 16, 2006, 09:02:09 AM
There's always going to be a bit of a compromise between the best clean tone & the best shred tone, I suppose you just have to figure out what's the most important out of the two.
Title: Cold Sweat for the Neck?
Post by: dave_mc on December 16, 2006, 12:57:35 PM
^ yeah, basically. I pm'ed tim with kind of the inverse of what you wanted (I wanted great shred tones with decent cleans, rather than the other way round EDIT: and I didn't mention anything about classic rock) and got recommended the cold sweat neck (I went with the MM in the bridge), so maybe that helps, maybe it doesn't...

Haven't got them yet, so I can't tell if it'll do what you want, lol.

:drink:
Title: Cold Sweat for the Neck?
Post by: Sifu Ben on December 16, 2006, 02:04:55 PM
Do any of us play TRULY clean anyway? By the time you've added reverb, chorus and a dash of slapback delay it'll be fine.
Title: Cold Sweat for the Neck?
Post by: Liquid on December 16, 2006, 03:40:02 PM
Well to be honest, the shred tone isn't really as important to me. I'd be happy enough using my bridge for that. Really I'm looking for great cleans and a Decent classic rock sound, that said, I still don't want it to get too muddy for me to solo with it
Title: Cold Sweat for the Neck?
Post by: MDV on December 16, 2006, 03:50:37 PM
I'd go for a VHII then
Title: Cold Sweat for the Neck?
Post by: Liquid on December 17, 2006, 01:40:41 AM
Is the Neck VHII Alnico V or Alnico II?

And isn't it pretty low output? Would I not be aswell to go for a Mule Instead?

EDIT: I just listened to a clip Antag did in the players section with a Holy Diver in the neck and the cleans sounded really nice. Has anyone tried one of those in the Neck?
Title: Cold Sweat for the Neck?
Post by: stuckin93 on December 17, 2006, 02:49:00 AM
black dogs!  :guitar4:
Title: Cold Sweat for the Neck?
Post by: Antag on December 17, 2006, 07:35:47 AM
Actually, the VHII neck is pretty high output.  Don't be fooled by the low DC resistance for the bridge model into thinking that it's some sort of shrinking violet :) - it's more than a match for the Nailbomb bridge in my Les Paul.

FWIW, my VHII neck is 8k & my Cold Sweat neck is 8.2k

I vote Cold Sweat - it has wonderful cleans but handles the high gain lead stuff really well also - a superb match for the MM bridge.
Title: Cold Sweat for the Neck?
Post by: Liquid on December 19, 2006, 03:50:52 PM
Thanks for the Help Guys, I think I'm leaning towards the CS again.

Does anyone know of any Clean Clips of a Neck CS? I looked in the Players Section but couldn't find any
Title: Cold Sweat for the Neck?
Post by: Liquid on December 23, 2006, 09:59:28 AM
Anyone at all have any soundclips of a Neck CS or VHII?
Title: Cold Sweat for the Neck?
Post by: octavio_amzer on December 23, 2006, 10:36:14 AM
Quote from: Liquid
Anyone at all have any soundclips of a Neck CS or VHII?


"players" section
Title: Cold Sweat for the Neck?
Post by: Liquid on December 24, 2006, 01:05:51 AM
I looked there but couldn't find any

I think a good clip or two will just about swing me to get one
Title: Cold Sweat for the Neck?
Post by: Sifu Ben on December 24, 2006, 06:00:15 PM
http://www.bareknucklepickups.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?t=4598
Title: Cold Sweat for the Neck?
Post by: Liquid on March 04, 2007, 01:24:49 PM
That clip sounded pretty nice, thaks for the link

I still haven't gotten anything yet, So I'm ressurecting this thread with the hope of finding something. My main concern is the CS's cleans. I Like my cleans pretty bassey with a lot of mids too but most Importantly I like them Clean! Breakup sounds great a lot of the time, and sometimes I go for that (Depending on what I'm playing) but for the most part I want my cleans clean And I'm wonderin would the CS push them to break up much earlier?
Title: Cold Sweat for the Neck?
Post by: Liquid on March 08, 2007, 12:52:07 AM
Can anyone help me out with this? I'm really anxious to get another BK after realising the huge improvement my MM in the Bridge made. I'm 90% sure the CS is what I want for the neck, I'd really love something that can give great clean cleans and a distortion something like this (Particularly the sound between about 1:20 and 1:40) :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5NfZBvRvkIg

I Love the distinctive sound of a neck pickup for leads, especially one that's being driven hard. I want a neck pickup that can handle lots of distortion without sounding like a bridge pickup and instead retaining that neck 'mellowness'
Title: Cold Sweat for the Neck?
Post by: JoshuaLogan on March 08, 2007, 01:05:02 AM
how nice the cleans are is going to depend on how much headroom your amp has heh. and also, I suggest getting push-pull pots for your LP and wiring it up so you can split the coils to mimic a single coil sound. the cleans will be much nicer with it split. and if you did this, you could even get a higher output pickup, because the coldsweat split would only be around 4k which is very low output. I think most vintage single coils are around 8k... judging from that, maybe a miracle man neck would be a better match packing more punch in the neck and when split still doing nice cleans.
Title: Cold Sweat for the Neck?
Post by: Liquid on March 09, 2007, 12:28:38 AM
Unfortunately, my amp doesn't have a great amount of headroom. It's not bad, but not exactly a twin reverb either.

I'd also rather try and avoid going for splitting or coil tapping. I'm not really experienced enough to try that myself and I doubt my closest shop would be able to do it for me. They charge €50 to install a new pickup :/
Title: Cold Sweat for the Neck?
Post by: Sifu Ben on March 09, 2007, 09:18:10 AM
It's not really any harder than installing a pickup, you just need to fit a new pot and wire it slightly differently.
Title: Cold Sweat for the Neck?
Post by: Liquid on March 09, 2007, 09:13:00 PM
I still wouldn't feel comfortable trying it myself, I've never installed a pickup before and haven't done much soldering either. And if this shop charges €50 to just install a pickup I'd hate to know how much they'd want to do a coil split...