Pickup reccomendations

[Yerjam]

I'm looking to swap the pups in my Epiphone Firebird, but there's so much choice here, I need some help!

It's an Epiphone Firebird Studio, all mahagony, TOM bridge, locking Steinberger gearless tuners. The stock humbuckers don't suit my needs at all; they're too quiet. I like the clean blues tones I get off them, but the distorted sound doesn't suit me anymore.

I want to change the pickups to a P90 in the neck and a humbucker in the bridge. For the P90 I like the sound of the Mississipi Queen, but I'm stuck on the humbucker.

I want something thats got more cut than what I've got now, and higher output. I play a lot of clean blues right up to some distortion, going through the classic and modern rock tones. I rarely play metal. Clean sounds are just as important as distorted sounds. I like the tones of Angus Young, Chuck Berry and Frank Zappa, among many others if that helps.

Thanks!

[Antag]

Hello & welcome to the forum.

I don't own an MQ or a Firebird, so perhaps I should stay away from this thread :) but the Riff Raff seems a popular choice for all mahogany guitars (I don't own one of those either :)).  Not sure how well a Riff Raff bridge would balance with an MQ neck though...

[Yerjam]

Thanks for the reply! Yeh that's another question I had, how do humbuckers balance out with P90-style pickups? I mean what's it going to sound like with both pickups on?

[Philly Q]

Forum members have used the MQ neck with various bridge humbuckers - from the Riff Raff to Black Dog to Nailbomb, all the way up to the Warpig.  Apparently it works fine with all of them!

I think Hunter has (or had) a Riff Raff bridge and MQ neck in his SG.  Might be worth a search, he probably did some clips.

[Plexi Ken]

Hi welcome to the forum  :)

Check out Hunter's RR & MQ clip in the following thread,
http://bareknucklepickups.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=19150.0

[badgermark]

Why not a MQ set? the bridge is up there with the big bad humbuckers and is thick yet clear enough to kick serious ass.

[syr2012]

Why not a MQ set? the bridge is up there with the big bad humbuckers and is thick yet clear enough to kick serious ass.

+1
Cleans and dirt are great, you can even manage some pretty great palm-muting (it doesn't get floppy like it can with many single-coils and low-output pickups), if you feel so inclined.

[AndyR]

Yeah, I'm another vote for an MQ set.

I've got an Explorer that's a big ole hunk of mahogany.

I tried Riff Raffs in there, there were very nice but, for me, they paled into insignificance when I swapped the MQs in.

I use the bridge pickup most, and it does for me what I would usually want out of a humbucker. I'm using it in a blues, blues-rock, classic-rock, and pop sort of way. Of course, it's not actually a humbucker, but I kind of prefer it... :lol:

Having said that, I've not tried this, but I do believe a Riff Raff bridge and an MQ neck would be a nice pair.

I'd actually try it the other way round myself if I was going to mix/match - I prefer the Riff Raff neck to the MQ neck, and the MQ bridge to the Riff Raff bridge, I suspect that would give me a clearer and more expressive combination for the way I play, how I use amps and what I expect out of my pickup selector - might not work out that way for someone else though... :roll: :D

[Yerjam]

Thanks for the replies, and thanks for welcoming me! I'm gonna have a listen to some more sound clips and see what would work best for me but I'm starting to lean towards an MQ set now. Thanks again.