To Ceramic or not to Ceramic that is the (pickup) Question?

[Nick1420]

Hi All

I was talking to my luther the other day and we got on to the subject of pickups and magnets. He was saying that, for modern rock tones its better to go for a hotter ceramic pickup in the bridge position and then reduce the volume to clean it up for softer blues tone than to get, say, an Alnico ll and crank up the guitar volume and amp (or boost/overdive) to a heavier rock tone. (In the neck position he favoured a conventional PAF). This goes against everything I've read on the subject (maybe I sould read more!). So I'm wondering what you excellent expert guys think about that?

N

[Sancho]

I don't think either method is better or worse. You just have to find which one works best for you...
Then again, I've got it simple. I only do heavy rock tone :)

Using lower output pickups with a booster will allow you to tailor your tone more, I think. You can only get one character by turning down the guitar's volume, but you can use different boosters for different flavours.

[witeter]

It completely depends on what your preference is, i play metal and I just have to have a ceramic magnet in the bridge-for me its that or nothing-its more aggresive and has better attack for that kind of music imo

[Nick1420]

Hi

Thanks for the replys

I can see the sense in using cermaic pickupsfor heavy / metal tones but do you find cooler blues tones when you back off the volume or gain?

[witeter]

Yes you can find those tones, maybe they wouldnt be as warm as an Alnico V bridge, but you can deffinetely get them-i also think a lot has to do with the amp when it comes to this

[Nick1420]

Hi witeter

You say it depends on your amp. Can you explain this. Do you mean if has a lot clean head room?

[explorer76]

I also play Metal ranging from bassier stoner over progressive/djenty to death/metal/core tones and I prefer using a more moderate output pickup with a tubescreamer for that really heavy stuff. That leaves more flexibility especially for "airy" solo tones if you switch off the tubescreamer!

That method works best for me, but I also understand the ceramic guys ;)

[witeter]

Hey nick - when i meant that it also depends on your amp, i mean that it depends on the kind of the distortion, versatility and the general tone you can get from it. I think pickups account for a decent amount of your sound but the majority imo depends on the amp-so if you were after blues and hard rock tones , a good starting point would be to buy an amp that delivers those sounds as its main selling point.

[ericsabbath]

some amps love ceramics, others don't
my bandmate used to have great cleaish tones with the miracle man, cold sweat and a prs tremonti, and they're all VERY ceramic sounding
I used to like medium high output alnico models (over 15k), then started liking ceramics, then went back to alnico... now I'm using mostly under 10k alnico pickups, since they're much easier to clean up through gain and still show a lot of teeth with a tube screamer or equalizer

[Nick1420]

Hi 

Thanks for that everybody. I think I'll have to try this out. Kent Armstrong/WD do some cheap ceramic pickups I think I'll swap in a pair to try out before splashng out.