Low/Mid Output for Basswood Ibanez MIJ

[CrunchRiff]

I'm not much of a fan of the Dimarzio IBZs in my Ibranez RG2550. I tried to look at other Dimarzios for awhile (almost pulled the trigger on a Paf Joe + Mo Joe set), but I eventually gravitated back here. I searched/read up for a day, now it's question time.

Guitar is:  Basswood, bolt-on, maple/rosewood neck, 24 fret, with a floyd-style bridge.
Rig: For now, digital. Mainly mix of Marshall and Fender Bassman sounds, though I will inevitably keep a Mesa or 5150 patch around for fun.

Styles I like:  I listen mostly to progressive stuff. Not the extreme end of djenty stuff, but the crunchy atmospheric stuff: Sky Harbor, Tesseract, etc. And Townsend. From there, take a complete 180, and I love Hendrix and the guys who love him, like Johnson, Timmons, Satriani. I love melodic phrasing and interesting chord writing WAY more than shredding.

What I'm after:  I'm a strat player, but recently went on a sort of tone quest to listen to tons of people I wasn't necessarily familiar with. A LOT of the tones I loved ended up being from Les Paul players in the 80s. I don't particularly like Les Pauls, so I started looking into compromise solutions. I found a quote from John Suhr where he says that the LP tone owes as much to the construction (shorter scale, set neck) as to the wood, and that to begin to cop that on a 25.5" bolt-on the best starting point was Basswood with a Maple cap. I didn't find any decent basswood/maple bodies for cheap, so I grabbed a high quality solid basswood. I'm trying to sound a bit more Les Paul-ish than I can with an Alder/Maple strat. I'll try to buy another Anderson someday.

Requirements (I think): 
Neck needs controlled bass so it doesn't get mushy. I'd also like sweeter highs. I really don't like shrillness. I sold my last Ibanez because it was too bright to my ear at the time (JS1000 w/Dimarzio Paf Pro and Fred).
Bridge needs mostly smoothness, but I'd like bass control here as well for when I do a bit of chugging with gain (my sonic happy place - like the Black Dog modern metal clip).

So, right out the gate, I'm thinking that I don't really want a hot modern pickup. I much prefer the concept of milder pickups that I can boost with pedals as needed, but that I can also use for clean sparkly ambience. I might consider a contemporary model if there's one in particular that seems controllable and particularly suited. That said, Holy Diver. Seriously. You guys recommend the HD daily, and it sounds like a legit choice.

Option 1:  Holy Diver brige and Emerald neck. I'm almost totally sold on this combo thanks to Slarti's reviews.

So there's not Vintage Hot HD? I know of the goodness of the Black Dog, but is it okay in Basswood? Would that be stacking too much low-mids? Or does its lower output leave enough clarity that it's okay?

Option 2: BD bridge, Em neck.

But by the numbers, the BD bridge has a lower resistance than the Em neck. I know the wire gauge is different (BD is thinner, so there's more wraps for equal resistance, so it's actually hotter?), is that okay?

If not, is there a lower output Emerald analog? Or is there another Contemporary option that's not as hot as the HD, but has similar tone structure. I looked and came to the...Juggernaut? Surely the Jugg bridge is hotter than the HD, right? But then again, you all talk about how it has the best cleans of just about any bridge pup, and Misha's demo showed some really tasty crunch tone. It didn't seem like too much at all. So...

Option 3: Juggernaut Bridge, Emerald neck.

Too low-middy again, or is it actually more restrained than the HD?.

Anything I'm missing?  I passed on the standard basswood answers (Nailbomb, Miracle Man, Cold Sweat) as too hot. I have also intentionally not looked at the P90 options. I know they're great. I have friends with similar setups. But I'm gonna' say no.

And I just assume an Irish Tour in the middle for the split-position space blues I want to play. Correct me if I'm wrong.

Thoughts?

[Dave Sloven]

VHII set?

[ericsabbath]

both holy diver and black dog get a lot of benefit from boosting
the diver is a little smoother and more sustaining

juggernaut sounds a lot more modern
it seems to have that built-in rectifier sound
reminds me of the contortionist big chords sounds or something

why do you specifically want the emerald?
the emerald neck sounds somewhere between the nailbomb and the mule
closest thing should be the vhII, but it has its own voicing

[Slartibartfarst42]

Option 1:  Holy Diver brige and Emerald neck. I'm almost totally sold on this combo thanks to Slarti's reviews.

So there's not Vintage Hot HD? I know of the goodness of the Black Dog, but is it okay in Basswood? Would that be stacking too much low-mids? Or does its lower output leave enough clarity that it's okay?

Thank you for your kind words and I do indeed have other ideas 

The Holydiver/Emerald combo is indeed a classic and should work fine in your guitar. The only thing I would say is that the Holydiver is definitely on the modern side of 80's Metal rather than authentically 80's Metal, which is why, after much soul searching, I eventually sold mine and went elsewhere for the tone I was after. That said, if you want a modern interpretation of that 80's Metal tone, it's a great option.

If you're looking for a more vintage version of the Holydiver, I actually think you have two options. The Black Dog is the obvious one but will be brighter overall than the Holydiver and if you're after more of a Les Paul tone, it might be a bit too bright. The other option would be the Abraxas. With its 43AWG wire, in many ways it does a better 80's Metal tone than the Holydiver and is very versatile. The pickup I use now for that tone is from a different manufacturer but it's essentially an Abraxas with an AV magnet.

If you look at a more 'modern' pickup, I don't think the Juggernaut is what you're after but I would take a look at the Crawler. I know it looks hot but it's not actually that bad because it retains a distinctly vintage feel to it. It's like an Abraxas taken up a gear and fitted with an AV magnet. It has a real growl to it and is really thick and rich. The bottom end will start to mush a bit under very high gain but anything up to 80's Metal is fine. I found this to be the most versatile pickup I ever tried and certainly gave my PRS SE Custom 24 a major shove in the direction of a Les Paul, which was exactly what I was after. It's well worth considering.

So, in conclusion I'd say you have four possibilities if you want a Bare Knuckle: Holydiver, Crawler, Abraxas or Black Dog. The Crawler will give you a tone most like a Les Paul and the Holydiver will be the most modern while the other two occupy the middle ground. I have some ideas on the neck pickup but it really depends on what you use in the bridge.

[CrunchRiff]

why do you specifically want the emerald?
the emerald neck sounds somewhere between the nailbomb and the mule
closest thing should be the vhII, but it has its own voicing

"Leads are thick, creamy and fluid all over the neck and NEVER turn to mush, even with quite a bit of gain. The alnico IV magnet really helps I think as the pickup has about the sweetest tone I've ever heard on a neck pickup..."
"Strum a clean chord on the Emerald and you'll get a chord that is rich and warm with loads of harmonics in it. It's the nearest thing I've ever tried on an electric guitar to playing an acoustic and it's the rich harmonics that are in there that do that."

That kind of stuff. It sounded like a very versatile neck pup with a very good tone to begin with. If other Alnico IV options are just as rich, and still strike the balance of not being muddy down low with gain and not being shrill or weak up high, then I'm open to them. I had liked the thought of the Nail Bomb neck in the past. The description had me at "woody". But I'm afraid of committing to something that hairy, and I generally thought of them as too modern.

Slarti, I think I could be talked into the Abraxas. I think I dismissed it earlier as probably darker sounding, and perhaps conflicting with basswood. Which makes me realize the balancing act in what I'm trying to do:  choose wood and pickups that start to give a Les Paul-ish sound, but they have to achieve that same goal in a complimentary way, not an overpowering (..ly low-mid) way.

Interesting note on the Black Dog. I'm reluctant to dismiss it, but I'll keep looking. Abraxas makes more sense to me than the Crawler, but I'm here to learn. On paper, I think the lower output option is better. I expected to be wrong about the Juggernaut, it just clocked in at a lower resistance than most, and without any more info I thought I'd better check to be sure it's not a Vintage Hot sheep in Contemporary wolf's clothing or anything.

So lets say I've narrowed the bridge down to the Abraxas and the Black Dog for the time being. It's sort of like I want the BD because I know what good it can do for rythm work, but the Abraxas may be more on-mission for my tone quest.

Where's that take my neck options?

Edit:

I know it looks hot but it's not actually that bad because it retains a distinctly vintage feel to it. It's like an Abraxas taken up a gear and fitted with an AV magnet. It has a real growl to it and is really thick and rich. The bottom end will start to mush a bit under very high gain but anything up to 80's Metal is fine. I found this to be the most versatile pickup I ever tried and certainly gave my PRS SE Custom 24 a major shove in the direction of a Les Paul, which was exactly what I was after. It's well worth considering.

The Crawler will give you a tone most like a Les Paul...

Still rolling this around.

Versatility is still a real goal. I wonder if I might ought to change my approach a bit. I have defaulted to thinking I want bass control for both pups, but maybe it would be best just for the bridge (like a Black Dog?), and I could be willing to accept something woolier for the neck (like a Nailbomb, or milder analog?). There are tones I love that I would describe as "squishy" or "chewy" (Satriani: Clouds Race Across the Sky, middle section), and I don't want to accidentally preclude those if something Nailbomb-ish is the path to getting them. Then again, I recently borrowed a LP that was quite nice, but that neck pup was muddy and much less useful than I wanted.

It's a good thing this stuff is fun, 'cause it can be pretty hard to try to think your way through all this.

So, summary of goals:
-Les Paul-ish tone with basswood. To my ear that's smooth and vocal.
and for versatility, lets splice in (if possible):
-Tightness in the bass for bridge pup (where I do most of my chord work with any gain). Growl and texture to low chords is what makes me smile most.

[Slartibartfarst42]

Mmmmmm, I have some conflicting ideas about this due to different things you say but let's start off with the neck Emerald. I have a natural love of neck pickups that have some PAF character and that often means an AII or AIV magnet. The problem is that these pickups are almost always wound with 42AWG wire and in my experience it invariably gives a very rounded response in the bass and I prefer the bottom end to be more articulate. To achieve that, you're better off using more modern wire like 42.5AWG or 43AWG. The Emerald uses an AIV magnet with 43AWG wire and in that sense is unique in the BKP range. I loved it because the magnet helped to give it a real PAF feel while the modern wire kept the bottom end really articulate. It is quite a hot wind though and that makes it a little darker than I normally like but you do end up with a very full and rich tone. I loved the Emerald while I owned it and I'd have no hesitation in buying another one. This experience with the Emerald has forged my view of neck pickups so these days they're either AII or AIV with either 42.5AWG or 43AWG wire. My current neck humbucker in my Les Paul is AII with 42.5AWG. I've only ever found one neck humbucker with 42AWG that had the articulation I wanted in the bottom end. If you really like an articulate bottom end with a more vintage magnet, the Emerald is your only choice unfortunately in the BKP range. The trouble is that because it's so hot, it probably wouldn't be a good choice to pair with a Black Dog. If it was a Black Dog bridge, I'd be more inclined to go for the Black Dog neck or the Holydiver neck, both of which are lighter winds and although they use the more modern AV magnet, they also use slightly more vintage 42.5AWG wire. An Emerald neck would pair better with an Abraxas or Crawler in terms of power but remember that the 43AWG wire puts it slightly more on the modern side of Vintage-Modern.

As for the bridge, words like 'growl', 'texture' and 'Les Paul' all suggest the Crawler to me but it can't be denied that the mids on a Crawler do move towards low mids and that's what gives it that fat and rich Les Paul tone with a substantial bottom end yet you also don't seem keen on low mids. The mids on an Abraxas seem more balanced to me and might be more to your taste if you prefer something a bit brighter. It uses 43AWG wire and I find that if you want a bit of 'Rock growl' to your tone, your pickup simply has to use this wire in the bridge. These days I will use no other wire for a bridge pickup. The AIV magnet certainly suggests a softer bass response but as it's also brighter than a Crawler, you may find that one offsets the other. The Black Dog will be the brightest option and in many ways the most vintage, despite having the best ability to take large amounts of gain.

[CrunchRiff]

...yet you also don't seem keen on low mids. The mids on an Abraxas seem more balanced to me and might be more to your taste if you prefer something a bit brighter. It uses 43AWG wire and I find that if you want a bit of 'Rock growl' to your tone, your pickup simply has to use this wire in the bridge. These days I will use no other wire for a bridge pickup. The AIV magnet certainly suggests a softer bass response but as it's also brighter than a Crawler, you may find that one offsets the other. The Black Dog will be the brightest option and in many ways the most vintage, despite having the best ability to take large amounts of gain.

First, thanks so much for your time. It's not that I'm not keen on low mids. They're kind of the point of the exercise. I'm just trying to be cautious with them, as other reviewers have commented that sometimes low mid-heavy pups wind up too woofy in basswood. So, I want them there, but in appropriately LP-ish measure, without going overboard. It's all conceptual, and I'm working with imperfect info. Those others might've had other rig issues that compounded things and they mistakenly blamed the pickup, or they might be hearing different things and I could love any of these options.

It may be that the basswood handles the low mids sufficiently, and I need the pups to fill in the rest of the LP spectrum. Or maybe I need as much low mid as possible from the electronics to get me squarely in the right territory. I don't know what I don't know here, unfortunately.

Your description of the Crawler's voice really does sound like what I'm looking for. But then it has the combo of higher output and not-necessarily-tight lows, and the Black Dog seems to conveniently fix those. So there's the tension. If the Abraxas is the best compromise between the two, then it's probably what I need to go with.

If anyone sees any more contradictions in what I think I want, by all means please help me tease them out. I know I'm asking a lot of one guitar, but I feel like BKP has enough variety to let me get pretty close. I'm here to learn.

Of course the best answer is usually to get them all. Eventually I may just put a set of BDs in something with a fixed bridge and mahogany and call that good for chugs. In the meantime, I guess I'm exploring compromise options.

[Slartibartfarst42]

Well, in many respects the Abraxas does represent the middle ground between the Crawler and Black Dog so in that regard you have your answer. If it helps, I had my Crawler in a mahogany PRS and it was great in there. It also works very well in alder Strats so as I find basswood as more of a neutral wood between alder and mahogany, I imagine it will work well there too, though I haven't much direct experience of basswood. Due to the exchange/refund offer from BKP, one option would be to buy both and then keep the one you prefer. Or possibly buy the Crawler to try and if it doesn't work for you, exchange it for an Abraxas.

[Telerocker]

I would not go Crawler here: might be too dark and warm in neutral sounding basswood. I think the Diver matches (not too darksounding) basswood well. The HD has not too much bass which will keep things tigh. It is smooth and has big mids. The leads are superb: thick and juicy. I had a Jem 77 FP with PAF Pro's, not quite comparable with the Diver, but not too far away either. I think you can't go very wrong with Diver + Emerald.

[ericsabbath]

the bridge vhII has a quite big low end, but a pretty tight picking response
if you don't need a ton of center mids, you might like it

[CrunchRiff]

So I'm continuing to study this and take advice, and I think I may have had an epiphany yesterday.

Step one: I think I understand that classic PAF-style sweet tone and warmth on one hand, and progressive "tightness" on the other are something like opposite ends of a spectrum. This should have been fairly obvious, of course. For me, this means I'm unlikely to find a single pickup that has vintage les paul warmth or thickness that is also perfect at tight staccato riffage. There are some creative compromises like the Juggernauts, but they're still not a PAF by any means. When put this way, I personally have to side with sweet vintage tone over any one particular capability. This guitar needs to be very versatile, and the sound needs to be rich.

Step two: I found a discussion on EQ with distortion that helped me understand what we don't like about mushiness or flubbiness. The oversimplified background on distortion, in case anyone needs it: clipping (aka distortion) can be thought of as a maximum amplitude (volume) that a circuit will reproduce with fidelity. You could graph it as a line above and below a sine wave. Signals below that amplitude will be clean, and above it will be distorted. Once clipping occurs, the peaks and valleys of the signal get chopped at the line, and the sine wave develops corners instead of smoothly flowing from one valley to the next.

This same thing applies to the relative amplitudes of your EQ. Whatever frequency is strongest will be clipped first. If you have a strongly scooped signal, or otherwise a bass-heavy EQ, then the lows are stronger in amplitude and will start to distort pretty early. This is (or is correlated to) flub or mushiness.

The epiphany: If I can carefully sculpt my EQ at or before my gain stages, then I may be able to use just about whatever kind of vintage-voiced pickup I want and I'l be able to dial out flub by reducing the EQ strength of the lows in my signal. If I focus the EQ into the upper mids instead, I should be able to get pleasing distortion sounds without the bass clipping (or without it clipping much) and if the bass part of the signal is still relatively clean then this should give me the effect of "tightness".

Right?

Reviews I've found of the Horizon Devices Precision Drive seem to indicate that this is the case, and more in general, I think this is why the Tube Screamer style of pedal has been so popular in heavier music styles for so long. TS's cut lows and boost mids significantly.

Sorry if all of this is common knowledge to most of you (or flat out wrong, though I don't think it is - though, like I said before, I'm here to learn). It seems like this understanding could help a lot of people who are hesitant to get Vintage or Vintage-Hot output pups (of which I think there are quite a few). If so, then a broader range of players could have access to a broader range of tones and overall higher tone quality than they'll be able to get if they otherwise feel shoehorned into the extreme end of the Contemporary pickup range.

Not that super hot pickups aren't the right choice for many folks, at all. Just that they're not right for everyone who wants to play metal. I know we've seen this in the past (Nolly's Emeralds, etc). I just never understood why it worked for them before now.

Hopefully this is useful!

[Yellowjacket]

I would be VERY hesitant to call the Juggerset a design 'compromise'; Misha has said that he didn't want a compromise and he wanted his signature set to do 'everything' well.  (Cleans, Rhythm, Leads)  I have two sets: a 6 string and a 7 string.  I find them to be incredibly versatile i.e.  They sound great under high gain for rhythm, clean, and leads.  They also perform well at many different gain settings.

Lately, I have been enjoying using them with Ibanez style wiring and the Core-tek 2502N switch in my super strats.  I put a 0 load tone pot with a 0.022uF paper in oil cap for tone and I have a 150k Ohm resistor and a 331pF capacitor running in parallel across the input and output lugs on the volume pot.
The result is that I can roll down the volume pot without losing highs which allows me to get those lower power pickup type tones as well as the full on brute force from the super powerful magnets.  Overall, they are very clear, musical, beefy, and huge sounding.   

Everyone has that 'sound' they want in their head and I 'get' trying to seek that out.  That being said, I have been continually impressed with the performance of the Juggernauts even though they would not have been my first pick based on clips that I have heard.