Advice for a lead based HSS set

[OceanMachine]

Hi folks, need some advice on an HSS set. I have a Made in Japan Fender strat, an old 89 model. It's fairly typical spec, alder body, maple neck, rosewood board. I always keep the trem blocked off.

I keep this guitar in Eb and I'd like the have a pickup set focused on lead playing/shredding (or in my case attempting to shred). Stylistically I tend to be into heavier stuff, however I have other guitars with higher output pickup specifically for that, this guitar I want to use for expressive high gain lead work, and the heaviest I might play on it would be the likes of Alice In Chains.

At the minute the guitar has a JB in the bridge position. I wouldn't say I'm unhappy with it sound per se, however I'm starting to really see the benefits of more moderate output humbuckers. I recently play a Suhr classic pro with an SSV in the bridge and love how clear it sounded and how easily harmonics were coaxed out of it. General consensus seems to be the VHii is a better SSV, thoughts? I wonder if I'll notice the drop in output from the JB, but again, I really enjoyed that SSV.

In regards to the single coils I'm at a loss, I'm no conosur of single coils, the guitar has a set of hotrails at the moment, however like the more moderate output buckers I love the expressive and dynamic quality of the single coils for lead work. The irish tours seem to be a popular match to the VHii, however I've heard them compared to fenders Texas specials which I'm not overly found of, I find they lack alot of bottom end compared to other strat pickups. I played an FSR Japanese strat recently, a classic 60's style model and really loved the pickups in that, again slightly lower output and very dynamic, especially on the neck position. I love a fat, punchy neck pickup for leads.

Any input here would be greatly appreciated, particularly in regard to the single coils.

[PhilKing]

Though I don't play a lot of high gain stuff, I do play some heavier rock, along with the classic rock and blues that I do most of the time.  I have a couple of HSS strats that I use.  The one I think you would like is VHII/Mothers Milk/Mothers Milk.  That's in a 64 strat clone, which sounds a bit like your 89 spec.  I find it a very versatile set and can cover most things with it.  I do have a coil tap  on the 5-way for the split position, but you could also do it with a push pull pot.

The other single coils that you might like with it are the veneer boards in the vintage series.  I have them in a hardtail strat and they sound really nice, covering most strat tones with ease.  I think they would work well with the VHII

[capac]

Holydiver is really popular lead pickup. It's also the one to get AiC tone with. I don't know much about single coils because I just don't use them.

[Telerocker]

Irish Tours have more bass than Mother's Milk.
But if want to shred: Holy Diver and two Trilogy's will do.

[GuitarIv]

I can definately vouch for the Holydiver. From all the bridge pickups I ever played in my life, none has come even close to the HD in terms of leads. I felt like it was a bit too rounded and polite for more aggressive riffing styles of metal, but if I ever had to choose to play blues/rock/hard rock and even early 80s metal using a guitar with the choice of having only one pickup to cover it all, the Holydiver would be my first choice.