Author Topic: Question about Mother's Milk (Read 5842 times)

willo · « **on:** September 19, 2005, 09:54:22 PM »

OK, so I'm getting the reference in the title - John Frusciante, of course. And I've heard the samples and enjoyed them. The question I wanted to ask is whether the Mother's Milk set represent John Frusciante's sound in the whole of his first stint with the chili's (i.e. MM & Bloodsugarsexmagik) and that 'Mothers Milk' was just a cool name to call them; or whether the pickups specifically focus on his tone on the album of the same name. I ask because his tone did seem to change fairly largely between the two albums, although I feel a lot of those changes came at the mixing desk.

I know that BK's are damn adaptable and can probably pull both sounds off, but I was just wondering what the thoughts were in your heads when you were designing them?

Thanks,

ian

Tim · « **Reply #1 on:** September 19, 2005, 10:21:08 PM »

The names of all the pickups are directed more at the overall vibe rather than one specific tone or point in time.
Mother's Milk spec is essentially a mid '60s spec, 42 AWG plain enamel wire and Alnico V magnets............the real tweak is the slightly hotter bridge which is done for balance and to releave broken glass that alot of Strats suffer from in the bridge dept.
John's tone has changed alot although it's probably as much to do with different recording, producers etc as different guitars.On the whole he seems to favour stock vintage guitars.
For some players, you mention Strat tone and they picture Hendrix, some Marvin, some SRV.............for me it's always been the Chilli's. I hear so many of the different Strat tones in their music hence the association.
I would never like to make a pickup and tie someone down with it's tone and say that'll make you sound like Frusciante but that's all it'll do.I'm trying to produce pickups that'll take you somewhere, a vibe, where you'll feel inspired and use it as a building block to create your own palette of tone.

Oh, and I thought it was a cool name too :D

willo · « **Reply #2 on:** September 19, 2005, 11:12:28 PM »

thanks Tim! sounds like i thought/hoped it would. It's a close run between that and the Irish Tours i think for what to go with in the custom guitar I'm going to get made, probably with a Crawler in the bridge.

Thanks for the info, and yes, it is a cool name! (but then so would the 'sexmagik' pickups too... :D )

willo · « **Reply #3 on:** September 20, 2005, 08:59:57 PM »

actually, I've just thought. I have some live copies (good quality) of some of the new Chili Peppers songs that are going to be on the new album. They've been floating around the net for a while now, but maybe some people who would like them haven't yet got them. Would anyone like me to upload the mp3s to rapidshare or yousendit.com, and put the link here for you guys?

Its' good stuff, some riffs, some funk...

Elliot · « **Reply #4 on:** September 21, 2005, 02:32:15 PM »

I love the Mother's Milks, in fact I prefer them to the Apache. The Apache is great and sounds like a true strat (in fact the archetype of a strat) but the slightly darker, more acoustic tone of the Mother's Milk has more of a blues/rock tone to my ears - to me the Mother's Milk captures Peter Green's pre CBS strat tone very well.

Although I must say that a great combination is to use my Mother's neck neck and Apache bridge via a blender pot - on low neck blend you take out the excessive sparkle of the bridge and with the neck on full you get a neck tone with a good splash of sparkle.