Hi everybody,
Firstly, WOW ! - a real revelation for any Jazz / clean / chordal players.
The Manhattans are for me the definitive Jazz pickup - in that they can produce a variety of different warm / clean voicings to suit player / guitar with just a subtle change of pickup height. .
I had better include the fine detail - in case anyone outside the forum is going to find this via 'Google' - and want to know more about the Manhattan set in the context of gear they own - or at least associate with.
The guitar is basically a 'Vintage' ES-175 copy, Maple laminates for the body - maple neck with 20 fret rosewood board. I did try a rosewood top on the existing rosewood floating bridge base, but for this guitar - prefered the metal 'tune-o-matic' style top - as the guitar is lovely and open / resonant - but not overly bright ( I assume from research - just like it's 'real' equivalent ). That was of course 'pre- Manahattan' - and these pickups are potentially so clear, revealing, articulate but still warm - that all the tone experiments would make much more sense now.
The rig was : ES-175 style guitar ( strung with a very low action using Thomastik 13-53 flat wounds but with the top 2 strings swapped from 13, 17, to 14 and 18 ) - a short 'Cleartone' cable - then straight into my AAD Cub 100 amp. The pickups already sounded very nice on a flat E.Q - but I adjusted the three E.Q knobs to my favourite settings of low pass reduced ( 9'o clock ) Mid = Neutral ( 12 o'clock ) - and high pass enhanced ( 3'o clock ) - and volume at half way. I sat 2 metres away - facing the front of the amp.
With both pickups set at a the 'usual' starting point of 2mm between the top of pickups and 'E' strings fretted at the last fret - I noted a lovely warm, articulate - almost 'standard' electric Jazz tone. Think George Benson, Joe Pass e.t.c. Remember that the amp used is a dedicated Jazz / Acoustic guitar amp - but I would say less compressed than a Polytone or JazzKat. A bit like a cross between an AER acoustic amp and a JazzKat / Polytone. It can be hard to describe this amp definitively - as like Bare Knuckle Pickups - the controls / settings are simple - but sensitive / effective.
Bear in mind I set the action at 1/32" at the 12th fret - and I am picking gentle / relaxed, so the B.K.P Mahattans were not going to get any help from me 'forceing' any projection, resonance or clarity from them.
The real revelation was with the pickup / string gap increased by a mere 0.5 mm to 2.5 mm . That is when I could not only hear each pick material even clearer and the hitherto undiscovered 'acoustic ' qualities of each flatwound string , BUT ALSO I could even hear ( doing legato pull offs on the top 'e' and 'b' strings at the 8th fret ) if I hit the strings with the finger which had the hardest skin / pad on !
All this without any lack of warmth or substance. I found that If you wanted to deliberately re-capture the sound of the 2mm gap without adjustment , you just used a nice heavy but slightly soft celluloid pick ( a Heavy B.K.P plectrum here ). The clarity has never been this pronounced before, even with the very lovely Stormy Monday pickups.
If your guitar has good acoustic / tonal qualities - these pickups will certainly bring it out so the listeners get every amplified drop of goodness, articulation and clarity - but left sweet and deeply resonant. Especially notable for me was when I heard what good Tapewound strings where supposed to sound like - ( i.e. slinky , characterful and smooth - not blurred and homogonised ).
I can see why even Tim found it hard to describe what they would be like in terms of comparison to other pickups. Perhaps his closest 'hit' was in saying that they may perhaps be likened a bit to to a quieter Mississipi Queen without the 'edge' - but even then Tim did not mention the incredible detail they can reproduce. I thought Stormy Mondays were clear, but these are in a different league still.
Do remember that you are not getting an enforced 'acousticy' sound from these - just the option to re-capture that - or the best of a Stormy Monday's clarity - but with a huge, crystal clear bass responce - which somehow never overpowers those sweet mids and top end. In cinematic terms - these would be '3D' .
How on earth Tim researched / designed these pickups when his virtuosity is thought to embrace other styles is a wonder indeed. You could not have sat down and chatted with all the great Jazz players themselves and come up with a better product.
I am only surprised that they are still not more widely publicised - as I note that the Bendetto 'special' on Jimmy Bruno's signature guitar look conspicuously like a black 'Warpig ' - and yet the Manhattan covers this and more bases. Time to 'go public' on these pickups I think, too good to be discovered accidentally.
As was mentioned by someone else on this forum, their potential reaches far beyond Jazz alone, but with them having a unique set of tonal attributes ( that is like trying to describe a colour no-one has ever seen before )- it may be hard to sell them as ' just like 'X' pickup'.
Nice one Tim ... 8)
