Pickup swap for a tele

[roland_rat]

Hi everyone im here for a little bit of advice.   One of the guitars I have is a Gordon Smith Tele (rosewood neck fairly bright and twangy sounding) .  Currently at the moment I have got a Boss bridge and a Irish Tour neck.   The irish tour neck  I love with overdrive or distortion.  Im not too keen on the cleans but more than happy becauce of how good the pickup is with OD and Dirt.  The bridge pickup I am unfortunatly not geting on with  in this guitar.   What I am hoping to do is to change the bridge pickup to another BK and keep the neck.   I think the boss has too many mids for me.
So my question  is which telecaster bridge pickups do you think would work well with a Irish tour neck?
My initial thought was to try a brown sugar bridge. 


Any ideas greatly recived. Thanks in advance guys.

[thisisnickpaige]

Well what kind of tone are you goin for man? Anything would go great with anything if its a tele pickup, because it fits inside your guitar; doesnt mean it's right for you. What kinda stuff do you play? what kinda stuff do you play on the bridge? What kinda stuff would you like to play? ya know? The ideal for me aint the ideal for you. =) Because personally i'd say Piledriver all day long! I'd use that pickup for anything! And if i wanted something slightly less output i'd rock a blackguard flat50 =) that pickup rules! =) so it's really up to what you play. The piledriver isnt only metal and only high gain it can be very mellow or have some twang if you chicken pick. All depends on your guitar, how you play and what you play . And judging from the fact you have almost 400 posts under your belt and numerous pickups in your collection your not a moron so i honestly dont know. How would you describe the boss? I've actually been very interested in that pickup as of late because i need a bridge pickup for my project. What would you describe it as?

[roland_rat]

Thanks for the reply and your rquite right I should have given some more information.
 The boss bridge I would say is best suited to (distorted and overdriven tones) rock and metal.  The pickup I would discribe as  non vintage im reluctant to say modern sounding.  The clean tones of the pickup are ok, though for me much worse than a yardbird.

I am looking for a pickup that sounds slightly more vintage, with  not as much mids has the Boss pickup.  I would tend to play blues or rock, a little very badly played jazz  and  a little metal.  Though not really any metal on this guitar.

What I am really after is a bridge pickup that is slightly more vintage  not  has  middy sounding but works well in the mid position with a irish tour.   If the pickup has a really nice clean tone that is a bonus.  There is no real fixed boundry of a certain tone im after geting from the bridge. I have just reached a point that when I pick that tele up I never use the bridge or middle pickup on that guitar.  Im hoping a pickup change will encourage me topick that guitar up more.

[AndyR]

Other folks is going to say it too, but I have this gut feeling BG Flat 50 is it. Obviously they're in different guitars for me, but I think the BG would go better with the IT than, say, the Yardbird bridge would.

But I don't know about brown sugars... and... and... we always seem to recommend BG Flat 50 to anyone who opens his mouth...

I was struggling until I got to this:

"I have just reached a point that when I pick that tele up I never use the bridge or middle pickup on that guitar."

That's what the BG Flat 50 fixed for me - I'd very rarely play a tele "bridge-only" until I got one. I also use the Yardbird "bridge-only" now, but more in situations where the guitar is playing with other guitar parts.

When I want a single guitar part to stand on it's own,  a big ole telecaster "hey your geetar sounds mighty fine" blues-rock tone, for me it's the BG Flat 50 everytime...

[Philly Q]

I'm pretty sure in another thread someone (probably Feline) said that the Brown Sugar is similar in output to the BG50, but with more mids. 

So if you're finding the Boss too powerful and too middy, and based on what Andy just said, maybe BG50 is the way to go.

[roland_rat]

Thanks guys.  Some very good  points you both made. I been thinking some more and  part of the problem is the amp I tend to use is a cornell romany which I like a lot,  however it has only got a treble and a bass eq on it so no eq for the mids to dial  some of the mids out. 

I will try and find some clips of the BG Flat 50  and have a good listen.


Cheers again

[PhilKing]

The Brown Sugar bridge nails the 'Start Me Up' tone perfectly.  I have it paired with an old PAF mini humbucker and it is a great match.

[roland_rat]

Thanks PhilKing,

I will go and have a good listen to it.