NPD - C-PIG out, AM/NB in!

[northlane.josh]

yesterday, my new pickups finally arrived!

As you may have read my previous thread asking for advice, I went for an aftermath bridge/nailbomb neck and it's PERFECT!

The aftermath is more compressed and forgiving than i expected (thankfully), with the lower tuning I use on this guitar & string gauge it's output is very similar to the C-pigs in the higher tuning/lighter gauge guitars I use (Ab with 13-66 v. Bb with 12-60). This is great because my patches are now very similar & consistent sounding for each tuning (i have separate banks tweaked for each tuning).

The lows on the aftermath are stupidly tight and fast tracking (great for big gauge strings) which is just what i wanted. The mids sit perfectly although there is a little less 500k honk than what i get with the C-pigs there is more cut around the 1200-1500hz range and a present but not quite as sharp treble. The mids are much more open-sounding and balanced than the C-pigs. It is very articulate and also great for lead work but for rhythms it is crushing, precise and has the perfect balance of saturation/note clarity for this application.

The Nailbomb sits well in the neck giving me a bright sounding neck pickup which is what I needed, output wise it sits well but has less compression than the AM or most other BKP neck pickups I've used with a similar output. It cleans up fantastically well, better than i expected and splits great with the AM (I have JPM-style wiring on my switches with outer coils on both in the middle).

Aesthetically these black covers look great and sit better in the guitar than the burnt chrome pigs did IMO.

Can't record clips at this point, the recording gear I use is my other guitarist's and he's currently moving but I'll be tracking a full-length with them through april so you'll be able to listen in the near future.

11/10 tim! couldn't be happier and i have a new favourite pickup.
Thanks for the great advice guys, especially Nolly.

For the record, if anyone is currently looking the guitar is a  Bernie Rico Jr Jekyll, maple neck-through with mahogany wings, birdseye maple fretboard & 1/4" flamed maple top, 25.5" scale & 13-66 gauge strings. Naturally he guitar is very punchy with growly low-mids and a rounded top-end.

Excuse the cr@ppy iPhone pics!

[Emperoff]

Is that a Bernie Rico Jr what I see? I recall seeing pictures of it and it's a maple neckthru with mahogany wings, just like mine.

 I'm very interested on hearing more of your thoughts on it. Being a very bright guitar I rejected the Aftermath from the start and thought the C-Pig would be a good alternative, but no you made me think about it more!

[northlane.josh]

Hey mate,

Track back to this thread for reference:
http://bareknucklepickups.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=23666.0

Pretty much I have 2 similar rico's, the only differences being one has an ebony board/spalt top and the other has a flame top/maple board. I use the one with the spalt top in Bb with 12-60 strings as opposed to Ab with 13-66's on this one.

What i found was that the C-pigs in the guitar i used for the lower tuning were too saturated, dark and had too much low end that i couldnt quite get tight enough, although i love their midrange response. Despite this, they still work perfectly and are fantastically well-balanced on the spalted jekyll I own in Bb with the thinner strings.

I find that the spalted/ebony one is a little brighter but both guitars are well-balanced and very punchy sounding, not overly bright with rounded lows & highs. This seems to be a characteristic of maple, I actually owned a guitar that was a 2pc flamed maple body once at it wasn't as bright as say, swamp ash. Rather it was very punchy with tailored lows & highs & plenty of high-mids and punch. On neckthroughs I've found that alot of the sound character seems to come from the centre piece and the wings seem to add icing on the cake, especially when the pickups are direct mounted. Therefore these two  aren't nearly as dark as a full mahogany bodied variant would be, and C-pigs seem to sit outstandingly well with maple's core voicing so I think you can't really go wrong. I would base my decision upon how much output you're looking for. I wouldnt say the aftermath is a bright pickup compared to say the cold sweat or painkiller