My sound is too bright/thin (7 string content)

[K-Roll]

Hey guys. I've tried a couple of the BKP 7 string pickups but no matter what I do, my sound is still lacking body.

THe problem I've been facing eversince the guitar was built is, that no matter what I do, I end up with a very thin sound.
I've thought that it's all in my head but recently I've had a chance to take the guitar to a friend of mine who does studio recording, plays in a band I quite like and whose opinion I always value. I let him play it for a while and come up with his opinion.

We agreed that the guitar lacks body.. Lows and lower mids. Once he started adding bass and lowering presence and trebles on his amp to compensate, there was this sub-bass frequency that came alive. Funny enough, the sound was still thin and very concrete with superb string separation, but somehow backed up with a round flub somewhere in the content which sounded weird, farting out while yet being sharp huh..

The guitar I'm using is a seven string superstrat. Honduran mahogany body, wenge top, one piece maple neck with indian rosewood FB (25,5'' scale) and a hipshot 7 bridge, 1 volume pot 500k. and that's it

HOnestly, I do not mind bright tones in general, but this little $%&#er still seems to end up as if there were some filter on the lower frequencies. It sounds like that all around processed recorded djenty tone that you may hear on modern records heh..

The pickups I've used over the time are the following:

painkiller 7 (very tight somehow, too scratchy and trebly on the higher positions due to the ceramic mag. I guess)

emerald 7 - a big NO.. very cutting/sharp/highmid focused/crunchy

nailbomb A5 7 and holydiver 7, which were kinda similar to each other with the nailbomb being on the sharper side and the HD7 on the smoother side of the spectrum. Bass was somehow too much on the NB7. I think the alnico 5 magnets helped to tame the brittleness but yet, I could not get a full sound with these.

blackdog 7 - somehow the best yet, although still the guitar lacks the body once you start playing chugga chugga chords.

I play a boogie mark 5 which on it's own is not a very chuggy amp. It's rather bright, tight and it even further stresses the tone of my guitar to be honest. I love the amp to be honest, but with guitars which i do not own.

MAybe it's time to look away from the BKP line and go with some other brands which are not that pricey, cause it gets rather too expensive to swap around these every 3-5 months once I realize it's not working as it should.
It's not that the pickups are bad, they are in fact superb, but this specific guitar is a PITA.

I'm looking at the D Sonic 7 and Tone Zone 7 if perhaps these could help me, but both are ceramic and from previous experience, that kind of magnet just never worked out for me.

any ideas?

[fhn_lopes]

In the BKP range I'd try a C-Pig or a Miracle Man... There's maybe another options such as the MCP solutions... in the, if nothing helps, you're going to end up with a dilema.. "Do I sell my guitar or do I put EMGs on it?"

[witeter]

Defo go with a Warpig, the guitar i installed it in (Alnico Warpig) was quite bright and now it has lots of thickness and body, i love it. Another thing to try if needbe is an eq pedal, either parametric or graphic-itll help you home in on the problem frequencies

[K-Roll]

Defo go with a Warpig, the guitar i installed it in (Alnico Warpig) was quite bright and now it has lots of thickness and body, i love it. Another thing to try if needbe is an eq pedal, either parametric or graphic-itll help you home in on the problem frequencies

thanks to both of you guys.


Just one thing about the EQ pedal - that should be placed on the first spot in the signal which goes from my guitar and not in the loop, right?
 

[Kiichi]

Yeah, if the WP does not give the guitar body you are in trouble.^^
Not sure about alnico or ceramic, I might even say get alnico cause it gives a more organic body character I recon youŽd like.

[Sarkasis]

A good way to set up your tone is Guitar -> Noise gate -> Compressor (if you like) -> EQ -> Boost (if you need it) -> Amp, and then maybe another EQ in the loop if you need it. But if you get a Warpig and it is giving you enough body but a little too much in the lows, before the amp you should try dialing back the lows a little with that EQ. That way the lows don't get too rumbly in the amp before you try to dial it out after the fact. That might get you there.

[witeter]

I have my eq pedal (mxr 10band) in the loop-but then again i use it to tweak the frequencies of the amps tone rather than frequencies from my guitar-experiment in both positions (in front of amp and loop) and see what has the required effect. i am assuming that you have played around with the onboard graphic eq the boogie has?
However my first port of call would be to try a pickup which is a match made in heaven for bright guitars -> The Warpig; and tweak from there

[witeter]

"Bass was somehow too much on the NB7"

I overlooked this remark-the Warpig has more bass than the NB so it may not be the best/only solution for your issue. By all means try it as you never know 100% when it comes to guitar/pickup combinations (i was steered away from the WP based on my guitar specs but its a perfect match!). It seems that you certainly want Alnico and fullness comes from mids in my experience, yet you also want enough chunk in the bottom end. I would say try a Warpig or a Blackhawk (Alnico)

[itamar101]

I second what witeter said.
You'll want mids, which you'll get from alnico pickups and a reasonable amount of bass.
The Alnico Warpig seems like a perfect fit to me, but i've never tried it. My Alnico Blackhawk is awesome though, very clear sounding, though, so it may not give you the fullness that you are looking for. It has decent amount of mids though and a very smooth high end.
It's sort of like a more HiFi and clear sounding version of the Holy Diver.