BKP as hot as a duncan distortion?

[Toe-Knee]

I have to say, the distortion is sounding much better to me in those clips. Tighter and chunkier. That's a kind of a disappointment :D

You sound like you have similar tastes to me. The Miracle Man could just be the one for you. Its the only BKP I would use nowadays.

[Alex]

I've never had a Duncan Distortion, but I have experience with the Seymour Duncan JB.

I can say that the Miracle Man is a bit louder in output than the JB, and much more muscular and clearer. With heavy settings that really makes it stand apart, even if it doesn't sound much louder. The Nailbomb I felt is pretty much around the same output as the JB. You really get BKPs because of the increased frequency range and the transparency, but not for the output and compression; I've always felt that many Seymour Duncans get their sound from a fairly strong output level, maybe even unneccesarily loud, that comes from quite a lot of compression especially in the mid and bass frequencies. None of them seem to have the same mid and bass transparency from BKP.

[Dave Sloven]

I listened to both of those clips, and liked the tune, reminded me of early Death for some reason.

I actually liked the sound of both pickups, but liked the Painkiller a bit more, but then again I like a more aggressive sound in the mids.  The PK seemed to have more high end, the SD a bit more growl

[darkbluemurder]

distortion
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/9807181/Recordings/Grind%20redux.mp3

painkiller
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/9807181/Recordings/Grind%20redux%20PK.mp3

Sounded very similar to me - the PK maybe a tad brighter and with a bit more attack to the tone. But I don't really play this style of music.

Cheers Stephan

[darkbluemurder]

I've never had a Duncan Distortion, but I have experience with the Seymour Duncan JB.

I've always felt that many Seymour Duncans get their sound from a fairly strong output level, maybe even unneccesarily loud, that comes from quite a lot of compression especially in the mid and bass frequencies. None of them seem to have the same mid and bass transparency from BKP.

That's exactly my experience as well. With the JB, it was like I had only midrange frequencies, no dynamics and the volume control worked like an on-off switch - off at 0 and full on from 1-10. Can't speak for the Distortion or Custom as I have never played them.

Cheers Stephan

[Jarowskij]

The thing is, I play thrash/death metal and for that kind of stuff you need a little bit of compression and not so much dynamics. I pick very hard and most of our songs are pretty fast, so I need my sound to "help me out" in a way, otherwise my right hand is gonna fall off :D I'm not talking about Cannibal Corpse levels of gain and compression but a super dry and super dynamic sound just doesn't fit this type of music in my opinion. I love a tight chug and precise attack, but also a little compression so I don't have to fight the guitar too much cause I'm picking hard and pretty fast pretty much all the time.

[JimmyMoorby]

The thing is, I play thrash/death metal and for that kind of stuff you need a little bit of compression and not so much dynamics. I pick very hard and most of our songs are pretty fast, so I need my sound to "help me out" in a way, otherwise my right hand is gonna fall off :D I'm not talking about Cannibal Corpse levels of gain and compression but a super dry and super dynamic sound just doesn't fit this type of music in my opinion. I love a tight chug and precise attack, but also a little compression so I don't have to fight the guitar too much cause I'm picking hard and pretty fast pretty much all the time.

I think if you had to pick some thing from the bkp range the black hawk would suit you best.  I play the nailbomb because I have have to play lots of stuff but if I was just playing thrash or death type stuff id definitely choose the black hawk because it just does the extreme metal thing .....extremely well....

[Jarowskij]

Yeah, I was thinking the ceramic black hawk might be something I'd like. The miracle man seems maybe a little too scooped because I like a healthy dose of midrange in my sound. It's always trial and error with trying pickups but I guess you win some and lose some  :lol:

[JimmyMoorby]

Yeah, I was thinking the ceramic black hawk might be something I'd like. The miracle man seems maybe a little too scooped because I like a healthy dose of midrange in my sound. It's always trial and error with trying pickups but I guess you win some and lose some  :lol:

Definitely!  I much prefer them to the miracle man any way not really versatile but perfect for heavy metal.  I definitely have a thing for bkp but there are the odd other pickups that catch my attention I still like emg's but also lace nitro hemi's.

[Toe-Knee]

I listened to both of those clips, and liked the tune, reminded me of early Death for some reason.

I actually liked the sound of both pickups, but liked the Painkiller a bit more, but then again I like a more aggressive sound in the mids.  The PK seemed to have more high end, the SD a bit more growl

Ha! I was on a bit of a death listening spree when writing that. The PK does work really well for that kinda thing.

[Toe-Knee]

The miracle man seems maybe a little too scooped because I like a healthy dose of midrange in my sound. I

This is why i like the MM loads of low mids & not much high mids which is perfect for thrash. For middier tones well that's what my amps for which is a very high mid based amp.

[ericsabbath]

the ceramic nailbomb has a bit of both
aggressive and punchy

[Slartibartfarst42]

The miracle man seems maybe a little too scooped because I like a healthy dose of midrange in my sound. I

This is why i like the MM loads of low mids & not much high mids which is perfect for thrash. For middier tones well that's what my amps for which is a very high mid based amp.

I agree. The Miracle Man is nothing like as scooped as the EQ chart suggests, it's just that most of the mids are lower mids which combine with the bass to give it a really huge bottom end as well as some screaming highs for solos.

[p4vl]

I've never had a Duncan Distortion, but I have experience with the Seymour Duncan JB.

Contrary to what many people say, the Distortion is not just a JB with an oversized ceramic magnet.  It's more of a variation on a theme, so I don't know that one can accurately compare their experience with the JB to the DD. 

From my experience, the JB is cr@p and the Distortion is the best pickup for lower tunings that I've ever used (I have it in an Ibby Prestige RG2550 in B standard).

Duncan makes a more 'modern' version of the Distortion: the Parallel Axis Distortion.  It's hotter than the original, supposedly.