Questions about alnico warpig?

[metalforbreakfast]

Hi all,

I'm in a bit of a pinch and figured this'd be a good place to ask this question - I have for YEARS had a good guitar tone that I was generally satisfied with, but now am starting to get more and more finnicky about.

My two main guitars are a Caparison Dellinger Oiled Mahogany and a Jackson KE-2.  My amp is a peavey JSX combo.

Recently I was messing around with some setups and tried tuning the dellinger to B.  I am, after all, a HUGE soilwork fan.  The stock pickup (PH-R) didn't really cut it though (palm mutes had no balls and sounded very unclear), so I brought it up one step to standard C and found it performs worlds better.  Then I took my Jackson (alder, maple/ebony neck thru), which was in C, and set it up in B.  The thing sounds like a damned sledgehammer, even considering the JB/Jazz combo.  The problem now is that the JB looses clarity when I try to play faster rhythm, and the Jazz has this really nasty honk on the plain strings (usually a complaint of the JB!).

As I said, I love soilwork, and I know Peter and Ola used EMG 85's, but I'd prefer to keep my guitars passive while still getting pickups that will deliver that thick, ballsy OOMPH while maintaining a nice "singing" lead sound (Predator's Portrait, Natural Born Chaos).  I'd heard the alnico warpig was THE way to go for this for the bridge, but wanted to check in here before I spent a lot of $$ on the pickups without really having a place I could return them to if things didn't work out.  I've also had people tell me to just magnet swap the A5 in the PH-R and the JB to A8s...this is all a bit much for me to be honest, and I don't really want to go all mad scientist.  If they were cheaper guitars, I'd stick the EMGs in them, but it just seems like it'd kind of be a shame to take out the passives.

Any advice or suggestion or experience?

[Dave Sloven]

If you are looking for a sound like the EMGs from a passive pickup IMO the Warpig is not a good choice.  EMGs tend to be quite bright, that's why they sound best in mahogany. Warpigs tend to be darker, and give a heavy tone to brighter woods.  I have Warpigs in an Explorer and while I like the tone for what I do with that guitar I can see how they could be quite limited to that.  Don't get me wrong - they are much brighter than the Mighty Mite Motherbuckers that were in there before, but they are not a bright pickup like an EMG.

If you want something more like an EMG maybe look at the ceramic Black Hawk.

[Slartibartfarst42]

If you nwant a huge bottom end and screaming highs in a passive pickup, especially in your Jackson, the only way to go for me is a Miracle Man. I had one in a Jackson Soloist and it was awesome. I think you'll find it will do exactly what you're after better than the A-Pig in this instance.

[witeter]

Hey man, i have an Alnico Warpig pickup in one of my guitars and i play through a JSX head.
I really like the pickup but after the usual 'honeymoon period' i feel that its a bit too 'tubby' in the bottom end, especially for single note tracking (this is for my preferences though), i think that if i got the Ceramic version this issue would be no more. Basically i have come to realise that for me, the bridge pup in my guitars have to be ceramic.
However the description you gave of 'ballsy OOMPH while maintaining a nice "singing" lead sound' fits the Alnico Warpig quite well, the EMG85 you describe is Alnico also, so i think youd want to try some Alnico options first?-i would recommend taking a look at the Alnico Blackhawk also though.

[metalforbreakfast]

Thanks for all the replies gentlemen.  I consistently come across recommendation for popping a miracle man into the Jackson - I think at this point that's exactly what I'll end up doing.

My caparison is definitely my project right now - I am, unfortunately, way too obsessive about getting things "just right", so right now I've been tinkering mercilessly with this guitar - at this stage, just with string gauges, pickup height, and various trem stoppers.  I'm getting close, but I'm not quite there yet.  Once again, thanks for the replies!

[ericsabbath]

joel stroetzel from killswitch engage was a long emg 85 user, as far as I remember, and now he has painkillers on some caparison and 7-string aftermaths in another
not that the painkiller sounds anything like an emg 85, but it's a common choice among modern metal players
personally, I prefer the more organic approach of the miracle man

[GuitarIv]

Reading through your post I'd say you should go for the Alnico Option, no matter what pickup you're gonna get.

I played both the Ceramic and the Alnico Warpig, the A-Pig sounded great from Standard tuning to Drop C (that's the lowest I played it so far), very warm, fat and chunky with that "wall of sound" thing going on. It basically reminded me of a Holydiver on steroids, however I'm not sure how well it performs in lower tunings such as Standard-C and B.

The C-Pig sounded harsh and abrasive compared to the A-Pig, played that one in Drop-B, and to be honest I didn't like it at all, at least not for the style of music I play. Very well suited to Death Metal but the lows would get a bit too much and lose some detail with the highs being a bit unpleasant. However the pickup was freshly installed into an ESP Horizon with an Alder Body, Maple Neck and Ebony Fretboard and I didn't tinker too much with the height, so I don't wanna give you any false presumptions.

Regarding the Miracle Man I own one and that one will do the job very well, it saturates in a very organic way for a ceramic pickup, similar to the Holydiver, but I'm not sure how much tightness it will have in lower tunings as I play mine in E-Flat. Could be the way to go.

I'd stay away from the Painkiller, that one is very abrasive and harsh with a very percussive feel to it, dry and full of face hitting and grinding upper mids. Very metal, but not metalcorish.

So my suggestions would be either the Miracle Man or as Witeter suggested the Alnico Blackhawk. The A-Hawk in fact should be somewhere in the EMG 85 territory.

Cheers

edit: the Juggernaut could be the way to go as well. Said to retain tightness and clarity in low tunings while maintaining weight in the low mids for those chuggs, should as well give you that fat singing lead tone:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s_JgKOjTTqg

I don't think that pickup is only suited for "Djent" (if that's not your thing anyway) but could be worth a consideration

[metalforbreakfast]

The thought there had crossed my mind about a Juggernaut.  I also just realized that the guitar I had heard the warpigs in was made out of walnut - it was the Caparison Horus HGS that Liam Engl uses on a lot of his youtube channels.  Realizing that also made me realize that the warpig wouldn't quite be what I was looking for in the Dellinger, and the mahogany body would sound quite different.  Still NO idea what I'm going to do with that guitar, but I've seen tons of suggestions elsewhere for Holydivers and alnico nailbombs in there as well.  Too many options!!

Now I'm wondering what an A-Pig would sound like in my Kelly.  Still, I'll probably go with a miracle man there - as I said, damn near everyone suggests that pickup for neck thru jacksons.