Classic Rock/Blues Bridge bucker

[richard]

Thinking of getting one of these:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=B0UIrEQk0Co

Looks like great value for the price. I've listened to loads of demos and, while I quite like the SD C5, it sounds a bit too scooped. I want a nice fat mid-range but with a good dose of top end bite. I have RYs in an all mahogany guitar and would like a similar tone, maybe with just a tad more output, in this alder strat-ish guitar.

I don't want a vintage output pickup and I certainly don't want a metal sounding pickup. I'm looking at Abraxas, Crawler or possibly Holy Diver. I think that the HD might be a bit too metal for me. This guitar is going to be used for blues/rock jam nights.

What would you go for ?

[darrenw5094]

The Abraxas is a fatter PAF or Mule. The Crawler would work also, but the Alnico Nailbomb is the big brother of the RY, so the tone would be closest to it, but much hotter output and is a modern voicing though

[Slartibartfarst42]

Crawler without a doubt. It's fat, warm, rich and has a distinctive growl too it. Fantastic for anything from Blues Rock to early 80s Metal. It also has the best splits of any humbucker I've ever tried.

[richard]

Slarti - I'm sure you're right. The Crawler was top of my list but I'm curious about the others. I'd love to have an Abraxas equipped guitar one day.

[Slartibartfarst42]

I've always fancied an Abraxas too but every time I've thought about it, something else has come along that seemed like a better idea.

[Telerocker]

Abraxas or Crawler, both will do. The Crawler is the uber-Abraxas with alnico V instead of alnico IV.

Crawler kills in my swampash /maple neck/ebony fretboard custommade (by Patrick Eggle) MXG superstrat. It sounds huge and fat, with a big bottom and lowmidrange, solid uppermids, and rounded topend, which has enough cut for most applications, don't worry. This pickup excels in bolt on alder/ash-guitars, giving them the beef they usually lack. You will notice that the Crawler's solonotes keep weight higher up the fretboad. And once you push it, the Crawler growls like a bear. Very unique throatyness. But at the same time the pickup sounds georgeous on the clean channel, providing a lot of chime if you roll the volume on the guitar back. As Slarti states, the Crawler splits very good. Together with a middle singlecoil you got  a very good Fenderish quack. Standalone the singlecoilmode of the Crawler gets close to a good telebridge.

With this impression I don't want to push away the Abraxas, which is a good choice too if you want a little more chime in the topend and compared to the Crawler slightly reduced mids.
For a 611 I personally would pick the Crawler.

[darkandrew]

The Crawler is great but is very sensitive to the guitar you put it in. I've tried mine in three different guitars and it sounds entirely different in each. It changes from a hot vintage-paf with soft highs, full mids, balanced lows and a hint of a modern twist in one of my Eclipses to a roaring, sledge-hammer of a beast with mids that can bludgeon you to unconsciousness in my basswood Showmaster superstrat. I keep the Crawlers in the Eclipse now where it gets used mainly for 80s / new-wave style playing (for which I would say it is absolutely spot on) but I'm sure it would also be very good for blues rock. I know you're not looking at a humbucking neck pickup but just for information, the Crawler neck is made for bluesy solos.