Review: The Boss set!

[Alfi27]

Good evening fellas! Once again, I ordered a set of pickups with quite few reviews on the internet (more than the Nantucket though), which made me very, very excited and with high expectations! This time the original pickups were not bad, they were actually $%&#ing awesome! They would probably never have gotten replaced if I did not return the neck Crawler, because I decided to sell the guitar it was going in instead.

The guitar is a Fender Telecaster Telebration 62' Custom, and the original pickups are the Fender 62' Customs. Pretty similar specs to the 55' Stagger except for the Alnico II magnet. Because of that the bass was a little bit soft, but apart from that they sounded like a set of Tele pickups should and could do just about every genre. I was also very, very back and forth about which pickups I wanted to try... Almost embarrassing. First the Piledriver, then the Boss, then the 55' Stagger, then the 52 Flat and so forth until I ended up with the Boss again. As usual, I did not change the pickups only, and I specifically requested a pair of 280k BKP pots with higher tolerances (to hopefully get a little bit twang).

The first thing that struck me when I got it all wired up was the amount of twang! Well, the amp is pretty bright (Marshall SL-5) but I did not feel like it was missing a lot of treble compared to the 62 Customs. It did, however, have quite a lot more bass and a more muscular, throaty mid range! I am a big fan of versatile pickups (like the Nantucket and Riff Raff), and this one is surprisingly close to my Nantucket-loaded LP Junior with gain, but still does country almost as well as the original pickups! The output is also quite close to the Nantucket, even though it feels a bit hotter actually. And the bridge pickup is quite a lot hotter than the neck! I think I have some tweaking left to do, not sure how close I can/should have the neck pickup, because I certainly do not want to back off the bridge pickup! The neck pickup is also a bit stratty, which I really like.

You can get so many excellent tones from this pickup, and the best thing is that all of them are pure Tele! I do not know how many times I have thought/said this, but I cannot believe I did not buy a Tele before... Great, great guitar! Sound clips will be posted shortly, when I have spent some more time with the guitar 

[38thBeatle]

Excellent. I am really looking forward to hearing the clip. Its good to hear Tele clips. I have a set of Country Boys in mine and I' must have had them about 7 or 8 years at least and I love them. I would like to get another Tele at some point just to get another set of BKPs and the Boss set is one of those that is of interest.

[Kiichi]

Nice, look forward to more info. Already made me feel a lot better about the Boss.

Also, I added it to the review sticky, where it is the first opinion on the pickup! Thanks!

[Alfi27]

Alright, so I have played around with them some more! I decided to try and lower the bridge pickup all the way and it sounds much better now! The bass is not as overwhelming, though definitely still there. The pickup is hot enough to still drive the amp quite good, and now I do not have to worry about the neck pickup being too high and killing the sustain. When the bridge pickup was high I could not get it to sound quite right, I was starting to doubt the Kemper, but I should have known that the height can really make a massive difference.

The clip is on its way, I am so sorry but this pickup is the most sensitive and responsive pickup I have ever tried! The height almost makes a different pickup! I think I might have it now but I have to do some more testing to be really sure.. Just bear with me 

[darkbluemurder]

In most tele sets the bridge pickup is louder than the neck pickup. The reason is that due to the small bobbin of the neck pickup it is not possible to fit as many turns of wire onto it. By comparison, the tele bridge pickup bobbin is large, larger than a strat pickup bobbin, so it can take quite a lot of wire. But since the strings vibrate more in the neck position than in the bridge position, the volume differences can in most cases be balanced by height adjustments - as you already noticed.

I wished there were more teles and tele pickguards routed for strat type neck pickups - that would provide for a much bigger selection of neck pickups for a tele.

Cheers Stephan

[Alfi27]

Alright guys, finally got a decent clip made! All Kemper, and the first sound is a Marshall JVM410 profile. The second one is a Marshall DSL100 (not sure if JCM2000 or newer one). It's the clean channel nevertheless, with a tiny bit of dirt. On the first clip I actually have the tone knob on about 5-6, so it is not as rounded as the site claims. Which is not a bad thing at all imo, I was afraid it would be too rounded! Tone is on 10 on the second clip. Hope you enjoy it!
https://soundcloud.com/alfi27/the-boss-demo/s-3Xgd3

[Kiichi]

Damn that sounds good. The first few seconds were underwhelming for me, but once you turned it up I was in. And the second half proved that I probably will not be in need of more twang. I am now pretty darn sure that when I get a tele some day that I will get these. =)

[Chris Rowberry]

Awesome clip Alfi! I'm pleased you have settled with them.

[38thBeatle]

Cool clip- they do sound lovely.

[Telerocker]

Good clip, yet a little hard to judge on this profile. Sounds a little harsh here and there, maybe due to the way of recording. Dunno exactly. Anyway, the toneknob is powerful tool a tele. For the Police I have it nearly full open, for heavy rock I turn it half way down. But I have the Fender no-load-circuit. Full blast is full spank.

[Alfi27]

Thanks guys! Where did you think it sounds harsh, Telerocker? If you are talking about the clean clip I found a bright profile to make sure that I got as much treble and twang as possible, maybe a bit over the top at some places. Nevertheless, I do not think that it sounds harsh in person

[Telerocker]

Maybe harsh is not the right word. I should improve my English to express myself better. Let's say I prefer the overdriven tones above the clean single notes. I suspect thats more due to the amp/patch than to the pickups. Or it's my taste. I get the best cleans with vintagepickups.

[Alfi27]

No worries man! I actually had an anti-honeymoon phase with the bridge pickup a little while after I wrote this review. I was really close to returning them, it was by pure accident I decided to give them another shot. And I am really glad I did, it is the best sounding guitar I have at the moment (the honeymoon hit hard this time), haha! This is probably THE Tele-set for driven tones, but the neck and neck+bridge position sounds great clean too! The bridge is obviously also great for cleans as well but I rarely play clean solos except for when I try to play country. I also installed a 4 way switch and the series position is much like a neck humbucker for smooth and fat solo tones! The Telecaster is now even more versatile! I hardly think a guitar can get any more versatile than this tbh, every rock player that own a tele should give these a shot