BKP for Ibanez RG550 / Paul Gilbert

[EPV5150]

Iīm looking for the "Paul Gilbert" tone, which BKP can I use? My guitar is an Ibanez RG550 20th and has a pair of DiMarzio Evolution, but I think they has a lot of mid to my taste.

Maybe 17k is perfect for me. And the neck pup around 14 15k is ok.

Looking the BKP website I liked the "Miracle Man" set. What can you tell me about this pickup?

[ericsabbath]

well, Gilbert does use very middy pickups
the most Gilbertish BKP i ever had was the neck cold sweat installed in the bridge, but that was in a maple neck Greco les paul
for an Rg I'd easily pick a black dog over a high output model

but answering your question, the miracle man is an amazing pickup and has a good history with rg550 model
comparing to dimarzio models, it should be closer to the stevie's special than to the evolution
bridge model has a really punchy low end with a nice treble spike wthout sounding harsh
it is extremely articulate on fast leads and sounds pretty focused and  intense on slow leads
the neck model is darker voiced and has a fatter midrange, kinda more modern sounding

[Slartibartfarst42]

Why on earth are you looking at a pickup like a Miracle Man for a Paul Gilbert tone? His preference for pickups seems to be from the Satriani school in that he clearly likes pickups with vintage pickups. If you look at his signature models, for the bridge he's using either an Air Classic (8.62 DC Resistance and AV magnet) or a PAF Master (7.69 DC Resistance and AIV magnet). To me, if you're after the Paul Gilbert tone you need to be looking at pickups like the Mule, Riff Raff or Black Dog. If you really want a hotter pickup and still keep a vintage feel for your Paul Gilbert tone, I'd say the hottest you should be looking at is an Abraxas.

[ericsabbath]

He also used high output dimarzios in the past, like the super distortion and the tone zone
The neck alnico miracle man in the bridge is pretty much on tone zone territory in both specs and voicing
But for his modern tones, the black dog and neck cold sweat are closest to his paf pro and injector tones
Not familiar with the paf master, though
The original dimarzio paf is a bit like a riff raff, but thin and harsh

[Slartibartfarst42]

This is very true, I was focusing more on his current guitars rather than the ones he used to use. There isn't really a BKP equivalent to the Super Distortion. I think that BKP suggest an Aftermath for Super Distortion tones but they sound nothing alike to me. I agree that for current tones the Black Dog is probably the best bet, though the Abraxas may represent some sort of halfway house between the pickups he used to use and the pickups he uses now. It has the AIV magnet of the PAF Master and keeps that more vintage feel but with about similar(ish) power to his older pickups and as the Abraxas is one of the most versatile pickups in the range, it probably has the best chance of covering the most tonal bases.