Pickups for bright guitar

[andrewt]

I have a Tele with HH in it. It is an alder body (a bit on the heavy side), maple neck and pau ferro fingerboard. It has a stop tail through bridge with 6 individual saddles. The pickups in there at present are PAF style. They came in the guitar and are not an aftermarket brand. All I can find out is they have Alnico II magnets, 42AWG wire and are described as Vintage PAF style with bass/middle/treble output of 7/6/6 and a relative output of 6 out of 10.

I find the PAFs are too scooped sounding and emphasize the top and bottom frequencies. Since the woods in the guitar and the scale length make it bright I want a set of pickups which emphasize the mids and make the guitar sound a bit more mellow. I've tried EQing out the problem, or rolling down the tone control to 2 which helps. I guess one way of describing what I'm looking for is when I play a full G major barre chord on the 3rd fret, I want to hear less treble content from the top three strings and have more emphasis from the bass and mids.

Trying to shift the guitar towards a Les Paul style tone, which is more mellow and has more bass and mids content due to the scale length and woods. I know I can't do the impossible and make a maple alder 25.5" scale guitar sound like a LP, but just to shift it in that direction.

What can everyone recommend?

[Telerocker]

Abraxas would provide more mids, more bass and a bit less topend, yet retaining the vintagevibe. It's a sort of hotrodded Mule. You could also inspect the Crawler, which sounds huge, has a more round topend (not dull!) and a unique growl. This BKP still has a vintage tonality. You could see the Crawler as the Uber-PAF.

[andrewt]

Abraxas would provide more mids, more bass and a bit less topend, yet retaining the vintagevibe. It's a sort of hotrodded Mule. You could also inspect the Crawler, which sounds huge, has a more round topend (not dull!) and a unique growl. This BKP still has a vintage tonality. You could see the Crawler as the Uber-PAF.

Thanks for the reply. I saw the Abraxas and wondered about them. I don't want a huge mid range, and don't want to sound like Santana, but I guess it depends on how much gain I run them through.

What about the Black Dogs? They look like they have more mids than the usual PAF. Or the Rebel yells?

[Dave Sloven]

If the guitar is as bright as it sounds you should avoid the Rebel Yells.  Holy Diver might be okay, not sure about the Black Dog.

The suggestion of a Crawler seems like a good one too, same with the Abraxas.  I don't think it would necessarily sound like Santana

[Yellowjacket]

ugggh Rebel Yells in a bright guitar.  They're really  REALLY at home in a heavy, solid lump of mahogany.

[ericsabbath]

ugggh Rebel Yells in a bright guitar.  They're really  REALLY at home in a heavy, solid lump of mahogany.

it actually sounds pretty fine in alder teles
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=20zSjw98Gvg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I2xjYHdRgq0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0F_Q1Mpjht0

[Slartibartfarst42]

My first suggestion would be the Crawler but the Abraxas and Holydiver should also be good options. I'm less sure about the Black Dog but it should still work well, though I'd expect it to be the brightest of the four.

[darkbluemurder]

My first suggestion would be the Crawler but the Abraxas and Holydiver should also be good options.

Agreed, and in that sequence.

Cheers Stephan