No longer a BK virgin, and HSS thoughts

[McStrummer]

Hello all.

Just dropped my first proper (i.e. excluding a rewind) BKs in a PRS SE (CU22 Semi) - a Mule / RR combo. Frankly amazed. Jaw droppingly amazed - it's like seeing in colour for the first time and makes the buckers in my other guitars sound like mud. As well as kicking the stuffing out of my US LP (490R&T) in the PAF stakes I've even managed to coax some usable split tones via a Fralin/PRS style partial split...nice jangly neck tone...still working on the bridge.

Planning on more BKs in the future. I've got vintage SC tones covered in a Strat ('69, so keeping as original as possible, no mods here), and PAF via the PRS+Mule/RR. Very well covered for blues / hard rock.

Which brings me to my Fat Strat. Normal alder/maple combo, rw board, acoustically fairly quiet, and quite dark for a Strat. I'm looking for something really modern here: pristine cleans (neck especially) and tight bass - more of a metal and prog machine. Would like to keep as much versatility as possible and definitely want to avoid a one trick pony, but not overly concerned about retaining "stratiness".

Ben has suggested a black hawk/cobra combo, and the demos/vids I've checked out seem pretty sweet. Then again, checking out the forums, the HD/Trilogy combo sounds very tempting.

Anyone have any experience with these or recommendations for an HSS Strat?

Cheers!

[Dave Sloven]

Ben's suggestion is pretty good actually, considering your preferences

I have the alnico Black Hawk in a mahogany body maple bolt-on neck Schecter and find that works very well (it has the matching BH humbucker for the neck, with a coil split) and really love it.  Apparently the ceramic model is a bit tighter and brighter with less mids.  I haven't played it.  There is a comparison video by Nolly on youtube where you can hear the differences between them in the same (seven-striing) guitar.

All of the videos I've seen of the Cobra are really nice and I nearly went with the A-Hawk/Cobra/Cobra combination in my Stiletto 6-FR rather than converting it to HH but then I decided I wasn't a fan of middle pickups anyway and the neck humbucker gives me enough tonal options compared to a HS setup.  But if you don't find that the middle pickup gets in your way then the BH/C/C HSS set could be a great choice

[McStrummer]

Cheers Dave. Appreciate the link to the vid, nice one. Was toying with routing for HSH, but on balance think I'll keep it HSS. N and N+M are some of my favourite SC tones. From the various vids, the cobra's seem pretty damned fine.