Author Topic: BKP Impotence? (Read 5513 times)

opprobrium_9 · « **on:** August 31, 2007, 07:30:15 AM »

And yes i mean Impotence (figuratively) and not Impedance. So i went and met this guy from around where i live who is also a guitar maker. I took my new build tricked out with BKPs to get feedback and we conversed about our common interests (guitars, duh). So anyways, I plugged in and played a bit on a very low cost/quality amp. It sounded nice, i added a little reverb, and so on. However, when switching between my two pickups (VHII and Nailbomb bridge) there was very little difference in sonic character; i mean, it was there, the Nailbomb was definitely more aggressive. However, i am not even complaining about this, i have tried out my guitar on several amps and have gotten very good results, so i am not unhappy, in that respect.

We will leave that issue be for a time. Anyways, back to the shop. This guy also makes his livelihood from giving lessons and selling guitar related things. As one might have guessed, in his shop were guitars; MANY guitars for such a low level operation. I only found out the reason for this later on: he buys cheap Chinese Built mock LPs, Strats, PRS's, etc. He had me try a couple out, and then he brought over a mock PRS, which he said was the best of his stock (selling at a measly $400, 200 quid for all you Brits and bought by him for half that). I tried it out, and as also might be expected, it did not even touch the playability of my build (i swear i am going somewhere with this). When i strummed my first couple cords i was not too impressed, it just seemed average. But then, i started striking some beautiful dissonance on it and...

THE BEST TONE I HAVE EVER $%&#ING HEARD!

There is just no way to exaggerate it enough, creamy thick mids and highs. This was $%&#in meaty and full-bodied and yet retained a really great bright tone. I mean, i thought my BKPs were good, but here is this shitety little Chinese build going through the wet signal of a really low grade amp, and i found the tone of the Gods. This guitar builder guy said that these were just really generic stock pickups, most likely mass produced with no bells or whistles in China. How is it that the neck pickup is even more creamy than my VHII? That the deep warm tones of this generic bridge pup is even more stunning than my Nailbomb?

I mean i know there are oddities out there, this could be a freak of a pickup that only happened once... but then, that doesn't seem likely. Am i just not using the right BKPs for the beauty of those sorts of tones? I mean there are so many BKPs i haven't tried yet. That richness is so godly i could just sink into it, I WANT THAT TONE DAMMIT! Or could it be the fact that the amp and the shoddy guitar just clicked sonicly? I mean there could be so many variables at work here. Does anybody have any ideas about this? Should i be looking into some other BKPs for that tone?

WezV · « **Reply #1 on:** August 31, 2007, 09:29:40 AM »

thats life!!

Try not to let it worry you too much

noodleplugerine · « **Reply #2 on:** August 31, 2007, 02:23:49 PM »

I bet you'll go back in tommorow and realise that the tone was nowhere near as good as you thought it was :P

hunter · « **Reply #3 on:** August 31, 2007, 02:34:18 PM »

Creamy is easy, but crunch and especially complexity/overtones as well as dynamics is what you don't get on these kinds of pickups.

I was also stunned by my stock PRS SE pickups (korean), but after 2 weeks or so I was bored by them sounding so flat and 2-dimensional.

WezV · « **Reply #4 on:** August 31, 2007, 02:41:12 PM »

i take it we are all aware that our ears start to blank out certain frequencies we hear a lot, especially when its from loud noise. Sometimes a break is needed to give your ears time to recover

Thats why playing something completely different can feel so refreshing.

FELINEGUITARS · « **Reply #5 on:** August 31, 2007, 05:13:59 PM »

I would also point out that the Nailbomb is a very warm (but aggressive) sounding pickup.
Having that in the bridge will not give as much tonal variation as having say a Miracle man or a Cold Sweat, when compared to the neck pickup.

From the sound of it you favour some of the crispy/harsh top end that the Cinese/Korean unit was kicking out - probably a ceramic magnet pickup

I too like that kind of tone and for that reason I steer away from a regular Nailbomb in any of my own guitars unless it is a naturally really bright guitar like a solid maple body or suchlike.

I fear there is a risk that you are not comparing like with like
If your guitar had a ceramic magnet BKP in it then it too may have a lot more presence.

I favour the BKPs that have a bit more top - so in the hot/overwound territory we are talking Miracle man, Cold Sweat or Painkiller (all ceramic)

I also like the Stormy Monday, Mule, VH2 and Riff Raff (all alnico powered) in the lower output ones as there is more dynamic range on tap which seems to compensate and give me the high end that i like.

Johnny Mac · « **Reply #6 on:** September 06, 2007, 08:26:12 PM »

Sounds like the guy in the shop strung the guitar with some Ernie Balls :roll:

opprobrium_9 · « **Reply #7 on:** September 06, 2007, 09:21:54 PM »

Quote from: Johnny Mac

Sounds like the guy in the shop strung the guitar with some Ernie Balls :roll:

Wow, you are persistent.

CJ · « **Reply #8 on:** September 07, 2007, 02:23:59 AM »

is it possible that your idea of a good tone isn't necessarily what most people think? i don't mean to criticize, but maybe BK's aren't quite right for you. i haven't really seen any of your posts, and i don't know how knowledgeable you are, so i could be wrong...

opprobrium_9 · « **Reply #9 on:** September 07, 2007, 04:43:56 AM »

Quote from: callme.nasty

is it possible that your idea of a good tone isn't necessarily what most people think? i don't mean to criticize, but maybe BK's aren't quite right for you. i haven't really seen any of your posts, and i don't know how knowledgeable you are, so i could be wrong...

How knowledgeable i am?... um, i don't really know what that means. And i doubt my idea of good tone "isn't necessarily what most people think" for i love the clips from some of our members here. Just because that pickup was "2nd rate" in terms of factory built with, most likely, not so great materials, doesn't mean that others would not like the tone as well. Just like Hunter said, when he got his Korean mock build, he loved the pickups but then got bored with them because the sound was, as he said, 2-dimensional. Maybe i was just a victim of this same problem? I certainly doubt my idea of good tone is THAT much different.

I love the Nailbomb... but given the sheer range of BKPs, and the fact that i haven't tried them all, there is much to be learned on my end in terms of tone potential in any given pickup (as there is undoubtedly the same learning curve for any user unfamiliar with them). There is such a huge range, and maybe my idea of "tone heaven" would be (and almost certainly is) attainable on some other pickup in the BKP line.

Maybe i should talk to Tim...

Roobubba · « **Reply #10 on:** September 07, 2007, 01:03:17 PM »

^^^^ Cracking response, Oppro!

I too favour the higher-presence, more clinical sounds, like what Feline alluded to. Last night at band practice, my miracle man was sounding absolultely superb. Bright, clean, chunky on the bass, but absolutely clinical on stopped notes.
I'm sure other people would hate my tone, but I'm reaching a point where I can understand what I like about my own tone, and how I want to improve it in the future. Thinking back to the INF2 pickups that were in my ibanez before I put the MM in at the bridge position - they weren't *that* bad. The difference with the MM pickups is twofold: Every sound sounds better, and I can access more sounds!

I always think in analogies, and guitar gear is no different. Just like computers, there's always a bottleneck with speed. With guitar gear, the tonal bottleneck might be pickups, (cables), pre-amp, power amp, effects units, speakers, cabinets... and so on.

In my case, the pickup wasn't the biggest bottleneck, but changing to the BKP gave me a noticeable improvement in tone, and the ability to improve tone much further by sorting out other bottlenecks later (like distortion effects, and noise reduction, in my case, being sorted this weekend and when my decimator arrives!).

Wow, I talk nonsense sometimes...

Roo

Pale Rider · « **Reply #11 on:** September 07, 2007, 07:43:41 PM »

Quote from: Roobubba

I too favour the higher-presence, more clinical sounds, like what Feline alluded to. Last night at band practice, my miracle man was sounding absolultely superb. Bright, clean, chunky on the bass, but absolutely clinical on stopped notes.

I really love that "mechanical" sound that some pickups generate. Like the one of EMG 81. I hope the Miracle Man can produce it too because I'm thinking to order it for my next custom guitar.

The rest of your post is not non-sense at all. I find it very methodical way of thinking about the "holy grail tone" search. I recently started to think that way too trying to complete the puzzle of guitar-pickups-amp-cab etc and that's the only way because tone is a chain of machines (except playing of-course).

Sorry for off-topic response.

CJ · « **Reply #12 on:** September 08, 2007, 12:57:18 AM »

Quote from: opprobrium_9

Quote from: callme.nasty
is it possible that your idea of a good tone isn't necessarily what most people think? i don't mean to criticize, but maybe BK's aren't quite right for you. i haven't really seen any of your posts, and i don't know how knowledgeable you are, so i could be wrong...

How knowledgeable i am?... um, i don't really know what that means. And i doubt my idea of good tone "isn't necessarily what most people think" for i love the clips from some of our members here. Just because that pickup was "2nd rate" in terms of factory built with, most likely, not so great materials, doesn't mean that others would not like the tone as well. Just like Hunter said, when he got his Korean mock build, he loved the pickups but then got bored with them because the sound was, as he said, 2-dimensional. Maybe i was just a victim of this same problem? I certainly doubt my idea of good tone is THAT much different.

I love the Nailbomb... but given the sheer range of BKPs, and the fact that i haven't tried them all, there is much to be learned on my end in terms of tone potential in any given pickup (as there is undoubtedly the same learning curve for any user unfamiliar with them). There is such a huge range, and maybe my idea of "tone heaven" would be (and almost certainly is) attainable on some other pickup in the BKP line.

Maybe i should talk to Tim...

as i said, i didn't mean any offense. obvously everybody has a different perspective on what a good tone is. i was just going by what you said about not liking your nailbomb, and the fact that you liked the cheap guitar better, that maybe you favored non-BKP's more.

Prawnik · « **Reply #13 on:** September 08, 2007, 11:49:06 AM »

I like whatever tone I'm not generating at the moment. If my sound is "clinical," I wish it were warmer. If the other guy has a warm tone, I think I'm too clinical. If I'm playing clean, I long for dirt. If I have a slight crunch going, I need raging distortion or maybe jazz clean or something that I don't quite have.

ailean · « **Reply #14 on:** September 08, 2007, 04:43:47 PM »

Quote from: Prawnik

I like whatever tone I'm not generating at the moment. If my sound is "clinical," I wish it were warmer. If the other guy has a warm tone, I think I'm too clinical. If I'm playing clean, I long for dirt. If I have a slight crunch going, I need raging distortion or maybe jazz clean or something that I don't quite have.

+1

I'm awaiting the day Tim anounces that he's designed a pickup that reads your mind and plays the way you most want to hear. (one that edits out dud notes would be a bonus too).