Tele Guys! What's Your Favourite Type of Neck Pickup?

[Kam]

Just for fun, really.

It seems to be a lot more common for people to mess around with the neck pickup in their Teles, rather than their bridge pickups; probably because the Tele bridge pup is a really integral part of the Tele sound and the overwhelming consensus on most Tele neck pickups is...meh. Personally, I like them, but I can see why people don't. Teles also seem highly adaptable to different kinds of pups; moreso than a lot of other styles of guitars, both sonically and aesthetically.

So, I thought a poll on the topic might be interesting.

I've probably forgotten something really obvious, so if you vote other, please mention what it is below.

EDIT: D'oh! Yup, forgot about Esquires...

[uOpt]

Re: Tele Guys! What's Your Favourite Type of Neck Pickup?

Neck pickup alone - P90.

Unfortunately the "both on" position sounds right with the useless awg43 tele pickup.

[ricks]

Re: Tele Guys! What's Your Favourite Type of Neck Pickup?

60's antiquity, has a little extra treble

[JeffB]

Re: Tele Guys! What's Your Favourite Type of Neck Pickup?

Cover and wiring makes all the diff. Old brass cover, original wiring not so useful except with a heavy gain fuzz to do a woman tone thing ala LZ1.

Modern nickel silver cover and modern wiring on a tele neck pup is excellent and what I prefer. Anything else sounds wierd to me...especially mini or regular humbuckers.

[Gypsyblue]

Re: Tele Guys! What's Your Favourite Type of Neck Pickup?

I think a Strat pickup sounds best.

[pinto79]

Re: Tele Guys! What's Your Favourite Type of Neck Pickup?

I voted humbucker because my favourite Tele is loaded with an EMG 81 in the bridge and an 85 in the neck and it's very toneful and useful.

I have another Tele with an Area T set and I'm not in love with the neck pickup. I'm considering going back to a dual Hot Rails setup as that was very nice in the neck.

[StratFreak]

Re: Tele Guys! What's Your Favourite Type of Neck Pickup?

I love the teles that are single coil bridge, hum neck. You get the full twangy, super bright, awesome tele bridge tone, and also a super fat, creamy humbucker sound in the neck. that sounds damn awesome to me!

[jeremy]

Re: Tele Guys! What's Your Favourite Type of Neck Pickup?

i voted firebird but it really depends.

if its a vintage type tele then i like a strat pup. if its hotter i prefer either a mini humbucker or firebird depending on which matches up better tonally/output wise

[dr.barlo]

Re: Tele Guys! What's Your Favourite Type of Neck Pickup?

I am very happy with the neck antiquity HB in the neck of my tele...

B

[Myaccount876]

Re: Tele Guys! What's Your Favourite Type of Neck Pickup?

The good 'ol tele neck single coil does it really well. A lot of people always complain and say they're useless because the 43 AWG wire makes them too hot/dark. What they haven't tried is 500K pots. And then the nay-sayers say "Oh but then the bridge it too bright". It isn't rocket science, lower the treble side of the bridge pickup, use your tone knob, roll back the treble a little on your amp, any of those work. The world doesn't explode if you use 500K pots with single coils.

[teleblooz]

Re: Tele Guys! What's Your Favourite Type of Neck Pickup?

I chose humbucker....since that's what i always seem to wind up with in the neck of tele(s). However, I dig the traditional single coil and P-90's too. Get the proper match to your guitar and the bridge pup and any of the above are able to take you there.

[jeremy]

Re: Tele Guys! What's Your Favourite Type of Neck Pickup?

lower the treble side of the bridge pickup, use your tone knob, roll back the treble a little on your amp, any of those work. The world doesn't explode if you use 500K pots with single coils.

no the world wont explode but i sure dont like what two of those things do to the tone.

lowering the treble side of the pup changes the volume of those strings, not the treble balance of the tone of the whole instrument. using your tone control is a fine idea but rolling the treble down on the amp will change its response on most amps since the passive tone circuits are interactive.

a good tele neck pup is a fine sounding pup, just not a tone that i like or want to use. changing the pots to 500k to make it more usable for me spoils the tone of the bridge pup which i much prefer with 250k pots.

[JeffB]

Re: Tele Guys! What's Your Favourite Type of Neck Pickup?

Tellin ya..Nickel cover. No need for a 500k pot. My pup is 43g, a3 poles at around 7k. With A5 poles it would probably sound better than a strat neck pup

[King IzzO)))]

Re: Tele Guys! What's Your Favourite Type of Neck Pickup?

I voted Filtertron, not because I've tried it, but because I think it would be perfect.

Everything else seems kinda off to me. I'm getting ready to try a homemade stag mag type with A3 rod mags, we'll see how that goes.

[ItsaBass]

Re: Tele Guys! What's Your Favourite Type of Neck Pickup?

A late '60's patent number humbucker in an ES-345 is my favorite neck pickup I've ever used.

In general, I have to vote Firebird, however.