Black Winter owner.... Feedback so far????

[Lucy Diamond]

Re: Black Winter owner.... Feedback so far????

I imagine it would. Sure a V body shape shape is going to sound different than a Strat, but I wouldn't hesitate if it were mine.

Is that the guitar with the JB in it?

No sir, I have a JB in an Ibanez USA Custom. She's mahogany with a flame maple top and the JB has served me pretty well in that one.

[Lucy Diamond]

Re: Black Winter owner.... Feedback so far????

I imagine it would. Sure a V body shape shape is going to sound different than a Strat, but I wouldn't hesitate if it were mine.

Is that the guitar with the JB in it?

No sir, I have a JB in an Ibanez USA Custom. She's mahogany with a flame maple top and the JB has served me pretty well in that one.

[Gone_Shootin]

Re: Black Winter owner.... Feedback so far????

Ok, just wondering. I still haven't gotten around to that mag swap I'm wanting to do in one of my JBs. I keep getting distracted, lol. I'll get to it before too long, though.

[Scott Olson]

Re: Black Winter owner.... Feedback so far????

Passing on this review from the guitarist of Novembers of Doom:

Very happy to report that the Black Winter pups are excellent. Installed them into my Subsonic baritone and played through several different rigs (a Peavey 6505+ half-stack, a Line 6 Flextone half-stack, and my Marshall EL34 tube power amp and multi-FX processors into a Mustaine sig Marshall cab), to see how they would perform in fairly different setups. A lot of times when we travel (especially overseas) we wind up using rented backlines which differ from what my normal rig would be, so I was curious to see what I could expect. What I got was a tone that didn't drastically change from what I'd had before with my other Duncans, but added a bit more meat and edge, which is a welcome thing! Honestly I was quite happy with the tone I'd been getting before.....or at least I thought so until I heard what my guitar and rig sounds like now with the BW's, because I now have an added edginess to my tone that I hadn't realized I was really missing. As you know from having heard our material, while we go for the heavy low-tuned crunchy sound, at the same time we utilize a lot of odd chord shapes and melodies we move around within the chord patterns that require having a distinct clarity in our tone as well as chunk and distortion. The Black Winter pups definitely give me that, I am happy to say. One thing I personally dislike about pickups like, for example, active EMGs is that they give you heaviness and chunk, but I always feel like I'm losing that bite and clarity that I really need. On the opposite end of the spectrum, when I have used passive classic pups like 490/498s, they have great tone but they don't give me that beefy heaviness that I need from the low-tuned baritone. The Black Winter pups seem to fit right into that perfect middle ground, for lack of a better term, that I really need. I can see why these would work great for black metal bands and more progressive death metal bands, who also need that clarity and definition when picking out the melodies and all the little intricacies while simultaneously thrashing out the heavy bottom end riffs. These Black Winter's definitely seem to give me a good balanced tone, yet with teeth!

I was impressed that I didn't have to alter my amp settings too greatly, other than backing off the gain a bit due to the seemingly higher output. Honestly one of my concerns was that these pickups might be a bit too rough for my clean tone, because I know sometimes when I've tried using similar styled pups in the past I've found that they break up my clean sound in a way I didn't care much for. VERY happy to report that wasn't the case this time! Rather than causing any unwanted distortion in my clean sound, I had a bit more of a brighter midrange-to-high happening, and the neck pickup really sounded great on the clean channel, especially through the Peavey and Marshall rigs. Seemingly unlike many guys in brutal bands, I tend to use my neck pickup a lot, or set the guitar in the middle position between the two humbuckers, for a lot of my rhythm playing. These pickups somewhat surprisingly worked very well for that, because I still got that percussive smooth tone I like but also with an added bit of edge that I was lacking before that definitely helped me cut through everything with more clarity.

I'm trying to think of any kind of constructive criticism I can offer on these..........honestly so far I cannot, haha. Maybe after a bit more time I might start being able to nitpick a bit more thoroughly, but as for right now I'm very much enjoying these pups in my arsenal. Can't thank you enough for setting me up with these, I really hope they catch on because I think they'll really appeal to a lot of players out there if they give 'em a chance. Oh and I definitely think these don't have to just appeal to guys who play extreme metal, they've definitely got a diverse enough tonal personality that could be used for guys playing everything from NWOBHM old school stuff to even guys who want to play mainstream rock looking for some different tonal possibilities. I have a feeling these would be amazing in one of my old Explorers, that's going to be my next task!

[Lucy Diamond]

Re: Black Winter owner.... Feedback so far????

None of these reviews say anything we haven't already covered here.

The Winters are A M A Z I N G.

[dvanburen]

Re: Black Winter owner.... Feedback so far????

I had a snow white esp eclipse II that i sold last year. should have kept it but it was mahogany body, maple cap, ebony board. LP style guitar. I'm thinking about getting a used one and putting a set of black winters in it. How do you guys think that would sound? Either that or a superstrat but im leaning on the esp

[SGFanatic]

Re: Black Winter owner.... Feedback so far????

I had a snow white esp eclipse II that i sold last year. should have kept it but it was mahogany body, maple cap, ebony board. LP style guitar. I'm thinking about getting a used one and putting a set of black winters in it. How do you guys think that would sound? Either that or a superstrat but im leaning on the esp

I put my BW in my Viper, and as far as relative tone is concerned, they're almost the same. I think it would sound great. I couldn't be happier with this setup.

Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk

[Lucy Diamond]

Re: Black Winter owner.... Feedback so far????

I'm either going to put winters in my strat or a '78 with a slash neck. I can't decide yet.

[DoomBuggi]

Re: Black Winter owner.... Feedback so far????

I dig the hell out of the Black Winter. I've posted a thread on the BW, but I'll leave this here, as it relates to this thread. Salud! -Jo

[dvanburen]

Re: Black Winter owner.... Feedback so far????

as I mentioned in the other post, I love this vid. It makes me want to get an all black les paul with these black winters. Honestly, what do you guys think about guitars, wood, fingerboard that these winters work well in? I may just buy a new guitar just for these pickups

[DoomBuggi]

Re: Black Winter owner.... Feedback so far????

as I mentioned in the other post, I love this vid. It makes me want to get an all black les paul with these black winters. Honestly, what do you guys think about guitars, wood, fingerboard that these winters work well in? I may just buy a new guitar just for these pickups

Thank you very much. I like this Les Paul. Its a bit beaten up, but its its lighter than the other Les Pauls I have, and sound nice with the pickups. As far as wood selections for these pickups, I can't give much of a hand. As of yet, I've only played them in this Les Paul. The specs on that guitar is the following;

1993 Gibson Les Paul Studio
Mahogany Body, and Neck
Maple Top
Ebony Fretboard

The other guitarist has a set in his Gibson SG voodoo, which is a swamp ash body, mahogany neck, and ebony fretboard. Those pickups sound pretty awesome through his rig as well. I haven't played that guitar though. They are definitely worth trying out.

[Lucy Diamond]

Re: Black Winter owner.... Feedback so far????

as I mentioned in the other post, I love this vid. It makes me want to get an all black les paul with these black winters. Honestly, what do you guys think about guitars, wood, fingerboard that these winters work well in? I may just buy a new guitar just for these pickups

Hi,

I would try them in anything. I'm reading all over the net that people are using them in Strats, Les Pauls, Explorers, Destroyers, SGs....US, foreign...whatever.

I still maintain that they are very useful for Jazz but honestly, I haven't read anything about people putting them in a hollowbody yet

What are you looking to put them in?? Maybe we can go from there?

[dvanburen]

Re: Black Winter owner.... Feedback so far????

What are you looking to put them in?? Maybe we can go from there?

honestly, several guitars come to mind. LP type with mohagany body and neck to warm it up but i like ebony boards. I love les pauls but I had an esp eclipse LP style with ebony board that I loved. I sold it but considering another one of those. And also considered jackson superstrat

[Lucy Diamond]

Re: Black Winter owner.... Feedback so far????

honestly, several guitars come to mind. LP type with mohagany body and neck to warm it up but i like ebony boards. I love les pauls but I had an esp eclipse LP style with ebony board that I loved. I sold it but considering another one of those. And also considered jackson superstrat

Yes, yes and YES my friend.

You are set with any of those options.

My explorer pro is a solid piece of mahogany whoop@$$ and she sounds awesome with the winters.

The winters prove that high output doesn't necessarily have to mean high gain. They clean up so well and maintain so much articulation that I think they will make people who are willing to listen redefine their terms.

[MicahMischief]

Re: Black Winter owner.... Feedback so far????

Hmmmmmm I REALLY want to try these, but I'll have to wait until I buy a new guitar.
I'm getting ready to do a massively custom setup on my only current electric.