Recent content by MikeS

Now that these have been out for a few months, I'm curious if anyone has had a chance to give them a go? I may be looking for something new for my 7-string Strandberg and the description for the Machete certainly gives me the impression it's a great answer for those looking for less compression...

Testing a new pickguard on my white mahogany Warmoth/Fender strat. Pickguard is loaded with a DiMarzio Fred and PAF Joe. I don't know why I continue to use this body as a test bed for pickguard swaps, as I don't think I'll ever find a guard that I like better than the blue shell loaded with a...

Played around on the Strandberg tonight looking to find some settings to reign in the bridge pickup (Fishman Fluence Modern Ceramic). I've long reached the conclusion that the ceramic version of the Moderns is not at all my thing. Time to test the neck, which is the alnico version, in the bridge...

Very cool, that color combo is a lot of fun.

While it's not necessarily interesting or unique, I've found the G&L PTB tone circuit to be worlds more useful than the traditional Fender tone circuit.

I'll second this, I love Artie's coil swap mod. I have a version of it on two different guitars, both HH, both with standard toggles and using a push/pull for the swap. This creates two flavors of the coil swap (bridge stud + neck screw in the bridge position and neck stud + bridge screw in the...

One of my favorite heavy JB tones is Jerry Cantrell's rhythm sound on "We Die Young."

Finally received a DiMarzio order I've been waiting on and tonight finally had the chance to install the Chopper T into my baritone thinline. At the same time I removed the 3-barrel bridge in favor of the more modern 6-saddle to help with intonation. Put it through the paces tonight and the...

I cut them after a little detuning. I cut them somewhere over the fingerboard, as cutting them too close to the tuner results in more frequent string end stabbings. Unless the board seems extra dirty, on guitars with floating bridges I'll sometimes go 1 at a time just to reduce chances of...

It's not. It's a function of string tension, geometry, spring tension, spring rate, and personal preference. I have different guitars set up different ways. I can't get a flutter with all of my setups, nor do I want to. But speaking of flutter, tonight I was playing my ESP LTD Serpent-600. It's...

Yeah, as others have said, Cool Rails is reasonably close to the Jazz. I think the highs of the CR are a warmer than the Jazz and it's a little more mid-focused. I've not A/B'ed them in the same guitar, but I have preferred the CR in 2 different strats over my experience with the Jazz in a...

QPs sit somewhere in the middle. Fat with with aggressive mids and plenty of output. High output single coils, can get a bit noisy if you're more prone to 60-cycle in your environment or signal chain. They are fun, but I don't find they are all that versatile.

There are photos on the Duncan website where the Sentient slug poles appear black, and others where they appear in the typical nickel-coated steel. The pickup's page doesn't give any indication (nor is there even an option to order it one way or the other). I've seen the same on seller websites...

I've never seen a cream quarter pounder.

I've not played a Katana 3, but with modeling amps I'm more concerned with the EQ in my pickups than I am output. My experience has not been that the JB sounds muffled or that the Custom is flat. When you characterize it as "characterless" I think I understand where you're coming from - it's a...