Re: Best single coil in an RG with Jason Becker and Full Shred
The Dimarzio Areas are some of the best I have found for an RG middle position. They are noiseless as well. They sound great clean, but really shine for shred with as much gain as you want to throw at them. The Area 61 and Virtual Vintage 54 pro keep up with humbuckers very well. The area 67 works well with lower powered humbuckers. I had to reverse the hot and ground on the Dimarzio singles (green to hot, red to ground) to keep them in phase with Dimarzio humbuckers. That seems odd, but it was true in every case I have installed them in an RG.
For the record, I love Duncans in my Les Paul, PRS, SG etc, but not so much in my RGs. At the moment I have one Fred/area67/Paf Joe, another one with Air Zone/Area61/Paf Pro, and another with Tone Zone/VV54pro/Paf Pro. If I did not already have an area 61 in the other one, I would use it in the RG with the Fred. It works great with that combo too. The Cruiser neck works great with all those combos too, but I like the more vintage strat tones of the Areas a little more.
One tip about installation in Ibanez RG's: The switch splits the humbucker coils in the 2 and 4 position and combines them with the middle. Because of this, it matters which way you mount the pickups in the cavity. I like the inner coils of the humbuckers to combine with the middle in the 2 and 4 position for a more powerful tone. If you look at the edges of the metal baseplate FROM THE TOP, looking down on the bobbin, you will see a blob of solder. I point that blob of solder toward the bridge on the bridge pickup, and toward the neck on the neck pickup. If you want a thinner weaker sound in the 2 and 4, you can reverse that.
