Black Winter or Distortion in SG?

[omg81]

I'm thinking about putting Distortions or Black Winters in my good old Epi G400, and possibly a future Gibson SG Special project with these. Did anyone of you try this before? Thing is, I love the SG, it's a badass design with that characteristic dirty, snotty hard rock/Black Sabbath sound. My worry is that the already bass-weak, mid-heavy SG will be just too harsh with SD Distortions, and possibly still too harsh with Black Winters.

I found one short video of someone using a Distortion in a Gibson SG:

Any experiences to share? Thoughts?

 

[Mincer]

Re: Black Winter or Distortion in SG?

You SG shouldn't be too harsh with Black Winters. You can also try the Custom or Custom 5, which should un-mid your guitar too. You can also use the Compare function on our new website to hear your choices side-by-side.

 

[marytakesadrag]

Re: Black Winter or Distortion in SG?

IMO, Distortion crunches better (more compression) and cuts better (more compression + high mids). Black Winter is kinda open sounding. I love the Neck pickup. I think the Black Winter is more organic and the Distortion is more aggressive. I think they both have good bass but if you want more from the Distortion, you can get thicker strings and it'll get the bass, but characteristically, won't get muddy from the thicker strings.

What pickups did you have before to consider the SG bass weak? The SG may have less bass than thicker Mahogany guitars but only because its tighter rather than deep/muddy. So if you get a pickup with hearty bass, the frequencies are actually there in the guitar and it'll show in a punchy awesome way. I always found SG the rhythm guitar of Gods. A5 magnets work well as the slight mid-scoop helps balance the SG and allows leads to fit in the mix.

Just depends what genre you'll be playing, how hot you want the output, if its strictly rhythm or lead, or if you want to do both in the bridge position.

 

[omg81]

Re: Black Winter or Distortion in SG?

I think I should clarify what I'm going to do. I have a Charvel So-Cal which has Distortions, and it's great. However, shortly afterwards I bought a Black Winter and installed it in my Jackson DK6 (single-pup guitar), and I truly fell in love. It had an EMG-81 before, it was a nice but not great guitar, but the BW turned it into a ****ing beast.

So now I'm thinking about buying a set of BWs for the Charvel too. With the Distortions, it's ace for Slayer, which I love, but the BWs are just darker, more balanced, and excel at almost anything. Most notably black metal, obviously.

So I wondered, what should I do with the Distortion set then? And I came up with the idea of putting them in my G400. Currently there are Phat Cats in there, which are great for blues and stuff, but I'm just more into extreme metal and don't play it a lot. At the same time, I use it for wiring/switching experiments. So now I wonder: should I put the BWs straight into the Charvel and the Distortions in the SG then, or should I first try the BWs in the SG before installing them in the Charvel?

I'll probably do the latter, but I'd just love to hear experiences with either. Regardless of how good Charvel and Jackson are, my heart still beats for the SG. For its badass oldschool devil looks, its raunchy sound, and its lovely squeal, its flatness and comfort, not to mention the unrivalled upper fret access.

I said bass-weak because it clearly has a mid/upper-mid tendency, and has the least bass of all my guitars. That's true for my other SG too, a Gibson SG Raw Power, which is all maple and is just too brutally harsh even with its Gibson '57 pickups.

More rhythm than lead, but lead too, style is Slayer and Mayhem and maybe a bit of Sabbath and Priest.

To me it now seems that very few put either into an SG. Maybe most people who use these pickups don't care much about that old hard rock guitar? I'd love to learn about experiences, I know the pickups, I'm just curious how they are in an SG.

 

[Gibson 1964]

Re: Black Winter or Distortion in SG?

I have black winters in the SG in my avatar. They sound great. But it is a set neck, all black limba guitar. In a more traditional SG I used to have a distortion. I liked it quite a lot. I might go with distortions as they have a bit more low mids there. I think the black winters work very well in my SG. Was playing it into my 6505mh last night and I really like it. I think it would work well for what you want.