Brian Setzer Grestch sound

[epii10]

I'm getting one of the Ibanez Artcore hollow body-electric fat body guitars that look sort of like the Grestch 6120 (Brian Setzer's guitar). These Artcore's are unbelievably inexpensive being in the $300 to $400+ price range and have gotten rave reviews. I'm told that you can effectively make them sound like a Grestch by changing out the pickups.

Here's the question:
Could anyone suggest the two pickups I should consider for that "50's" finger-pickin' Chet Atkins sound? Are there pickups designed more for a finger-pickin' style that would better suit my purposes other rthan the stock humbuckers that come with the Artcores? I really know very little about guitar electronics.

TIA
Rick

 

[kmcguitars]

Re: Brian Setzer Grestch sound

They have Brian Setzer PuPs in the custom shop aswell as Seymour's
version of flitertons and Hilotron's or T.v. jones makes PuPs like that to.
A big part of his sound is the roland space echo he use's for slap back.
Last time I saw Brian play was in the late 70's. He was useing some
strange solid body guitar ?? into a SF Super and I thought he sounded
great.

 

[Wattage]

Re: Brian Setzer Grestch sound

The Ibanez has full sized buckers so your best bet would be the TV Trons from TV Jones most likely. I haven't heard any other hum sized Filtertron knockoffs though I am sure they're out there if you look. TV has a real good rep and Gretsch uses them in the Setzer model. The next best thing might be a set of Phat Cats.

If you look around you can find the Hot Licks Setzer video and you can see Brian's rig pretty well laid out and yes he loves the Roland Space Echo. Most guys use an analog delay playing rockabilly type stuff, Brian also uses a chorus quite a bit too.