Duncan Jazz vs EJ Custom for clarity and brightness with distortion

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DanielMapleSG

New member
I have a BC Rich Mockingbird ST with a maple neck-through, ebony fretboard, mahogany wings, ebony stringers, and a flame maple veneer or top. I want to put a pickup with a lot of highs, bite, and clarity into the bridge and neck positions. I'm used to using 1 meg pots on my other guitars to achieve clarity and bite, but I could not use 1 meg pots on this one because I could not find stacked concentric pots that are 1 meg for this. I don't care about output since I can get that from my amp and the pickup booster pedal. I called up Seymour Duncan and they said their pickup with the most highs and clarity would be the jazz set for the bridge and the neck.

I play with a lot of distortion so I want clear pickups that sound defined so I am planning on buying the jazz or the Dimarzio EJ Custom. Has anyone had experience with the jazz in both positions? Has anyone also had experience with the EJ Custom on the bridge and the neck? If so what are the differences between them?
 
Re: Duncan Jazz vs EJ Custom for clarity and brightness with distortion

I use the Jazz set on one of my guitars. It's a Warmoth chambered black korina LP with a 24.75" scale wenge neck featuring a ziricote fretboard. Basically, my guitar is a well balanced one tone wise and also has a nice low end rumble. The Jazz set is incredible, even in this balanced to warm guitar the tone remains articulate with clarity. The Jazz set can take as much gain, distortion or even fuzz as you can throw at it. It's an incredibly versatile set and I couldn't recommend it enough to anybody looking for clarity and brightness from a humbucker. It's been said by some people that it doesn't get any brighter than the Jazz when talking humbuckers. In my experience that's a true statement.

The neck is articulate while still hanging on to the warmth you would expect from a neck humbucker. So, even though it is articulate and clear you can still pull off some nice creamy leads with it and it can take distortion like nobody's business. The bridge position can handle more gain than you would ever expect from a humbucker with "Jazz" for a name. It's bright as hell and great for palm mutes and eardrum bleeding solos. If you want treble the Jazz set is for you.
 
Re: Duncan Jazz vs EJ Custom for clarity and brightness with distortion

It would help to know what amplification is been used and roughly how the controls are set.
 
Re: Duncan Jazz vs EJ Custom for clarity and brightness with distortion

DanielMapleSG said:
I have a BC Rich Mockingbird ST with a maple neck-through, ebony fretboard, mahogany wings, ebony stringers, and a flame maple veneer or top. I want to put a pickup with a lot of highs, bite, and clarity into the bridge and neck positions. I'm used to using 1 meg pots on my other guitars to achieve clarity and bite, but I could not use 1 meg pots on this one because I could not find stacked concentric pots that are 1 meg for this. I don't care about output since I can get that from my amp and the pickup booster pedal. I called up Seymour Duncan and they said their pickup with the most highs and clarity would be the jazz set for the bridge and the neck.

I play with a lot of distortion so I want clear pickups that sound defined so I am planning on buying the jazz or the Dimarzio EJ Custom. Has anyone had experience with the jazz in both positions? Has anyone also had experience with the EJ Custom on the bridge and the neck? If so what are the differences between them?
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I own both, I was also looking for a sub-PAF type brightness. The EJ Custom is very bright. The Jazz is a lot more balanced, somewhere between the '59 and the EJ Custom. It's a tough call, on the one hand you like bright pickups to the extent that you're willing to use 1 meg pots, but on the other hand you want to play with a lot of distortion, and the Jazz will be much better in that case. The EJ Custom didn't have enough lows and mids for a good overdriven tone, but the Jazz sounds great when overdriven.

The other notable option is the Humbucker from Hell, but I haven't tried that one yet.
 
Re: Duncan Jazz vs EJ Custom for clarity and brightness with distortion

The speaker cabinet I use is Marshall 1936 2x12 with G12-T75 speakers in it. I alternate between playing through a 6505+ head and a 6534+ head. I usually have the mids turned up on both, the bass low, and the highs and presence change depending on the guitar. I never use the resonance knob. The gain is set at 6. I hope that helps in terms of how the controls are roughly set.
 
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