Let's bend the G string above a side by side humbucker in neck position: the sound should fade away when the string passes from above the G pole to above the D pole.
It's due to the side by side design and explains the commercial fail of pickups like the Fender Super 55 Split Coils, for example.
There's a way to overcome this problem: Fralin Split Blades have itheir magnetic poles and coils ending further than the G and D strings, in such a way that each coil "hears" these two strings. It prevents any muting due to phase cancellation.
Evans Eliminators were also designed like that if memory serves me, at least for the mid and neck PU's - the bridge one hosted just two coils side by side, since the G string is rarely bent enough to go from a G pole to the D pole above a bridge PU...
Zexcoil pickups, with their
six coils, host slanted blade poles going each under two strings for the same reason.
I frankly don't know to which extent G&L pickups have been designed to avoid this phenomenon. The temporary muting of a bent G string might also be slightly less noticeable with such Z shaped transducers, since their coils don't capture exactly the same harmonics because of their location.
But what I evoke explains largely IMHO why side by side HB's can be found mostly on bass guitars - where bending the D string above the A poles is generally not a risk...
My two cents, FWIW. HTH.
