Hard choice: Cool rails or Vintage Stragged for neck????

[edi_87]

Hey, I have Vintage stragged in my MIU strat (neck) it's ok, sounds great and everything, but when i start playing jazz or fusion there's lack of the sound of humbicking pickup.. I mean, I need more warmth and something sounding closer to fat humbucker (but not a humbucker!!! i love single coils)!!)
What do you think of putting Cool rails instead of Vintage Stragged?? How does it sound when split with single coil (middle).. Could you compare the tone of the 2 pickups? Thanks

 

[Rainmaker]

Re: Hard choice: Cool rails or Vintage Stragged for neck????

Don't know much about Vintage Staggered.. but I have a Cool Rail in the neck of my Pacifica... take note it IS a humbucker, just in single coil housing.

Bee

 

[Lewguitar]

Re: Hard choice: Cool rails or Vintage Stragged for neck????

The Vintage Staggered being a Duncan SSL-1? You're right...a vintage style Strat pickup will never sound like a humbucker...unless you're Eric Johnson.

I don't think the Cool Rails (which is a humbucker) will give you what you want either.

Probably the closest to a paf humbucker in a single coil size would be the Little 59...tho that is also a humbucker.

If you want to stick with true single coils, consider the APS-2. Those are fat, chunky and plucky. Alnico 2 single coils, like the APS-2 and Antiquity Texas Hots (also worth considering) have a thicker chewier tone with more mids than the alnico 5 SSL-1 Vintage Staggered pickups you are using.

But there are no single coils that sound exactly like a paf humbucker.

Personally, I'd go for the Duncan Texas Hots or APS-2's.

 

[Vincent]

Re: Hard choice: Cool rails or Vintage Stragged for neck????

Try Kinman pickups Avn 62 blues model. They are hum-cancelling, and sort of sound like a very fat single coil. Truly under-rated these pickups are. I went to Kinman's factory in Queensland Australia, and he is a great pickup maker - pays inornate amounts of attention to detail and tone. He ONLY makes single coils, although he has created this one single coil that sounds like a P-90.

 

[Travis]

Re: Hard choice: Cool rails or Vintage Stragged for neck????

Personally I think the Cool Rails is the bee's knees. But take Lew's advice on tone. He knows his stuff.

 

[Benjy_26]

Re: Hard choice: Cool rails or Vintage Stragged for neck????

i play the APS flats in my strat and they sound very good for jazz style playing. Another pickup I really liked at the neck is the Dimarzio Virtual Vintage Blues. It doesn't sound exactly like a classic single, it has a darker, meatier sound than that, but it walks the line between clucky single and fat 'bucker very nicely.