HSS SUPER-STRAT PICKUPS!

[mst]

Hello guys! psychological consultation needeed!

Is time for my HSS superstrat to have the right pickups cause I am not satisfied with the sound of the actual ones.

My guitar is Korina body with poplar top and has a laminated maple neck with epoxy fingerboard- no I am not kidding ahahah

In the neck and middle I am mounting the stock alnico V, SC pickups, 6,2 K resistance. They sound nice, but thin and little personality.

IN the bridge I am mounting also alnico V Humbucker 9,6 k resistance I believe. Sounds nice nut I have to say it tends to be muddy with distortion and is not as nearly as articulate and clear as I would love it to be. I have set up a push pull series parallel on the bridge which gives me in the parallel mode a sound that goes extremely well with SC.

Now my vision of tone.

Bridge

My idea is to have a great bridge pickup that has not the super ultra high output thing cause I believe even the hardest of distiortions are better if generated through more gain in the amp or a booster rather than the output of the pickups. Sweet voice when soling and even rythms are what I am looking for. Veeeeery dynamic ( this stands for all 3 pickups)!! Balanced across the strings. Big fan of the SC and parallel mode.

Neck.

Cant decide if going with a mini HB or a High output SC. I guess the High out put SC has a clarity that I cannot give up. Please help me cause the main problem here is that is has no continuity with the tone of the bridge hb, which I need.

Middle. I almost never use it by himself, but a lot with the other 2, especially Middle and bridge. It should thin up the sound a little without sounding from another instrument if u know what I mean. In the neck + middle I would love it to not wash away that beautiful warm tone too much.

One final request. I don’t use my pickups too high. I believe I found my tone into having them a little lower and pushing harder with my hand. Middle pickup would be even a bit lower cause my pick goes into it when moving ahah. I believe this is important piece of information.

A lot of words for a pickup! And I apologize, but sound is no easy thing to describe!!!

your psychic patient

Mst

 

[Mincer]

Re: HSS SUPER-STRAT PICKUPS!

Well, you have a lot of choices here. A higher output but still-dynamic humbucker for the bridge is the 59/Custom Hybrid. It won't hit the amp too hard, but it is certainly louder than PAF-type pickups. The split sound is really good, too, as well as parallel, as it doesn't cancel a ton of frequencies due to the mismatched coils. I'd go for something like a Classic Strat Stack in the middle to keep it hum-cancelling and have enough power to compete with the humbucker. I'd go for a Little 59 for the neck to get a igher output, smoother sound than a traditional single coil. It sort of falls somewhere between a single coil and a full-size humbucker, sound-wise. The attack is still there, but the sustain is smooth, and it has enough output to push the amp.