misterwhizzy
Well-known member
As long as I've been a member here, all I've ever read from anyone who's not a through-and-through metalhead is that actives are sterile, cold, boring, etc. Pick your word for uninspired.
Then I got a call from my good friend John Jolly, as I'd believe a lot of you also have. He said, "Hey, man, have you tried these f***in' d**n Blackouts, man?" Or something like that. He told me, "I don't want to go sayin' they're the cat's meow, or anything, but..." So I started looking around. I browsed eBay and Craigslist, and I talked to Jolly again, and I told him I'd find a set to put in my Les Paul.
I hadn't even had the bug to change my tone, except I was looking for something with a little more fullness than the Crazy 8. It was so close to being what I wanted, but it didn't quite have the low-mid chunk I wanted to hear with palm mutes. And this is really just where the story begins.
I finally ordered a set on eBay. It came with short-shaft pots, which wouldn't fit in the Les Paul. And there were only two of them. So I ordered a full set of four, and when they arrived I started the wiring. I got everything wired up and went to plug it in. Nothing. I went over and over and over that diagram, and I'd work about half an hour for a week, and I still couldn't get it right. I measured one of the pots closed, halfway open, and fully open, and I measured no resistance across any of the lugs. It was either bad, or I had burned it out. At that point, I decided to take it from the top again.
After I received another set of pots, I pulled everything out all the way to the switch, and I rewired it all again. In the midst of this, I did have output at some points. I'd have the plate off, the battery hanging out, and I'd get something to come out, but it was weak and crackly. I finally gave up and took it to Infinity Guitars in Houston. Randy worked through it with me until we finally figured out that my switch has the hot and ground backwards.
Now it's perfect, and that brings me to my original point. The Blackouts are loud. They're high output in the truest sense of the words. But that doesn't mean they lack dynamics. That doesn't mean they won't clean up with the volume rolled back. That doesn't mean you can't go from clean to mean with the flick of a switch. I don't understand the hatred, and I honestly believe a lot of it comes from anonymous internet types who are repeating things they read online while wording them differently enough that it sounds like it's an original thought. You want a higher post count? Good for you.
That being said, I've never played EMGs, so I'm not going to make the comparison here. Blackouts just sound gigantic. They're fairly balanced, if a bit bass heavy in the bridge. The focus is more lower-mid based than the Custom 8 or Crazy 8 that were in there before, and I think that contributes to the bigger sound. That and the higher output. I'm still trying to get the neck to exactly the right height, because the D and G strings drive the amp a little harder than I'd like. I definitely would not call the neck cleans glassy; I think warm is a better word. But both positions stay crystal clear through the entire gain range and volume knob travel. Honestly, the reason I'd been putting things off so long is the weirdness of having a battery in my guitar and the necessity of changing out all the pots for something I wasn't sure about.
But they're awesome, and they'll stick around.
Then I got a call from my good friend John Jolly, as I'd believe a lot of you also have. He said, "Hey, man, have you tried these f***in' d**n Blackouts, man?" Or something like that. He told me, "I don't want to go sayin' they're the cat's meow, or anything, but..." So I started looking around. I browsed eBay and Craigslist, and I talked to Jolly again, and I told him I'd find a set to put in my Les Paul.
I hadn't even had the bug to change my tone, except I was looking for something with a little more fullness than the Crazy 8. It was so close to being what I wanted, but it didn't quite have the low-mid chunk I wanted to hear with palm mutes. And this is really just where the story begins.
I finally ordered a set on eBay. It came with short-shaft pots, which wouldn't fit in the Les Paul. And there were only two of them. So I ordered a full set of four, and when they arrived I started the wiring. I got everything wired up and went to plug it in. Nothing. I went over and over and over that diagram, and I'd work about half an hour for a week, and I still couldn't get it right. I measured one of the pots closed, halfway open, and fully open, and I measured no resistance across any of the lugs. It was either bad, or I had burned it out. At that point, I decided to take it from the top again.
After I received another set of pots, I pulled everything out all the way to the switch, and I rewired it all again. In the midst of this, I did have output at some points. I'd have the plate off, the battery hanging out, and I'd get something to come out, but it was weak and crackly. I finally gave up and took it to Infinity Guitars in Houston. Randy worked through it with me until we finally figured out that my switch has the hot and ground backwards.
Now it's perfect, and that brings me to my original point. The Blackouts are loud. They're high output in the truest sense of the words. But that doesn't mean they lack dynamics. That doesn't mean they won't clean up with the volume rolled back. That doesn't mean you can't go from clean to mean with the flick of a switch. I don't understand the hatred, and I honestly believe a lot of it comes from anonymous internet types who are repeating things they read online while wording them differently enough that it sounds like it's an original thought. You want a higher post count? Good for you.
That being said, I've never played EMGs, so I'm not going to make the comparison here. Blackouts just sound gigantic. They're fairly balanced, if a bit bass heavy in the bridge. The focus is more lower-mid based than the Custom 8 or Crazy 8 that were in there before, and I think that contributes to the bigger sound. That and the higher output. I'm still trying to get the neck to exactly the right height, because the D and G strings drive the amp a little harder than I'd like. I definitely would not call the neck cleans glassy; I think warm is a better word. But both positions stay crystal clear through the entire gain range and volume knob travel. Honestly, the reason I'd been putting things off so long is the weirdness of having a battery in my guitar and the necessity of changing out all the pots for something I wasn't sure about.
But they're awesome, and they'll stick around.
