Iron Maiden Clean Sounds, Humbuckers?

[James Rock]

So I'm fixing up an old hss washburn and going down the kinda 80s metal path. I'm usually a single coil or lp guy so I'm tossing up whether to go overwound single coils or rails in the middle and neck. I kind of want to go the Iron Maiden ish route, hoping to get in the ball park of the cleans on Fear Of The Dark (album) and select songs like Hallowed Be Thy Name, those cleans are pretty clean, did they have rails in their guitars by Fear Of The Dark or was it still full size hums and a single middle (Dave Murrays strat) or did they use other guitars for clean. I want something thatll match with a medium to hot bridge pickup and if I go all hums (full size and two rail types) i'll have switch to split them all. Any thoughts appreciated?
Probs won't be duncans (thinking IronGear) unless I happen upon some secondhand for a decent price because they are really expensive in Australia atm (dollar value and other things), not really wanting to drop $200+US on pickups in a guitar I bought for 30 bucks.

 

[Nagisa]

Re: Iron Maiden Clean Sounds, Humbuckers?

I tried searching but couldn't find the answers to what they originally used.

The cleans sound like a full humbucker to me - got that chimeyness.

 

[Mincer]

Re: Iron Maiden Clean Sounds, Humbuckers?

I think that sound can be found with the Hot Rails neck. It is clean, but has a warmness to it, too. I think they might even have that in the Dave Murray strat.

 

[Aceman]

Re: Iron Maiden Clean Sounds, Humbuckers?

Yeah - I think they are actually using SuperD's with volume turned down.

But could also be neck or middle singles...a SuperD split would be instant clean.

 

[dystrust]

Re: Iron Maiden Clean Sounds, Humbuckers?

For Number of the Beast Dave Murray was playing the former Kossoff '57 Strat with PAF / original SC / SuperD, and I don't know if the single was hooked up because I've never seen video / pics of it being used. The tone on that album was an MXR Distortion+ into a NMV Marshall, so for clean parts he probably just turned the D+ off. He didn't start using the 3 Hot Rails setup until 1993.

 

[Mincer]

Re: Iron Maiden Clean Sounds, Humbuckers?

His Hot Rails setup was later. But re-creating that sound now, I think it is pretty easy with the Hot Rails neck. It is a pretty good approximation of his early solo tone, which I absolutely love.

 

[PFDarkside]

Re: Iron Maiden Clean Sounds, Humbuckers?

For Number of the Beast Dave Murray was playing the former Kossoff '57 Strat with PAF / original SC / SuperD, and I don't know if the single was hooked up because I've never seen video / pics of it being used. The tone on that album was an MXR Distortion+ into a NMV Marshall, so for clean parts he probably just turned the D+ off. He didn't start using the 3 Hot Rails setup until 1993.

I’m not even a huge Iron Maiden fan (I really like the hits, but have little knowledge of the album cuts) but I love that guitar. I had the poster of it from Guitar World hanging on my wall in HS.

 

[Synapsys]

Re: Iron Maiden Clean Sounds, Humbuckers?

His Hot Rails setup was later. But re-creating that sound now, I think it is pretty easy with the Hot Rails neck. It is a pretty good approximation of his early solo tone, which I absolutely love.

Completely agree, and the base tone is there, almost regardless of the woods used for body, neck and fretboard.

My ESP LTD MH-1000HS came stock with a HR neck. The guitar has a maple neck-through with mahogany body wings, quilted maple top and ebony fretboard, it's a 24 fret neck, and my bandmates told me my lead and clean sounds reminded them of Iron Maiden. Not my intended sound for that guitar, so I went with a Lil '59 instead.

Still, for Murray Maidenish tones, you can't go wrong with a HR neck

 

[James Rock]

Re: Iron Maiden Clean Sounds, Humbuckers?

Thanks for the replies, seems like I'm on the right track. Not looking for nailing that tone but more it's a tone I like and this guitar is aiming for that era of metal along with getting more modern tones and a contrast to my other guitars which sit alot more in the 70s rock, new wave and 90s alternative sounds.

 

[Mincer]

Re: Iron Maiden Clean Sounds, Humbuckers?

And man, that is my favorite tone in classic metal, by a mile.