Is it worth spending over 200.00 on a set of pickups?

C

cradlefish

New member
I've heard and read many tone snobs go out on a limb to spend around 250.00 and up for set of pickups to improve their tone with WCR, Bareknuckle, Fralins, Holmes, and etc. From experience, yes there is a difference in quality of sound. But by how much? IMO not worth spending the extra hundred or two. I've used SD JB/59 pickups for 6 years now and it's been great. The only regret I have was I wish I would've upgraded the electronics sooner. After a tip from my friend and doing some internet research. Upgrading my capacitors for my Les Paul Classic and ESP EC-1000 was one of the best things I've ever done to improve my sound. It has made a huge impact on my tone and I didn't have to fork out a couple hundred bucks. It only cost me 15.00!

If you don't think it's worth spending all that money for boutique pickups like me but like the more widely pickups being used out there like Seymour Duncans, Rio Grande and etc. Check out the Mojotone Vitamin T caps! They cost less than 4 bucks a cap and can make your pickups sound better than they ever did! It's definitely worth every penny and more!

The Vitamin T certainly gave my guitars especially the EC-1000 better clarity, depth and a spongier feel. It seem to have taken some of the brightness off my LP as well.
 
Re: Is it worth spending over 200.00 on a set of pickups?

Not trying to go against the grain here but I paid $150 per set for my Duncan APII's and while I really like them and they sound great, I have a set of pickups that blow them out of the water. Back in the day I think they cost around $220 per set, but the last I saw were going for upwards of $300 bucks. I'm talking about a set of WB custom winds I ran across. If I had the $300 extra bucks to burn on a few sets, I would have as many as I could find. They are an absolutely amazing pickup.

The thing about them is this, the APII's sound good in a good guitar. If they go into a dead piece of wood or a crappy guitar, then they don't make it sound any better. The WB's have the same wonderful sound whether they are in my Les Paul or a $50 piece of junk. I don't know what it is about them, but to make a cheap guitar like my King V Jackson, an Epi Silverburst that was a dud or any number of other guitars I have put them in sound as huge and bad arse as the top of the line LP's it's a winner and worth the extra cash IMHO........
 
Re: Is it worth spending over 200.00 on a set of pickups?

I'd have to agree that some of it is just hype. OTOH, there are truly some upper end pickups that will make a huge difference in tone. Like LL said, there are some off the shelf production pickups that sound great, but there are some custom winds out there that will blow your mind.
 
Re: Is it worth spending over 200.00 on a set of pickups?

I have 2 full sets of BKP Strat pickups, Apaches and Irish Tours. I have used SD pickups ever since they first became available. (I have no experience with the Antiquities though). I have to say this, based on what i have just said and also the fact that i build tube amps and have experimented a lot with different qualities of components, particularly capacitors.

I feel that most of us can get good sounds without spending a small fortune. Maybe 85% of the way towards tonal heaven. Maybe even 90%.

BUT ..... that last 10% or so is where you can spend serious money to go from 'good' to 'great'. If you can't hear the difference, don't spend the extra money, to my way of thinking, you are very lucky....you can be satisfied and happy at the 'good' level.

The big problem occurs when you DO hear the difference....then you will never be happy until you can spend the extra $$$$$ for the expensive stuff.

In my case my ear has developed and i can hear the difference with some of the more expensive stuff. The BKP pickups are stunning....there is a 'third dimension' about their sound, leaving everything else sounding only 2 dimensional. Very hard to go back once you can hear the difference.

I don't think of myself as a tone snob, but as someone who has spent, and wasted, a h*ll of a lot of money over a very long time, and i'm not prepared to keep doing that. Now i struggle to get the extra $$$$ and buy the best, get it right first time and have equipment for life. I know from building amps that to get the best sound usually means spending the extra money on better parts. Do it once, get it right, be intensely happy and get on with the job of playing. Whenever i did it any other way, i always ended up going to the top eventually but not before endless part-swapping and money wastage....but no more of that for me.

So IMHO some pickups can easily be worth the high price tags. Depends on who you are, your ears, what you do and don't hear. Also of course the quality of the guitar you put the pickups into and the rest of your gear. The best way is to probably try to hear expensive pickups in a decent instrument, and concentrate on the CLEAN sounds, as that is the basis for all the other sounds.

Of course soldering and wiring can have a lot to do with things too.......it's important to try to eliminate *any* weak links in the chain, from the guitar through to the speaker.

But only spend the serious money for the right reasons....if you hear the improvement, get the better parts. If not, don't...save your money.
 
Re: Is it worth spending over 200.00 on a set of pickups?

Money wise, once I get into the price realm of say, a used MIM Strat or something, that's where I draw the line. I'd rather get another guitar for this kind of money rather than sink it solely on pickups. Granted, you get what you pay for (pickup wise) but still, there are other measures which can be taken to achieve a personally acceptable tone.

As always, this is merely my opinion, YMMV.
 
Re: Is it worth spending over 200.00 on a set of pickups?

crusty philtrum said:
BUT ..... that last 10% or so is where you can spend serious money to go from 'good' to 'great'. If you can't hear the difference, don't spend the extra money, to my way of thinking, you are very lucky....you can be satisfied and happy at the 'good' level.

The big problem occurs when you DO hear the difference....then you will never be happy until you can spend the extra $$$$$ for the expensive stuff.

In my case my ear has developed and i can hear the difference with some of the more expensive stuff. The BKP pickups are stunning....there is a 'third dimension' about their sound, leaving everything else sounding only 2 dimensional. Very hard to go back once you can hear the difference.


So IMHO some pickups can easily be worth the high price tags. Depends on who you are, your ears, what you do and don't hear.
But only spend the serious money for the right reasons....if you hear the improvement, get the better parts. If not, don't...save your money.
Click to expand...

+1
Words of wisdom !
The truth,
the whole truth,
and nothing but the truth.
 
Re: Is it worth spending over 200.00 on a set of pickups?

It depends what you are going for. AND the guitar. I have guitars that I just wanna rock with them. My duncan customs, custom 8, jb etc work wonders..
But, if you want a sound that cant be reached with off the shelf pickups, thats why Duncan has a custom shop and there are boutique winders. Just popping for a big dollar set of pickups wont make you a guitar god and wont (in most cases) make a subpar guitar extraordinary. Ive paid stupid money for a pickup before that simply ended up with the rest of my spares..
But matching the right pickup to the guitar and what you want to do with it.....Priceless.. (whatever the cost of the pickup)
 
Re: Is it worth spending over 200.00 on a set of pickups?

cradlefish said:
I've heard and read many tone snobs go out on a limb to spend around 250.00 and up for set of pickups to improve their tone with WCR, Bareknuckle, Fralins, Holmes, and etc. From experience, yes there is a difference in quality of sound. But by how much? IMO not worth spending the extra hundred or two. I've used SD JB/59 pickups for 6 years now and it's been great. The only regret I have was I wish I would've upgraded the electronics sooner. After a tip from my friend and doing some internet research.
Click to expand...

Some boutique pickups are just much better than the regular pickups, even SDs. I don't know why but there it is. So far I identified SD custom shop and WCR are clearly in that category. (That doesn't mean I don't like the other boutique makers, only that I didn't test them enough yet).

Higher gain pickups might be a different matter, I don't have anything boutique that isn't vintage.

I really like some regular pickups. The 59 has a character that isn't to be found anywhere else. The APH1 bridge does, too. The Demon can be a great neck pickup to shut up a Les Paul with a flubby neck position. But overall, see above.

cradlefish said:
Upgrading my capacitors for my Les Paul Classic and ESP EC-1000 was one of the best things I've ever done to improve my sound. It has made a huge impact on my tone and I didn't have to fork out a couple hundred bucks. It only cost me 15.00!
Click to expand...

Figures. I can hear the difference between capacitors (I posted soundclips friday) but I find it nowhere close to the differences in pickups.
 
Re: Is it worth spending over 200.00 on a set of pickups?

In the UK we have to pay about $200 for a set of Duncans, never mind any fancy custom stuff.
So think yerself lucky! :)
 
Re: Is it worth spending over 200.00 on a set of pickups?

9finger said:
I'd have to agree that some of it is just hype. OTOH, there are truly some upper end pickups that will make a huge difference in tone. Like LL said, there are some off the shelf production pickups that sound great, but there are some custom winds out there that will blow your mind.
Click to expand...

+1. I played a set of WCR's that knocked my dick in the dirt but, I cant convince myself to pay their prices.
 
Re: Is it worth spending over 200.00 on a set of pickups?

Depends who you're talking to.

Me, I once bought a 300€ guitar just because I liked its' neck and body (both woods and woodwork).
Right now I have about 700€ worth of after market parts (the Suhr/Anderson pickups alone cost me 300€) and currently it's at a luthier for a full setup, fret dress/level, some minor woodwork and currently the cost I'm looking at is in the 200€ range.

For me it was worth it because not only it ended up being my meanest, fullest sounding guitar, it strangely also is my sweetest sounding (when clean) one as well!!!

Other than that I'll go with the crowd, if you can't hear the difference (or you can hear it but can't justify it) then save your money.
 
Re: Is it worth spending over 200.00 on a set of pickups?

I tend to think it can. sometimes whats different with your sound is not something you can completley say OK its brighter or its fuller or whatever but something just hits you that wow its better its more refined if you will. i am not one who settles for acceptable tone. I want the best soundi can get because if I enjoy my sound I will play better. What can get expensive is when you find your tastes changing. ARGHH!!!!!!.

As others have said in my own words. A $300 set of pick ups will not turn a piece of fiberboard into an EJ strat!!!
 
Re: Is it worth spending over 200.00 on a set of pickups?

Once a guitar is made, the main thing you can do to change the tone is replacing the PU's (or sell the guitar). The wood & the PU's have to work together, and it's worth spending some money to get an above-average tone. The better your sound, the better you're inspired to play. Funny how that works.

My theory is: If you have a mid-priced import, take the savings and put in a pair of high-quality American or European made PU's. Don't scrimp with cheap muddy PU's. If cost is an issue, look for used PU's, as they'll often sell for half of retail. Swap magnets and pots if needed and get the electronics to blend with the wood's inherent tones. Buy a used Epi, upgrade and tweak, and you can have a nice-sounding guitar for several hundred dollars.

If you have a high end guitar, all the more reason to get the right PU's in it. Swap magents or PU's if you need to, but it 's tone should match it's price tag. It's an investment, so don't settle for anything less than knock-your-socks-off tones.
 
Re: Is it worth spending over 200.00 on a set of pickups?

It all depends...I have pickups that cost $50 and pickups that cost $250...not a set, $250 a pickup...was it worth, sure...would I do it again, sure!

It all just depends...some guys pay $5000+ for a set of PAF's, I won't but thats me...
 
Re: Is it worth spending over 200.00 on a set of pickups?

I may not be qualified to speak to $300 pups, because I have never bought any. However, I have guitars that have pups that may fetch that price, and have played guitars with pups that good.

The weird thing is that many high end pups are emulating some stock pup of another era, or in some cases an entire sound including all parts of a person's sound at a specific gig/recording. I thing the best players could sit in a room full of what we may call 80% gear, and churn out a sound that would inspire boutique makers to make $300 pups that emulate it. So on the subject of the last 10%, I tend to think that it is all player.

That being said, I also think that there is something to the idea of being able to hear the difference between good and great. I do think it takes the ears to properly appreciate and work with good gear. I fly fish, and I'd say most of the guys that I fish with can't cast more than $100 out of their $600 rods. Based on the Youtube clips I've seen, I'd say the same is true for guitar gear.

If you are a tone freak, then it only makes sense to try the best of the best, because that's what being a tone freak is all about. Being an artist is something different altogether. Michelangelo carved David out of an old piece of used stone.
 
Re: Is it worth spending over 200.00 on a set of pickups?

To me, they're tone and frequency generators that also happen to be sonic works of art.
You usually get what you pay for, but all the other things factor in as well. So, after all of it.....after going through most Duncans, which basically ARE boutique pickups, as well as great handwound pickups from their CS and other CS's, I've just come to the conclusion that you first look at your entire rig. Then, you figure out what you EXACTLY want a pickup to do within that rig, and make your best choice. After that, you may need to make a few more choices to dial it in.

Is price a factor? Yes, but so is everything else. I try to be economical, but sometimes I can't be. The final result is what matters.

For the record, the best pickups I've used are the cream of the crop from a variety of companies, but mostly Duncan. They've hit the nail on the head more times than any other company IMO, but I won't discount the contributions from any other company or one man operation either. Again, it's the final result, not just pickups.

I see a lot of players, trying desperately to go through many pickups to nail something they hear in their head, and they've missed the mark with some other aspect of their gear. Those things need to be in order too, and unfortunately, in most cases, you get what you pay for. And that's usually the quality of the guitar and the quality of the amp you're using for your particular style of playing. If that's not dialed in first, pickups won't help much. Pickups should be seen as one of the last ways of fine tuning your tone....definitely not the first.
 
Last edited:
Re: Is it worth spending over 200.00 on a set of pickups?

I'm glad Joe pointed that out. All to often I see people get a new guitar and right off the bat they're asking what pickups they should put in it. I think you should wait at least a few weeks to play the guitar through your rig to really hear what it's missing before making a pickup swap. And more often than that I see people tearing through pickups being unsatisfied w/ them when they should be looking at their amp(s) and pedals for a change.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top