Re: Mag swappers advice for Seth Lover bridge
Very even. I bought this guitar with the Seth Lover in the bridge, it was only when I went to swap out the stock neck pickup (yuck!) that I realized that it was a Seth Neck model that was in the bridge.
First, I'll compare the uncovered SethN in the bridge of my Flying V, then I'll compare my experiences with the Seth bridge in various guitars. As you'll see, my comments might be very V specific.
The uncovered Seth Neck sounds very even. It has some brightness without being shrill. Very versatile, with each note standing out. It could do a less-middy version of "Just Got Paid" (see below) and "Hot for Teacher" with ease. At times it could get a little bit of single-coil clang. Anytime there was too much treble, it was easy to dial back with the tone control. The only reason I wanted to try something else was that I wanted something a tad hotter and with slightly less highs, which is why I dug out the Seth bridge.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6c7d8BYJy8I
The SethN is less middy and more even than below, but with the same underlying flavor:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mkBCvITuyv4
I bought the Seth bridge years ago for my SG and hated it. It was very bright and a step backwards from the 490t in that guitar. Keep in mind that the bridge pickup in an SG is a lot closer to the bridge compared to an LP or V. In addition, the body is thinner, so SGs tend to have thinner tones than LPs or Vs. A few years later, just for kicks, I threw it into a hardtail swampash strat I was building. Yuck. Bright, thin, and no body.
So how was it in my V? At first I thought it was dark, yet clanky. So I took the pickup covers off. It made the pickup brighter, yet got rid of some of the single coil 'klank' that I can hear in the video below when the covers are on:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ga-P4pfVdj4&playnext=1&list=PL61374A83835D3B5B
I liked the uncovered Seth bridge a lot better, but compared to the neck model, it was too middy! The V has a nature mid-hump, the Seth bridge has a natural mid hump, and the mixture was a bit too much for me (but might be perfect for someone else). The bass also seemed flubbier than when I had used the neck model in the same position. I preferred the neck model.
I next tried an unoriented A5 in the bridge. This sounds pretty good, and might be a keeper, but the A2 Seth neck might be closer to what I'm looking for. For what it's worth, the UO A5 Seth bridge sounds a lot like this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dd-q-F0tat0
For kicks I threw in a ceramic magnet. Truth be told the basic tone is excellent, and reminds me a lot of the Custom! But, this is some underlying harshness and nastyness in the background that sounds too unrefined. My guess is that you really need a Custom wind to smooth that out.
For what it's worth, I'm running the uncovered Seth neck with an A3 in the neck position. The A2 sounded very good, but it really wasn't what I was looking for in a neck pickup. I have an A2pro on order. I figure I'll probably end up with the A2 SethN or A5 Seth bridge in the bridge, and the A3 Seth neck or some A2pro variant in the neck.
The final thing I'm going to do is to rewire the controls. Stock is two volumes and 1 tone, but I really don't need 2 volumes nor do I need the tone to affect both pickups. I'm going to change it to master volume, bridge tone, and neck bass-cut.
