Medium output humbucker with BIG mids?

[Clint 55]

I don't like ceramic pickups either, which is why I swap alnicos in.

 

[Reee]

I don't like ceramic pickups either, which is why I swap alnicos in.

that's intriguing! do you have any clips of how a SH-6 neck sounds in the bridge with A5?

 

[Clint 55]

I only have my delux Distortion neck/JB hybrid that I made. But I think you can hear the effect from the less compressed and differently voiced DDn coil.

 

[JB6464]

The Hybrid is, but just in power. The EQ is very close to the 59, without the upper mids of the JB.

I disagree , A Custom 5 would be a higher output 59 with the same EQ and no upper mids .
The Hybrid gets it's upper mids from the over wound 43g coil , mix that with the 42g regular 59 coil and that's where you get the upper mids ..
It's just not the same upper mids as a JB because of the winding .

 

[Reee]

I disagree , A Custom 5 would be a higher output 59 with the same EQ and no upper mids .
The Hybrid gets it's upper mids from the over wound 43g coil , mix that with the 42g regular 59 coil and that's where you get the upper mids ..
It's just not the same upper mids as a JB because of the winding .

that's interesting! FWIW i think the custom 5 is cool on paper but it sounds kinda grainy and stiff to my ears, my charvel came with it originally and i was never really a fan of it, it's too hot, too undefined, too stiff, it doesn't remind me of the 59 at all, the 59 is spongy, crystal clear/crisp etc.

from what i can tell from youtube clips the Hybrid sounds like a 59 with more mids and the slightly harder edge of the custom but it still has the clarity and sponginess of the 59

 

[JB6464]

that's interesting! FWIW i think the custom 5 is cool on paper but it sounds kinda grainy and stiff to my ears, my charvel came with it originally and i was never really a fan of it, it's too hot, too undefined, too stiff, it doesn't remind me of the 59 at all, the 59 is spongy, crystal clear/crisp etc.

from what i can tell from youtube clips the Hybrid sounds like a 59 with more mids and the slightly harder edge of the custom but it still has the clarity and sponginess of the 59

I have the Hybrid/59 and a unpotted 59N in my Custom Built Mahogany Tele Deluxe and the Hybrid/59 has the mid high bark in it , it's just not slapping your face like the JB does .
I recently took out the Antiquity JB in the bridge , tried the Custom 5 , put a 59B back in , then took it out and settled on the Hybrid/59 for now .
You could definitely hear the increased mids in the Hybrid/59 over any 59 build any day of the week .

 

[Mincer]

I disagree , A Custom 5 would be a higher output 59 with the same EQ and no upper mids .
The Hybrid gets it's upper mids from the over wound 43g coil , mix that with the 42g regular 59 coil and that's where you get the upper mids ..
It's just not the same upper mids as a JB because of the winding .

Interesting. Absolutely not how I hear it. The C5 has almost no mids. The 59 and the regular Custom have almost the same EQ, but different power levels. The Hybrid retains more true mids than a C5, though. Neither pickup has 'big mids' like the OP wants, though.

 

[JB6464]

Interesting. Absolutely not how I hear it. The C5 has almost no mids. The 59 and the regular Custom have almost the same EQ, but different power levels. The Hybrid retains more true mids than a C5, though. Neither pickup has 'big mids' like the OP wants, though.

I can"t see how a 59 and a Custom have almost the same EQ when they use different magnets , wire and not to mention the winding difference of a 8k to 13k pickup .
A Ceramic mag sounds nothing like an A5 even in the same pickup , I tried that by the way in a 59 .
I definitely can hear an EQ difference between a 59 and Custom .

As for the Hybrid , maybe different wood that's used in guitars bring out the mids and highs more .
Mahogany , Maple , Alder , Ash and so forth don't sound the same to start with ,
so a pickup can sound totally different depending on what wood you are using and what tone your after to start with .

 

[Mincer]

I just put it down to different people hear different things.

 

[Reee]

Interesting. Absolutely not how I hear it. The C5 has almost no mids. The 59 and the regular Custom have almost the same EQ, but different power levels. The Hybrid retains more true mids than a C5, though. Neither pickup has 'big mids' like the OP wants, though.

i'm not sure if it is big mids i'm after per se, just bigger mids than a 59 because that one is way too scooped for my tastes, and i'd like a good bit more output as well but not so much that it kills dynamics

 

[Demanic]

i'm not sure if it is big mids i'm after per se, just bigger mids than a 59 because that one is way too scooped for my tastes, and i'd like a good bit more output as well but not so much that it kills dynamics

Which is why I suggested a UOA5 for the 59. It will definitely have more mids than a regular 59 while still keeping the same character.

Sent from my SM-A115A using Tapatalk

 

[Mincer]

i'm not sure if it is big mids i'm after per se, just bigger mids than a 59 because that one is way too scooped for my tastes, and i'd like a good bit more output as well but not so much that it kills dynamics

In this case, anything hotter than the Hybrid, and you start to hear the compression kick in. A boost or EQ pedal might work here, too

 

[Reee]

In this case, anything hotter than the Hybrid, and you start to hear the compression kick in. A boost or EQ pedal might work here, too

I tried boosting, overdrive and mid-heavy EQ but there's only so much that can do, i think the hybrid will suit me well.

Which is why I suggested a UOA5 for the 59. It will definitely have more mids than a regular 59 while still keeping the same character.

Sent from my SM-A115A using Tapatalk

it would still not be hot enough

 

[Clint 55]

I'm curious what you thought of the tone in my clip.

 

[Demanic]

I tried boosting, overdrive and mid-heavy EQ but there's only so much that can do, i think the hybrid will suit me well.



it would still not be hot enough

Then by all means go with the Hybrid. From what I've heard of it, it's a good pickup. Of course, you could still try a magnet swap if it's not quite right. In which case my recommendation stands.

Sent from my SM-A115A using Tapatalk

 

[Reee]

I'm curious what you thought of the tone in my clip.

kinda hard to tell but nothing that would make me want to have this pickup

 

[Clint 55]

What a strange response.

 

[Reee]

What a strange response.

it's a very short clip that doesn't really tell you much about the pickup because you're just strumming a chord through what sounds like some kind of cheap modelling amp, that's why i didn't respond in the first place because i appreciate that you shared it so i didn't want to leave a negative comment about how i didn't like it..

 

[Clint 55]

The reason I asked is that I usually go for hot and compressed bridge humbuckers. But I created this one and I think it came out well from that standpoint but also from the view of people who like clear, uncompressed, vintage response, the same ballpark as the 59/Custom hybrid basically. And if it wasn't appealing, I would be genuinely curious as to the specifics of why not, I'm not gonna take it personally if you're not gonna go out and get the pickup. It's being played clean like the title says, not through a modeling amp. It's my $500 Peavey tube amp on 1 watt that I use to get clean breakup and my $1500 twin reverb used as a cab. Also recorded perfectly which is why it was kind of weird that you said it's hard to tell what the tone was. How exactly would you showcase the tone better? With a distortion box on?

 

[Reee]

The reason I asked is that I usually go for hot and compressed bridge humbuckers. But I created this one and I think it came out well from that standpoint but also from the view of people who like clear, uncompressed, vintage response, the same ballpark as the 59/Custom hybrid basically. And if it wasn't appealing, I would be genuinely curious as to the specifics of why not, I'm not gonna take it personally if you're not gonna go out and get the pickup. It's being played clean like the title says, not through a modeling amp. It's my $500 Peavey tube amp on 1 watt that I use to get clean breakup and my $1500 twin reverb used as a cab. Also recorded perfectly which it why it was kind of weird that you said it's hard to tell what the tone was. How exactly would you showcase the tone better? With a distortion box on?

i would play a piece of music with it and not just a chord, and play something clean and then something distorted. the pickup does seem to clean up well with the volume knob but that's the only thing i could tell from your clip.

i think the edge of breakup sound of your peavey just sounds harsh which made me think it was some cheap modelling device, i'm not really a fan of edge of breakup tones in general and i think your pickup might be a little too hot for that type of tone, seems to work better with single coils and low output humbuckers.