I was one of the first PJ Marx dealers back in the 80s.... Sold a buttload of them. The 210 and 412 models worked well in combination, and the Brad Gillis models outsold Jeff Watsons by 10 to 1. Loved that thick chewy tone of the Gillis! The single coils models were OK, too. PJ has moved on to selling high priced pistols and such these days.
Gillis was always a bigger name than Watson, I suppose, but that only because Jeff was underrated.
I don't have too much money to blow at these things I'm afraid, but I keep an eye out for PJ Marx pickups owing to the Night Ranger connexion. I think Derek Frigo in Enuff Z'Nuff used a 412 for a while too. Beyond that I don't really know much about them!
Yeah. Brad was always the most flamboyant one… which is quite a feat, Jeff's speed picking and tapping taken into consideration! But both are excellent, of course; what a duo! But yes, Jeff definitely deserved more attention. And I'm very interested in getting one of those pups.
To be honest with you, it's been in there so long I don't even know. I get this really great tone out of it that I love, and the clean sound in that position in that guitar is fantastic - I used to use that for all my "acoustic" parts when I played live way, way, way back in the day.
I still have the Watson, and this might be as good a place as any to ask: is there some sort of preamp that is supposed to go along with it? Mine is very weak. I asked Jeff about it, and he said that he had no idea, but he recalled them being very loud and compressed, which suggests a preamp somewhere.