Review: Earl Slick "Slick Lead" Aged Pickup Set

[HKZSquared]

Okay, so I'm one of those people who really likes Earl Slick (Bowie's guitarist). Last week I noticed an ad on Guitarfetish for new Slick guitars and pickups. I saw the specs and price for the set called "lead." Lead bridge is basically an older metal-output pickup at around 13K wiring. It sounds about as loud as my Invader. The neck pickup is about 9K, and on accident, I flipped the humbucker inside the mounting ring (the screws face the bridge not the neck), but had too busy of a schedule to take the time to flip it around again, and I'm still genuinely impressed with the set. Under extreme gain, both pickups respond well to harmonics, rapid picking, tapping, and other various tricks. They're G spaced but the polepieces seem big enough to handle F-spacing alright. Clean, these pickups shimmer. I don't think I've ever had a better clean sound...
A+ so far
Will edit after I play them through my all tube Blackstar on Monday.
Total cost for the set? About $61
A cool FYI, the wooden boxes the pickups come in are actually not bad, and it seems like each box is made (at least partially) by hand, as each of the two boxes was different in a number of ways.
Guitar used for review:
Epiphone 2002 Les Paul Standard
Amp:
Peavey Vypyr 15W
Preferred Settings:
Bridge: Volume 10 Tone 10
Neck: Volume 10-7 Tone 7



Sorry about the poor photo conditions, not exactly my home set-up, it's campground rig (vypyr wherever it will fit, and whatever guitar I bring that weekend)

Thanks for reading!
-selling the stock Alnico Classics from this Epi on the trading post btw-

 

[Chocklit_Thunda]

Re: Review: Earl Slick "Slick Lead" Aged Pickup Set

Nice! I've been looking at getting a set of these. Reasonably priced and from what you say here, sound good as well

 

[jon the art guy]

Re: Review: Earl Slick "Slick Lead" Aged Pickup Set

I like the look of the Slick guitars but wish the LP derivatives had set necks. Actually, I wish I could find a scuzzy superstrat with a set or they neck with the Slick aesthetic

off u see did MRSAge, I m on tapa talk and auto correct is hating on me

 

[HKZSquared]

Re: Review: Earl Slick "Slick Lead" Aged Pickup Set

I honestly love most things GFS is putting out that I've tried. Their Amphenol brand of cables is the only cables I use other than my one livewire elite. The only bad thing about the slick pups (and this is mearly astetics) is I'm not a big fan of aged pickups on a guitar that looks new lol

 

[Artie]

Re: Review: Earl Slick "Slick Lead" Aged Pickup Set

PLEASE NOTE- Slick Brand Guitars and Pickups will be available for order on a first come, first served basis at MIDNIGHT Saturday May 31 2104.

Wow! So these won't be available for another 90 years!

 

[formula73]

Re: Review: Earl Slick "Slick Lead" Aged Pickup Set

I dig the look of the Tele and Strat copies and those bridges look meaty as hell. I've got one of the weirdo brass locking TOMs on one of my Vs and apart from having to grind down the baseplate a little, it's been fantastic.

 

[HKZSquared]

Re: Review: Earl Slick "Slick Lead" Aged Pickup Set

Wow! So these won't be available for another 90 years!

Lmao I didn't notice that fail xD
Guess I must have got a promo release... Lol

 

[dominus]

Re: Review: Earl Slick "Slick Lead" Aged Pickup Set

OThey're G spaced but the polepieces seem big enough to handle F-spacing alright.

You sure? The strings look to be lined up with the bridge pickup on your Epiphone and that's probably F/TB spaced. Most of the GFS pickups have wider spacing on the bridge models.

Also, can you try cleaning the rust off the pole pieces? If you can clean them up easily enough, I'd be tempted to grab one of these.

 

[jimijames]

Re: Review: Earl Slick "Slick Lead" Aged Pickup Set

Honestly, I feel like you like the neck pickup so much because it's flipped.

Every neck h/u I've tried with slugs facing the neck has been much better. Fatter, clearer, etc. It sucks because it throws off the visual symmetry but sonically IMO/IME flipped neck is just better. I just wish they made coil slugs that looked like screws and vice versa. Wouldn't need to turn the screws if they were under a cover too, so you could have something that sounds good, looks good, and doesn't suffer from the lost functionality you'd get from screws that only adjust from the top sitting under a metal cover.

 

[HKZSquared]

Re: Review: Earl Slick "Slick Lead" Aged Pickup Set

I'm sure you could probably clean off the rust, I just like it surprisingly
And I never measured the spacing, everything seemed to line up right so I assumed G spaced
Never really tried a flipped humbucker before, only flipped single coil and that was interesting to say the least

 

[HKZSquared]

Re: Review: Earl Slick "Slick Lead" Aged Pickup Set

I like the look of the Slick guitars but wish the LP derivatives had set necks. Actually, I wish I could find a scuzzy superstrat with a set or they neck with the Slick aesthetic

off u see did MRSAge, I m on tapa talk and auto correct is hating on me

Personally, I'm wishing they didn't have the vintage set of pickups installed because vintage just doesn't hit my gain needs c; lol