Re: Seymour Duncan Pickups Suck Period
Zhangliqun said:
Though I must confess, I'm a bit confused. First...
...then...
Well, do they all sound the same or not?
You got a good point. And I do kind of feel like a jerk for being so negative but you gotta hear me out. I play quality gear. I am not falling for the trap of telling you what I play because it doesn't matter and every SD crazed fan is going to tear it apart.
But you got a good point. A lot of this post is just pure frustration at Seymour Duncan. They really advertise these pickups like they are totally different sounding, with unique attributes to them all. And it's just not true, and most importantly THE POSTERS ON THIS BOARD are so heavily "pro SD" that they would never bad mouth it, they just figure it's them and they need a new amp, a new guitar, and new ears, NO! It couldn't possibly be the pickups!
But here's the deal: the 59, the lil 59 , the neck 59, the Duncan Distortion all sound identical. The only disappointment here is with the DD since all the rest should sound the same or close to it. But the DD should sound different, I mean, the descriptions I read from SD and from reviews was that it has an output and sound equivalent or better than an EMG 81! That was not the case. It sounds identical to the 59, and lil 59 except it has a little overall output, which gets lost in high gain situations. The frequency pickup is almost identical, and they just aren't different sounding.
The Vintage Rails Pickup is a joke. I play it and laugh. It is horrible. It sounds worse than the stock pickups to my spare guitar. Seriously. There is no "glass" to it. It is very low output, and it just sounds weak. The frequency pickup is horrible.
The Jazz also has no glass to it. It's a bit warmer than the Vintage Rails, but it isn't as it was described by SD: "This pickup is for players who need an accurate, clear tone for fast jazz runs. The brighter sound has slightly less output and is a good match with most pickups." The tone is actually pretty muddy for a neck "clean" pickup and it actually is a super warm, super rich sounding pickup. BUT POSTERS ON THIS BOARD claimed it to be "glassy" and super clean. not the case.
SO here's my main point: It's as if the people at SD have 1 pickup, change the frequencies slightly, and market all these slight variations like they are totally different pickups. It's lame dude. My EMG's sound totally different, my stock pickups even sound more different than these SD's.
I have EMG pickups, I play a JMP-1 through a 9100, and I will not accept the nonsense that it's my gear. I see you guys posting your pictures of your strats and gibsons. I roll my eyes and I know who I'm dealing with so I'm gonna keep it vauge: I play a super strat type guitar, actually 3 of them, 2 of them list for over 1300, 1 of them lists over 950.
Anyways, long post . Sorry to waste your time. I'm not doing this for the Seymour Duncan fans. I'm doing this for a consumer who wants a different point of view. I know SD pickups are popular, but a lot of people rate them as subpar. It's not just me.
Anyways. I'll shut up now, and leave you back to your pink cloud. Adios.
pcorn:
