The LEAST Versatile Pickup

[Rex_Rocker]

Except most all those acts used the same sound recipe: Fender+JB >> Marshall dimed. Only the players and their songs were different.

Arch Enemy did use Marshalls at some point, but the iconic sounds are all Mesa, Peavey, or Krank, also through more Gibson-y guitars than Fender-y. Pretty sure Dirt was a Bogner preamp into a VHT poweramp. For EVH, pretty sure by the time he was using JB's, it was on the Soldano days. Then Adam Jones used the JB before too on his Gibson Les Paul into, yeah, a Marshall, but mixed with a Mesa and a Diezel.

Nah. The JB is so ubiquitous and has sold so many that people from many different kinds of genres have used or use it. It does do the classic 80's sound into a gainy Marshall, but it also does so much more.

 

[Mincer]

The JB has a 'sound' for sure, but as a 4 conductor pickup, it is more versatile than any one with just hot and ground.

 

[Archer250]

Fuckin' X2N

Literally zero application beyond "driving the amp hard"

I love a lot of the pickups people said are not versatile, namely the EMG 81, the JB, the Custom Custom... there's still more than one application I love using them in.

Well the Custom Custom less so than the other two, but still.

I can't work with the X2N. There's no realistic application where I don't think the Super D, D-Activator or Tone Zone are not superior.

 

[ToneFiddler]

Blackouts Metal. High gain honk and nothing else.

totally agree!!! (and i don't even like the trick)

Nazgul: i only use it for the downtuned high Gain thing, but it's not the worst PU for low to mid gain. At least it's tight & bright.
EMG81: it works as a neck PU also, so no one trick pony
JB: great leads, and eveything from grundge to Metal. So no one trick pony.

 

[ToneFiddler]

IME, the least versatile is any high output humbucker with dual conductor cable or wired without split/ parallel options... My first aftermarket bridge HB was a DiMarzio X2N and it had one single sound (based on its ability to overdrive anything). I hadn't yet learned to work with pots but I remember my volume control as being practically an on/off switch : it didn't clean up the sound like with a good classic humbucker.

I don't see at all low output pickups as being not versatile.

To expand the versatility of lipsticks, just put two of them side by side in a HB slot, with a series / split switch. Wire them to 500k pots and a no-load tone control.

Filter'Tron's are actually quite versatile IME... They just need to be really close to the strings. That's where their double thick magnets make a difference (Larry DiMarzio was fond of these double thick Gretsch A5 bars, for the record, and by design, a Super Distortion is not unlike a Filter'Tron with four times more muscle. Try one wired in parallel to see what I mean). If the voicing of Filter'Tron's is still too bright, add a switchable 3.3nF capacitor in parallel with the pickups from hot to ground. It will make them sound just like P.A.F. clones.

actually i like my filtertrons a lil further from the strings (i should try them close again), but i agree with the rest.
they are not my choice for the chugs but they work for everything else.

 

[RanchManSandy]

EMG 81 gettin' slandered in here

There's gotta be a reason both Slayer and Prince used it

​​​​(and that reason is that the thing is does is applicable across genres)

 

[freefrog]

actually i like my filtertrons a lil further from the strings (i should try them close again), but i agree with the rest.
they are not my choice for the chugs but they work for everything else.

No objections about personal preferences: my own tastes have changed several times when it comes to height settings with FT's

My point was just that 'Tron's are not so low output, despite of their weak inductance.

TV Jones recommends to set the top of the cover 4mm away from both E strings with the bridge PU. But how screw poles are set in factory for this bridge model makes them closer to the strings than one would expect, if memory serves me...

 

[beaubrummels]

Arch Enemy did use Marshalls at some point, but the iconic sounds are all Mesa, Peavey, or Krank, also through more Gibson-y guitars than Fender-y. Pretty sure Dirt was a Bogner preamp into a VHT poweramp. For EVH, pretty sure by the time he was using JB's, it was on the Soldano days. Then Adam Jones used the JB before too on his Gibson Les Paul into, yeah, a Marshall, but mixed with a Mesa and a Diezel.

Nah. The JB is so ubiquitous and has sold so many that people from many different kinds of genres have used or use it. It does do the classic 80's sound into a gainy Marshall, but it also does so much more.

You cited 'Jeff Beck to Ratt to Green Day to Alice in Chains to Megadeth all the way to Arch Enemy'. Jeff Beck with a JB was a Tele into a Marshall. Ratt was superstrats into a Marshall. Green Day was a superstrat into a Marshall. I'm less familiar with the rigs of AIC, Megadeth and Arch Enemy back in the day, but even most of the additional things you cited were founded on the idea of a humbucker into a Marshall sound. Soldano was a customized Marshall. Bogner was an advancement of a Marshall sound, etc. IMHO It isn't the pickup that is versatile, it's that the players were very different and doing different music with it.

 

[Rex_Rocker]

it's that the players were very different and doing different music with it.

That's kinda what a versatile pickup should be able to do, no? LOL.

By those standards on the amps, everything gainy is a modded Marshall except for maybe a Mesa Mark series. A Rectifier is basically a Soldano with a different poweramp, yet the sound of a JB through a boosted Rectifier on Modern Red mode through a Mesa cab couldn't be further from a cranked Plexi through a cab with Greenbacks as far as gainy sounds go.

Then again, pretty sure Lamb of God used the JB too at some point too through Mark IV's.

But I don't think I'm going to convince you, so we're just gonna have to agree to disagree. IMO, the JB is not all that non-versatile. It does Rock, and it goes heavier too. Just because it doesn't do the lighter, less over-the-top edge of the spectrum, doesn't mean it doesn't do a lot of other stuff well.

 

[beaubrummels]

That's kinda what a versatile pickup should be able to do, no? LOL.

By those standards on the amps, everything gainy is a modded Marshall except for maybe a Mesa Mark series. A Rectifier is basically a Soldano with a different poweramp, yet the sound of a JB through a boosted Rectifier on Modern Red mode through a Mesa cab couldn't be further from a cranked Plexi through a cab with Greenbacks as far as gainy sounds go.

. . .

But I don't think I'm going to convince you, so we're just gonna have to agree to disagree. IMO, the JB is not all that non-versatile. It does Rock, and it goes heavier too.

Interesting comparison. When I recorded at the Record Plant, I had the opportunity to play through Carlos Santana's 1968 Marshall Super Lead 100 Plexi with a Marshall greenback 4x12 straight cab. After that experience I then went out looking for an amp that sounded like it. The only amp that sounded exactly like it was a Mesa Dual Rectifier through a Mesa Rectifier cab (this was in the 1990s, so I don't know about "modern red" or what Rectifiers sound like today, but...).

I'm just saying it isn't the pickup that has many versatile sounds, it's that the players are making different music with the same sound; something akin to everyone coming in to the recording studio and playing through the house backline. Citing a dozen different pieces of gear doesn't mean the sound is that dramatically different. In music, go by the sound, not the gear list.

 

[Rex_Rocker]

Interesting comparison. When I recorded at the Record Plant, I had the opportunity to play through Carlos Santana's 1968 Marshall Super Lead 100 Plexi with a Marshall greenback 4x12 straight cab. After that experience I then went out looking for an amp that sounded like it. The only amp that sounded exactly like it was a Mesa Dual Rectifier through a Mesa Rectifier cab (this was in the 1990s, so I don't know about "modern red" or what Rectifiers sound like today, but...).

I suppose it's because the Rectifier is a more vesatile amp than what people give it credit for. Pretty sure the lower gain (I forget if it's green or what color) channel on Raw or Pushed mode gets very Plexi-ish through the right cab. Modern is the highest gain (arguably most stereotypically Recto) mode. Red is the last channel where the presence knob behaves the most aggressively. Vintage Orange is very loosely Marshally high-gain too.

And the music on Doomsday Machine is dramatically different than it is on Dookie, but so is the sound. Like night and day as far as gain sounds go, IMO. If you don't feel like that, then I don't think we'll ever agree.

 

[Chistopher]

Coodercaster bridge, you dummies. Not only does it only have one sound, you can't palm mute and too many people ask you about it to be enjoyable to take one anywhere with you.

 

[jeremy]

Of what I own and have experience with...

Least versatile humbucker: JB
Least versatile single coil: Jaquar pickups

jag pups without the claw are pretty close to strat pups. i use the antiquity ii jag pups in one of my main strats and they sound fantastic

 

[Phantasmagoria]

Dimarzio X2N. It's got that one sound. A great sound imo. But versatile it is not....

 

[Mincer]

A very specialized pickup is less likely to be versatile. That doesn't make it bad, but it wouldn't be used for a jack-of-all-trades guitar, but more of a specialized weapon. So less versatile isn't really less usable.

 

[Rex_Rocker]

I actually was very disappointed on the X2N when I had it. I found it very dark and thuddy compared to other pickups I had at the time, the Black Winter and the 500T. I was surprised, because I got it thinking "I love Chuck's tone", but I didn't sound anything like him, LOL. Then again, I don't have a Valvestate... or the crazy chops, for that matter.

I guess what's pertinent for this thread is I'm sure it's a one trick pony, but what is its trick? Is it being run through a Valvestate and that's it? I wouldn't think it would be THAT specific.

 

[Archer250]

The "trick" is goosing the front end of the amp.

IMO the X2N is obsolete as a tool.

 

[orpheo]

The least versatile pickup I know of?

Singlecoil: jazzmaster. Flat, dull, boring.
Humbucker: actives. Very flat EQ, no 'liveliness', just no vibe.

I prefer lower output pickups nowadays since my amp has enough power, but largely, actives are just not my thing.

 

[DonP]

I have to speak up for the X2N. It came to me in a used MIJ So Cal Charvel.

At first I thought I would hate it, thinking it would sound like you people are describing. But it was mis-mounted in the pick guard with long heavy springs and one side stripped, so that it would barely be above the pick guard.

For those who don’t know the MIJ Charvels, they come with a top mounted Floyd, so the pickup is a half inch away from the strings. And it sounds awesome. I bought a neck De-Activator X to match the X2N and it is one great sounding guitar. The volume works great and I use it for a wide variety of tones.

Happy with the X2N I bought a second one.

This is from someone who plays hard rock to metal and for some reason cannot get along with the Duncan Distortion or EMG-81.

 

[Seashore]

I have to speak up for the X2N. It came to me in a used MIJ So Cal Charvel.

At first I thought I would hate it, thinking it would sound like you people are describing. But it was mis-mounted in the pick guard with long heavy springs and one side stripped, so that it would barely be above the pick guard.

For those who don’t know the MIJ Charvels, they come with a top mounted Floyd, so the pickup is a half inch away from the strings. And it sounds awesome. I bought a neck De-Activator X to match the X2N and it is one great sounding guitar. The volume works great and I use it for a wide variety of tones.

Happy with the X2N I bought a second one.

This is from someone who plays hard rock to metal and for some reason cannot get along with the Duncan Distortion or EMG-81.

Sounds like my experience with the Invader, moving it down pretty far away from the strings opens it up nicely.