the ultimate neck pickup choice

[Warheart]

I need some major help choosing a neck pickup for my Jackson Rhoads V. The guitar is a maple neck with rosewood fretboard, and the body wood is mahogany, with only a tung oil finish. Also, a floyd rose original and an EMG 81 in bridge position with only 1 volume. I'm also switching the EMG out for a JB model, as I have played it through my amp before, and it sounds better than the EMG, and I've seen the light. My current amp is a 5150 combo (JJ tubes), with which i am having no trouble getting a nice metal crunch. But i need to get a good lead tone, especially for sweeps, which means i need to get a neck humbucker. the only problem is, there's not enough room on my guitar for another humbucker. So I've cut it down to 3 choices: the JB junior, lil '59 or the hot rails. could anybody tell me which is better for neck position? I have spent a few weeks going over the tone charts and still can't decide! I need a strong humbucker sound so that sweeps and arpeggios won't have the harsh high end that they do now, with only my EMG. My favorite lead tone is Michael Arnott's, so i was thinking about going for the lil '59 for the neck position, because he uses a full size JB in the bridge and the '59 in the neck. Only problem is, i don't know how well the lil '59 and the '59 compare.
Any help would be appreciated.
Thank you,
Allen Miller

 

[fusion101]

Re: the ultimate neck pickup choice

the lil'59 doesnt compare to the 59, not in that its bad its just not the same sound. What u need are the cool rails which is what alot of people on this board say is a great shredding pickup thats smooth in the neck position.

 

[scooter]

Re: the ultimate neck pickup choice

First, welcome to the forum. I don't quite understand why there's not enough room for 2 humbuckers. The RR Jacksons come stock with a set of JB's. Is your guitar a custom RR style guitar or a RR Jackson from the factory? Will you need to route the cavity for a single coil sized pickup? Anyway, I'd go for the hot rails in the neck. I really like its tone in that spot and it will certainly give you what you're looking for. I'm actually building a V style guitar and have routed it for a humbucker/single coil. I plan to put a dimebucker/hot rails combo in this with a single push/pull pot for switching and volume. You may want to consider this since you only have 1 volume pot.

 

[Warheart]

Re: the ultimate neck pickup choice

Thanks!
yeah..I kinda assembled the guitar myself. got the jackson neck off ebay, got the pickup off ebay (took a month to get here...never again), got the floyd original from warmoth, had the body made locally, which was a bad idea, but i had a dream. I gotta find a picture to show you. I will need to route the cavity for it too. I got the wiring figured out a bit differently too...i'm going to have to mix the active and passive pickups, with a two way switch, so the pickups are pretty much going to be independant of each other.
Thanks again
Allen