What's the general consensus on active pickups?

[Diego]

Re: What's the general consensus on active pickups?

I've tried EMGs and Blackouts. I can't throw them in the same category, totally different feel and response. I like them all, for different reasons.

I don't think of them as actives, meaning they don't feel different because of their active nature, but because of what they are as pickups. My consensus is the same as passives: Some suck, some are great and it depends.

 

[larryguitar]

Re: What's the general consensus on active pickups?

I've tried EMG's and Blackouts, and generally don't find they work well for the way I play.

That said, I just picked up a Charvel Desolation DS-1 with Blackouts, and in that guitar, they make for a great, aggressive rock and roll tone. Not (IMHO) versatile, and couldn't work for me for, say, a slow blues, but for straight-up RnR, just killer.


Larry

 

[Artie]

Re: What's the general consensus on active pickups?

This brings up an interesting question: Is there an active pup voiced for a smooth, bluesy tone? Kinda like an active Seth. The thing I like about actives is that they're "self-buffered". That is, not really altered by downstream effects and loading.

 

[JohnnyBsurfin]

Re: What's the general consensus on active pickups?

I've tried EMG's and Blackouts, and generally don't find they work well for the way I play.

That said, I just picked up a Charvel Desolation DS-1 with Blackouts, and in that guitar, they make for a great, aggressive rock and roll tone. Not (IMHO) versatile, and couldn't work for me for, say, a slow blues, but for straight-up RnR, just killer.


Larry

I really like ds1 desolation. I liked the first one (hard tail) so much I bought a second (floyd rose).

 

[allstarrme]

Re: What's the general consensus on active pickups?

This brings up an interesting question: Is there an active pup voiced for a smooth, bluesy tone? Kinda like an active Seth. The thing I like about actives is that they're "self-buffered". That is, not really altered by downstream effects and loading.

The fishman fluence classics voice 1 has a very good Seth thing going on, while the voice 2 for the bridge is JB. The neck voice 2 has its own thing but it’s great. There’s some demo’s online but the moderns and signatures get most of the love.

There is an open coil (uncovered) version of the classics that even has a third single coil voice.

They are super versatile and not at all like the Emg’s that they replaced. I’m not sure why they aren’t hugely popular, other than actives are often associated with modern sounds.

I also have blackouts and fishman moderns, the passive modern is voiced a lot after the custom.

 

[PFDarkside]

Re: What's the general consensus on active pickups?

I couldn’t articulate the nature of EMGs until Evan describes it here. The brick wall limiting of the internal amplifier gives a very specific response, the EMG “feel”. All of a sudden it made sense.

The Fishman Preamp was designed with a much higher headroom, and I have a feeling the newer EMG preamp does the same, but I’ve not played them.

 

[ItsaBass]

Re: What's the general consensus on active pickups?

They are "sterile" IMO...but sterility can be a very good thing. It's like having a blank canvas, with the ability to create anything you want on it. They are extremely versatile, IF you know how to use them. The problem is...it's a blank canvas; you have to "build" everything yourself, from scratch. You need to know exactly what you want, and exactly how to get it. You need to know what level of output you need in order to interact "right" with your amp. You need to know what e.q. bands sound like what, so you can manually dial in or out everything you need to achieve a certain tone. A passive pickup has more inherent "character," so the user doesn't need to make as many decisions. It already leans toward this tone or that tone, or toward this level of output, etc.

I don't use a lot of actives, because I don't need the utmost in tweakability and versatility. But if I was a studio musician in this day and age, I would probably rely quite heavily on my EMG SA loaded (also Kahlerized) Strat with my outboard 31-band graphic e.q.