Quote:
Originally Posted by FrankHudson
Even though the following isn't going to follow this precept, I've come to think that there may not be any bad sounds, only ones you personally don't like right now in the context you're using them.
That said, I too have had my problems loving a great many regular humbuckers over the years.
If it's like mine, the set of P90s in the Epi 339 sound very good to me, so you're comparing against a pretty good sound. I find them very flexible, different things come up if they're picked gently with the volume down into a clean chain vs when you dig in and up the volume/gain.
And you've already tried minihumbuckers, which I love too.
I'll agree with Bob on the 57 Classics. I have a set in a Les Paul and I like it more than most any Gibson solid-body humbucker guitar I've ever played. Not muddy at all.
Another humbucker option to try would be Gretsch Filtertron. Brighter and more articulate than the average humbucker.
The longer Fender scale helps with the humbucker pickups a bit too from my experience.
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All of that makes sense - right sound for the right need/time, especially. I'm glad to see I'm not alone on this issue. As you might expect, I'm looking for reasons/ways to reduce the number of guitars (and these are just the electrics, I'll spare you the similar acoustic ensemble), while keeping what I'm likely to stick with (but I don't want to sell and regret it, so you see my problem . . . .).
I found your Epi P90 description spot-on. They sound good no matter what I do around them. Flexible, they are.
I haven't tried a long-scale HB set up yet. I know it's very popular, but assumed it was Fender's "Gibson wannabe" setup to garner that market segment. That assumption was based on minimal information, limited to the observation that almost all Gibson short scales were HBs (or P90s), while almost all long scale Fenders wore the single coils, save for the oddball HBs thrown in here/there. In other words, I assumed from this that HBs sounded best with the shorter scale.
I appreciate the Filtertron recommendation and will explore those. I've heard nothing but good about the '57 Classics and will keep an open mind, but I truly couldn't tell the difference in that video.