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out of phase pickups examples on "famous" recordings?


lukeswall

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do you guys know of any songs by famous or almost famous artists with out of phase pickups being used profusely?

 

I've read a lot about them and I'm really interested in trying it out, since I don't get a real use out of my two pickups combined, but I have no solid idea of how it sounds!

 

I have almost all Frank Zappa albums if that helps.

 

thanks!

 

[edit] I'm talking humbuckers here.

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A lot of Steve Miller's singles used the neck+middle out of phase positions on a Strat. That's really "phase cancellation" rather than reversed phase - truly reversed phase on a Strat gives a very thin screechy tone that's very "60's psychedelic." It's rather cold and brittle sounding, but interesting with distortion.

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A lot of Steve Miller's singles used the neck+middle out of phase positions on a Strat. That's really "phase cancellation" rather than reversed phase - truly reversed phase on a Strat gives a very thin screechy tone that's very "60's psychedelic." It's rather cold and brittle sounding, but interesting with distortion.

 

what's the technical difference between phase cancellation and reversed phase? :confused:

 

I thought it all came down to opposite phases between the two pickups.

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gotta disagree w/ nile rodgers and roxanne. I don't have a ton of Chic, but I have le freak and good times. Neither one is out of phase strat. Raoxanne seems to have too much bite to be out of phase.

 

That's what I don't like about it. It takes away the attack. makes it sound all mushy. That's why it sucks for funk time. In my opinion of course.

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There's a difference between brian may out of phase and mark knopfler "out of phase".

A lot of people call the 2 and 4 positions on a strat "out of phase", because the 2 pickups are combined in parallel, and there is a slightly hollow sound. There are some phase cancellations happening, because the sound waves aren't identical, but to a large extent they are very similar, and the output is the combined total of this wave (with the output the average output of the two pickups rather than the combined total).

However, you can also reverse the phase of one of the pickups by wiring it differently, which is what Brian May has switches for.

In this case, the waves of each pickup are opposite polarity - picture two sine waves in which one starts by going up while the other goes down. In this case, a lot of frequencies get cancelled out, but fortunately not all, as the pickups aren't in the same place.

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However, you can also reverse the phase of one of the pickups by wiring it differently, which is what Brian May has switches for.

In this case, the waves of each pickup are opposite polarity - picture two sine waves in which one starts by going up while the other goes down. In this case, a lot of frequencies get cancelled out, but fortunately not all, as the pickups aren't in the same place.

 

 

that's what I'm talking about!

anyone else got some fine examples?

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what's the technical difference between phase cancellation and reversed phase?
:confused:

I thought it all came down to opposite phases between the two pickups.

 

 

The "out pf phase" positions on a Strat are not out of phase. They are generally referred to as such because they imply the thinner, phase canceled tones of true out of phase PU's.

 

What happens on a Strat is that the PU's are mounted a few inches apart, this means the string travel arcs a little wider at the PU closer to the middle of the string. This difference in string travel creates a midrange complexity as the too signals are blended together. It's the same effect that gives humbuckers their muddled midrange creaminess, just amplified because of the longer distance between coils.

 

None of the examples of Dire Straits, U2, Robert Cray or the Police are actually out of phase tones, nor is BB Kings (which is a result of the bandpass filters in the Varitone circuit). You want out of phase? It's all over funk records, Peter Green recordings, and the aforementioned Brian May.

 

I find it's why to thin for single coils, but kinda cool for HB's.

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