Members Mind Riot Posted November 21, 2005 Members Share Posted November 21, 2005 Years ago, a friend of mine and I made an explorer body for another friend of ours. We also painted it and refinished the neck he had and the headstock, all in a pearl white. We delivered it to our friend, who never had the money to finish it (pickups, hardware and such). Fast forward about four years to a few days ago, when said friend comes by to show it to me. It's finally done, equipped with black hardware and an EMG 81/89 combo. Said friend leaves it with me for a few days to play with. I do some A/Bing between it and my main, a Schecter 007 Blackjack. Mainly for heavy stuff, I'm just curious to see what the differences are between the two, tone wise. So just for clarity, I am comparing:Home made explorer with EMG 81/89Schecter 007 Blackjack with Duncan JB/'59 Tone wise, they both sound great. Nice and tight, although the JB sounds a bit "hairier" for lack of a better term. Now, please bear in mind that I haven't played an EMG equipped guitar in years, and didn't really remember what it was like. But the thing that irked me a little was this: Everything was ludicrously easier to play on the Explorer! I'm just talking about heavy stuff, palm muting and such. The EMG's are so freaking compressed you look at it funny and it'll slam the amp. I'd heard about it, but jeez! And this translates into less playing effort for me. I can play lighter, because the pickups are doing a lot of it for me! By comparison, the JB can sound very similar and just as tight, but I have to really spank the strings to get it out of them, comparatively speaking. I know the JB has more dynamic range, and that's a trade off, but still, for heavy stuff... I'm not really sure why I'm posting this, other than this general irked feeling I have that I'm having to work harder to get a tight, heavy sound than some other guys just because I use passive pickups. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Terrorizer Posted November 21, 2005 Members Share Posted November 21, 2005 ( playing small fiddle ) Deal with it..... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members walfordr Posted November 21, 2005 Members Share Posted November 21, 2005 Mmm. Sounds like you've lost all dynamics with the EMGs. Not for me thanks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members loner22 Posted November 21, 2005 Members Share Posted November 21, 2005 Originally posted by walfordr Mmm. Sounds like you've lost all dynamics with the EMGs. Not for me thanks. i beg to differ. it's like saying "if you play thru a Mesa, you sound like everyone else" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members walfordr Posted November 21, 2005 Members Share Posted November 21, 2005 Originally posted by loner22 i beg to differ. it's like saying "if you play thru a Mesa, you sound like everyone else" I can honestly assure you that it is not a bit like saying that. That would just be dumb wouldn't it? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members ranalli Posted November 21, 2005 Members Share Posted November 21, 2005 Why do people confuse more output with compression? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Pizza Combo Posted November 21, 2005 Members Share Posted November 21, 2005 The 18 volt mod takes away a lot of the unwanted compression. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members aliensporebomb Posted November 21, 2005 Members Share Posted November 21, 2005 It's more output, not compression. I've got a twin bucker passive equipped guitarand a SA/89 based EMG active guitar and thedifferences are subtle but there. The real area EMGs excel is if you're using alot of effects or have a preamp that requiresa lot of output to get a good sound. All of that drive indeed should not be confusedwith compression. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members morder Posted November 21, 2005 Members Share Posted November 21, 2005 Originally posted by aliensporebomb It's more output, not compression.I've got a twin bucker passive equipped guitarand a SA/89 based EMG active guitar and thedifferences are subtle but there.The real area EMGs excel is if you're using alot of effects or have a preamp that requiresa lot of output to get a good sound. All of that drive indeed should not be confusedwith compression. In fact you do get more compression, but I don't think it's being compressed by the pickup, unless it's caused by the built-in preamp not getting enough juice. In this case, getting a fresh battery, or using 2 batteries (18V) may help.. the compression is more likely to be applied by the preamp stage of the guitar amp, and is caused by the higher output uf the pickup. You'd get the same result from using a higher output passive pickup. The main advantage of active pickups is that you can use longer(or cheaper) guitar cables without having a negative impact on tone. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Mind Riot Posted November 22, 2005 Author Members Share Posted November 22, 2005 Hmmm...there seems to be some dissent in here about this. I didn't really mean it in a whiny or negative way, I actually think it's cool and I was half joking, but I should have known that doesn't come through in plain text. My bad. I was under the impression that the Duncan JB WAS a high output pickup, though for some reason I can't seem to find any specs for it's output voltage anywhere. There doesn't seem to be a whole lot of crazy high output passive pickups out there. I know the Dimarzio X2N is supposedly the highest output passive, at something like 510 mV. Some in here seem to think EMG's do add some compression, and I've heard that a lot elsewhere, and some say it's only from higher output, but since I don't have a bunch of different pickups to try I guess I can't really weigh in on it thoroughly myself. But, compression or not, it would seem they add their own sound to the mix or people wouldn't pay almost double the cost of a passive pickup to have them. Actually, I'm a little jealous of them. Feels kind of nice to not have to work so hard to play the same thing. I might have to consider getting an EMG equipped guitar, this one sure is fun to play. I'd think about putting them in my seven string, but there's the whole routing thing and no going back after that. And I love my JB'7 anyway. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members morder Posted November 22, 2005 Members Share Posted November 22, 2005 Me myself consider putting EMGs in the guitars I use for playing live (my jackson kellys that is) and keeping passives in those I only use in the studio and for home practise. whether you like it or not EMGs seems to sound more consistent in different guitars than most other pickups. In a live setting this is a good thing, as you won't have to radically change amp settings if you break a string and need to change guitars in the middle of a song.. In a studio setting it may be a bad thing, as you may want your guitars to sound more different. BTW: When it comes to playability I think this has just as much to do with preamps as pickups. It takes so much less effort to play difficult stuff if you have a really tight sounding amp that responds to your playing the way you want it to!(of course, pickups play a part of this) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members warriorxtman Posted November 22, 2005 Members Share Posted November 22, 2005 Pizza Combo, can I do your avatar? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members chimairob Posted November 22, 2005 Members Share Posted November 22, 2005 Originally posted by warriorxtman Pizza Combo, can I do your avatar? 2nd that man! those are some nice titties Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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