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Tell me about Dimarzio Air Zone and Air Norton pups...


steve_man

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I have an Air Norton in the neck of a mahogany body Tele (Tone Zone/bridge).

It's installed with coil split and it's one of the best sounding humbuckers in single coil mode that I've heard, which give tremendous versatility between that and full humbucker mode, which also sounds great. The Tone Zone is awesome too. I've mainly used Duncans, but I really like these DiMarzio's.

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There's nothing wrong with the stock pickups. Epiphone is putting out killer guitars these days.

 

 

Oh, it's Opposite Day already?

 

The stock pups blow donkey dick, as do the electronics.

 

The guitars are fine, but far from "killer".

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I have both these pickups in 2 different guitars. So maybe my opinion will actually mean something.

 

Air Zone - Bassy, middy, PAF that has been wound fairly hot. It is a lot like the Duncan Custom Custom. It has a good deal of output. It's fairly hot rodded. Not really a pickup for "teh brootz" so don't use it for that...but it can handle a lot of stuff. Does hard rock to soft rock very well. Can handle 80's metal and older metal. DONT put it in a Les Paul unless you want crazy bass. It is REALLY bassy. I have one in my alder carvin with an all maple neck, and even in there it's super bassy.

 

Air Norton - Considerably less output for the neck position. The character of the gain sound is very "clean" in the fact that there isn't much hair to the distortion. It's just clean gain. If you want to hear how this pickup sounds in a high gain setting, go listen to a BTBAM solo. It's that kind of gain. When played clean, it's pretty typical of a medium hot neck pickup. I personally don't like the Air Norton that much for anything other than higher gain playing. It lacks character for the low gain stuff. Although the clean split and parallel tones are teh secks.

 

I want to repeat. Don't put either of these pickups in a Les Paul (or any warm guitar) unless you want an ungodly amount of bass. These pickups were designed to make a superstrat type guitar sound like a Les Paul. Not the other way around.

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I have both these pickups in 2 different guitars. So maybe my opinion will actually mean something.


Air Zone - Bassy, middy, PAF that has been wound fairly hot. It is a lot like the Duncan Custom Custom. It has a good deal of output. It's fairly hot rodded. Not really a pickup for "teh brootz" so don't use it for that...but it can handle a lot of stuff. Does hard rock to soft rock very well. Can handle 80's metal and older metal. DONT put it in a Les Paul unless you want crazy bass. It is REALLY bassy. I have one in my alder carvin with an all maple neck, and even in there it's super bassy.


Air Norton - Considerably less output for the neck position. The character of the gain sound is very "clean" in the fact that there isn't much hair to the distortion. It's just clean gain. If you want to hear how this pickup sounds in a high gain setting, go listen to a BTBAM solo. It's that kind of gain. When played clean, it's pretty typical of a medium hot neck pickup. I personally don't like the Air Norton that much for anything other than higher gain playing. It lacks character for the low gain stuff. Although the clean split and parallel tones are teh secks.


I want to repeat. Don't put either of these pickups in a Les Paul (or any warm guitar) unless you want an ungodly amount of bass. These pickups were designed to make a superstrat type guitar sound like a Les Paul. Not the other way around.

 

 

You have any suggestions then? I was actually thinking about a Tone Zone for the bridge and the Air Norton for the neck...decided to go a bit more higher output than a vintage type humbucker. Don't play a lot of high gain, so obviously it needs to sound good clean, plus have a nice, distintict distorted tone with low to moderate breakup...

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I would get a pair of 30th anny PAFs for what you want. The high output Dimarzios aren't known for being great at clean tones.

 

 

I actually do not like how any humbuckers sound on clean tones unless it's on an archtop on the neck pickup.

 

I've always thought that single coil pickups are much better at clean tones and humbuckers are better at dirty tones

 

I love how Les Pauls sound through a mid gain tube amp, but I've always thought they sound like crap if you play them clean. They are made to be overdriven.

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I actually do not like how any humbuckers sound on clean tones unless it's on an archtop on the neck pickup.


I've always thought that single coil pickups are much better at clean tones and humbuckers are better at dirty tones


I love how Les Pauls sound through a mid gain tube amp, but I've always thought they sound like crap if you play them clean. They are made to be overdriven.

 

I love a clean humbucker sound, different strokes. Single coil clean tones have a particular sound to them, which I don't like all the time.

 

High output pickups never get completely clean though, which was my point. If the guy is gonna spend most of his time playing low-mid gain and clean tones, something like a ToneZone which has "hair" clean might not be the best bet. :idk:

 

Some of Satch's pickups(MoJoe, PAF-Joe, Fred, PAF-Pro) might be a good choice. Medium hot.

 

Dimarzio's Pickup Picker is pretty good actually. I can usually end up with my favorite pickups by plugging in values. :lol:

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Are you cross-shopping the 36th Anniversary set with the Zone/Norton set?

 

Wow... those are like... opposites, man. :poke:

 

I mean, nothing wrong with checking out your options, but those are radically different sounding pickups. 36th Anniversary for nice vintage-y tones... earliest days of the PAF up through Led Zep and AC/DC. Tone Zone for modern 90s and 2000s higher gain tones. The Norton is a nice neck pickup, but certainly more modern flavored than the 36th.

 

Anyway... not even similar. :lol:

 

I would tend to think someone with a Vox amp and Greenback clone speakers would be much happier with the 36th Anniversary set. If you have a Charvel dealer near you, the Tone Zone is in some of their current models so might be easy to check out. The 36th Anniversary aren't identical to the 57 Classics or the Burstbucker 1 and 2 set, but they are in the same general ballpark and several Gibsons have those pups installed.

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Are you cross-shopping the 36th Anniversary set with the Zone/Norton set?


Wow... those are like... opposites, man. :poke:


I mean, nothing wrong with checking out your options, but those are radically different sounding pickups. 36th Anniversary for nice vintage-y tones... earliest days of the PAF up through Led Zep and AC/DC. Tone Zone for modern 90s and 2000s higher gain tones. The Norton is a nice neck pickup, but certainly more modern flavored than the 36th.


Anyway... not even similar.
:lol:

I would tend to think someone with a Vox amp and Greenback clone speakers would be much happier with the 36th Anniversary set. If you have a Charvel dealer near you, the Tone Zone is in some of their current models so might be easy to check out. The 36th Anniversary aren't identical to the 57 Classics or the Burstbucker 1 and 2 set, but they are in the same general ballpark and several Gibsons have those pups installed.

 

I'm the one that recommended the 30th anny models. Seems like he was shopping for pickups based on youtube vids, while his actual needs didn't match the models he was looking at, IMO.

 

It's better to figured out what you want from the guitar, then look for pickups that work for that, then to just go for the flavor of the month, or what others like.

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You have any suggestions then? I was actually thinking about a Tone Zone for the bridge and the Air Norton for the neck...decided to go a bit more higher output than a vintage type humbucker. Don't play a lot of high gain, so obviously it needs to sound good clean, plus have a nice, distintict distorted tone with low to moderate breakup...

 

The Tone Zone is the EXACT same pickup as the Air Zone with more output. So you will have the same problem. You can try them if you want, but don't say I didn't tell you when your LP sounds like a mud puddle.

 

The real issue here is that 80% of the Dimarzio line is too bassy for a Les Paul. They are mostly designed for Ibanez guitars and stuff like that.

 

The PAF 36th pickups will sound great. But if you need higher output, looks elsewhere. The only other set that works well in an LP is the D-activators.

 

How much output do you want anyway?

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