Pickup Pole Heigth

I pickup my SG bridge pickup next week....chrome cover, 53mm spacing, 16k, Alnico V....I'm gonna keep the 7.8k Alnico II in the neck.

What cha think????
 
Sounds promising. I was jammin with my Bill Lawrence pupped SG in the wee hours after dropping my gf off to go back to LA and thought to myself, I wonder what Robert would think of how the Lawrence Circuit Board pups sound in an SG.

This guitar sounds very lively to me, the notes off the strings blossom when strummed and the pups are nicely balanced in contrast to how some SG's sound weaker in the bridge pup.
 
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I asked my friend, Fil Oliveri of Solo Dallas fame, to tell me about how Angus set up his low output Gibson pickups. Fil has had access to all of Angus' guitars and amps. here is what he sent me this morning:

Robert!
I am doing very well, thank you! And you?

Robert, the pickup height has been as high as it could go in the early years - they would do it in order to get the maximum output possible. Despite what people may think or say (some think that pickup too close makes you lose ‘tone’ etc.) many guitarists in the early days would bring the pickup super high, as high as it gets before it touches the strings. So in order to do this, you would flush the pickup screws with the surface of the pickup cover (so that the string itself will not touch the screw once it’s raised all the way up) and then, you just raise the pickup itself as high as it’ll go.

In order to do this, you need to fret both E strings (one at a time) at the very last fret; then raise the pickup (i.e., fret the thick E string at the last fret and raise the correspondent side of the bridge pickup - same for the neck pickup).
Then do the thin E string, same procedure.

I would do it for both pickups - I do, in fact.

And so did Angus.
You have to realize that in the early days before the Schaffer-Vega, Angus would solo on the neck pickup (live) most of the times. So he needed the maximum output, always, on that pickup as well.
The reason is, in the 1970s, you had only certain Marshall models - and that was that.

When the SVDS arrived, Angus began soloing exclusively on the bridge pickup - still he needed maximum output.
Raising the pickup all the way will also thicken the sound. Something I always thought to be desirable.

In recent times, I have seen Angus with the pickup always raised all the way, or almost all the way up. He may not need all that output anymore, but I am sure that he still likes that type of sound.

Hope it helps!
 
^^^^Very informative!

Thanks, Robert.

Consistent with what is stated above, I've seen some videos of Ritchie Blackmore back in his days with Deep Purple days with the bridge pickup on his Strat set very high. That's where I got the idea to try it.
 
smitty_p said:
^^^^Very informative!

Thanks, Robert.

Consistent with what is stated above, I've seen some videos of Ritchie Blackmore back in his days with Deep Purple days with the bridge pickup on his Strat set very high. That's where I got the idea to try it.
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Exactly!
 
Those early AC/DC tones are raunchy as hell! Not much gain as we know it today, but raunchy! :dood::dood::dood:

 
mdubya said:
Those early AC/DC tones are raunchy as hell! Not much gain as we know it today, but raunchy! :dood::dood::dood:

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I love that tone....and I can nail it....but it's not real versatile....

Here's a I-Pad clip I just shot...Not quite the same right-hand technique as Malcolm's reverse pick stroke, but the way I play it....

 
Here's all my effects running....just screwing around on Holy Diver....until my I-Pad battery went dead...LOL

 
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This tone isn't too bad. It's about the wildest tone ive been able to coax out of the SG thus far.

Amp is set with gain, treble and mid maxed out, bass, presence and resonance about halfway and the GE-7 is adjusted for no boost with an "inverted V" mid boost pattern...
 
tone:
Definition of tone
1:vocal or musical sound of a specific quality
  • spoke in low tones

  • masculine tones
;especially :musical sound with respect to timbre and manner of expression
:a sound of definite pitch and vibration
b :whole step
:accent or inflection expressive of a mood or emotion
4:style or manner of expression in speaking or writing
  • seemed wise to adopt a conciliatory tone
5:a particular pitch or change of pitch constituting an element in the intonation of a phrase or sentence
  • high tone

  • low tone

  • mid tone

  • low-rising tone

  • falling tone
:the pitch of a word often used to express differences of meaning
(1)
b :the color that appreciably modifies a hue or white or black
  • gray walls of greenish tone
:the effect in painting of light and shade together with color
9a :normal tension or responsiveness to stimuli; specifically :muscular tonus
:the state of a living body or of any of its organs or parts in which the functions are healthy and performed with due vigor
10a :general character, quality, or trend
  • a city's upbeat tone
b :frame of mind :mood
c :healthy elasticity :resiliency

Merriam Webster? who the fook is Merriam? I mean we HAD Webster -- and FUNK & Wagnels.....but who IS this Merriam bitch and when did she horn in on Websters DICtionary?
Definition of TONE

not once is a GUITAR ---or an AMP mentioned in this definition
 
The video above was made with the bridge pickup 4/32" from the strings, fretted at the 22nd fret.

It made a noticeable improvement in fullness of the tone...

I welcome your critique on the tone...
 
chilipeppermaniac said:
Sounds promising. I was jammin with my Bill Lawrence pupped SG in the wee hours after dropping my gf off to go back to LA and thought to myself, I wonder what Robert would think of how the Lawrence Circuit Board pups sound in an SG.

This guitar sounds very lively to me, the notes off the strings blossom when strummed and the pups are nicely balanced in contrast to how some SG's sound weaker in the bridge pup.
Click to expand...

Note bloom is ever better the higher I go up on the pickups.
 
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