Are gold foil pickups a one trick pony?

hessodreamy

I’ve been really digging any demo I’ve seen of guitars with gold foil pickups and keep backing off from the brink of rash buying decisions. 

But all the demos seem to be through a distorted fender tweed with loads of reverb. I dig the clarity they have when driven, but is this the only situation where they shine? Would a clean vox amp with no reverb work? 

p90fool

Yes, in fact I think that's where they shine. 

The Tweedy reverb thing probably stems from a Ry Cooder influence, but they excel at totally clean sounds more than most other pickups in my experience.  

TheMarlin

I had a pair of Mojo Filterfoils (Filtertron mount goldfoils), thought they were epic. Great for clean and dirty, and everything in between. 

There is a little bit of Gretsch Hilotron in there. 

There are plenty of new guitars with Goldfoils fitted. Get yourself to a showroom, and try some for yourself. 

Treewig1

I’ve got a pair of McNelly goldfoils in my TLL. They are dual blade splittable humbuckers. I mostly only play clean and they are very good in humbucker and ‘single coil’ mode.  

Whitecat

They’re good for slide guitar too...

dazzajl

I have one of these and it’s an excellent guitar. Especially clean through an AC30

https://reverb.com/item/31330987-supro-2020ts-westbury-dual-pickup-island-series-electric-guitar-flame-maple-tobacco-burst

I’m kind of teetering on the edge of selling off everything but a simple tele and amp, so if you’re at all interested, let me know...

JerkMoans

I’ve got a Novak gold foil in the neck position of my Jazzmaster. Almost invariably play it clean and it’s wonderful. Really rich, full complex tone. 

If you factor out my ham fisted twanging, obvs.

Dominic

Great all round.......Joe Gore does some great vids of them and I love his playing and wackiness
he has discovered that they dont back off when used with fuzz to clean up