I don't know if I just need to adapt my technique, or take more time fiddling with my settings, but I get the impression that the Seymour Duncan Alnico II pickups in my Talman are less 'dynamic' in their response than the Fullshred humbucker fitted to my RG.
I don't mean in terms of output - there is obviously a huge difference there - but rather in the way the amp / sound responds to variations in playing dynamics.
Using my Blues Cube Hot both can be set up to give a clean or an overdriven sound but, when playing just on the edge of breakup, with the Fullshred it is easy to get the sound breaking up by digging in harder with the pick whilst keeping things smooth and clean with lighter picking. The single coils will do this, but a lot more effort seems to be needed to drive the sound into breakup. I.e.
It seems that
I need to be much more dynamic in my playing to get the same effect and variation in sound.
I had thought that if an amp was 'on the edge', exactly where that edge was didn't really matter, as digging in harder would push it over the edge, as it were, but is seems that other factors are also important, such as just how much output the pickup has.
Is this just me or do single coils really respond differently? If so, how do people adapt their playing or set-up to account for this? If there is a difference, is this an advantage or disadvantage of using single coils?
Also, how pickup dependent is this? For example, do you also have to be more dynamic and 'forceful' when playing a lower output vintage humbucker than a 'hotter' one in order to get the same variation in sound?
Thanks!
Comments
Studio: https://www.voltperoctave.com
Music: https://www.euclideancircuits.com
Me: https://www.jamesrichmond.com
*An Official Foo-Approved guitarist since Sept 2023.
• Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/@Goldeneraguitars
Clearly, I need to have a fiddle with my knobs. Ooh er misues, etc.
If single coils give more dynamics, how do they do this, given that with both single coils and humbuckers one might think there is a similar relationship between how hard you pick and how the output changes?
It's all a bit of a mystery to me!
However, wouldn't the same be true whatever pickups were fitted?
*An Official Foo-Approved guitarist since Sept 2023.
It's both/either/neither. The construction of the pickup is far more important than whether it's a single coil or a humbucker.
A low-wound humbucker with an alnico magnet will have more dynamics than a high-wound single coil with a ceramic, for example.
The amp is much more important anyway. Pickups don't really 'compress', so to a degree they all have similar dynamics in terms of outright signal strength relative to picking force. What matters is how the frequency response of the pickup changes as you play harder and how that interacts with the sensitivity of the amp to those frequencies.
"Take these three items, some WD-40, a vise grip, and a roll of duct tape. Any man worth his salt can fix almost any problem with this stuff alone." - Walt Kowalski
"Only two things are infinite - the universe, and human stupidity. And I'm not sure about the universe." - Albert Einstein
*An Official Foo-Approved guitarist since Sept 2023.
if you've gain matched your pickups to the front end of the amp it doesn't matter if they are humbucking or not.
Personally speaking, I find I sound more like 'me' with single coils - the sound in my head. And to be honest, it usually either Tele pickups or P90s that work best for my playing.