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Post subject: Which pickups for surf style music?
Posted: Tue Nov 15, 2011 1:23 pm
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After a 30 year layoff from guitar playing, and I was never any good to begin with, my wife got tired of me commenting on wishing to play again and bought me a Fender Starcaster from Amazon for cheap. Please, spare me the negative comments; I’m aware this is not a high quality guitar. Over the past two years I have installed GraphTech saddles, nut and string trees, decked the tremolo and installed a heavy GFS trem block, leveled the frets, smoothed the sharp fret ends, installed 250K CTS pots, CRL 5 way switch, .022 Orange Drop cap, copper shielded the pickup cavity and installed a switch to turn the neck pickup on with the bridge pickup. Neck relief, pickup height and string action are set to Fender specs. The last thing I want to do is upgrade the pickups. I know I should have gotten a Squire or MIM Strat, but I probably would have tinkered with and/or changed the same parts anyway. Since I can’t sing to save my life, I mostly noodle on instrumental songs. What pickups would you suggest to play instrumental and surf type music? I’m leaning towards Fender vintage 57/62 based on Fender’s description. But have also considered Fat 50’s or Custom 54’s. Just to keep the faith, I would like to stay with Fender pickups. Thanks in advance for any wisdom that you can offer on my request for pickup selection.


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Post subject: Re: Which pickups for surf style music?
Posted: Tue Nov 15, 2011 3:37 pm
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Either of the sets you're considering would be legitimate choices for the genre of music you prefer. I have no personal experience with the CS '54 set but I installed the Fat '50s in one of my Strats and the 57/62's in a couple of others. Clean or dirty, they sound great -- especially with a quality tube amp.

HTH

Arjay

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Post subject: Re: Which pickups for surf style music?
Posted: Tue Nov 15, 2011 5:30 pm
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The long and the short of it is, back in the, "Surf Era", so to speak, various and assorted Fenders Strats of the 50s and 60s (of course) were used for Surf Music. Consequently, any Fender pickup set offerings having anything to do with being retro and faithful to their pickups of the 50s and 60s would be suitable. Specifically, Fat 50s (smooth and bell like), Custom 54s (crisp and snappy), 57/62s (a combination of the aforementioned two with a tad more power) and Custom Shop 69s (extremely bright and less power than all the aforementioned) are your choices. As to which would be your absolute best choice, as you can see, the 57/62s would give you the most versatility not just for Surf stuff, but all around.

As always, this is merely IMO where YMMV.

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Post subject: Re: Which pickups for surf style music?
Posted: Wed Nov 16, 2011 6:47 am
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Thanks gents, I appreciate your comments. I'll probably go with the 57/62's.


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Post subject: Re: Which pickups for surf style music?
Posted: Wed Nov 16, 2011 6:51 am
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ras1500 wrote:
Thanks gents, I appreciate your comments. I'll probably go with the 57/62's.


Enjoy!

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Post subject: Re: Which pickups for surf style music?
Posted: Wed Nov 16, 2011 11:30 am
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I regard the 57/62 pickups as producing the "bellwether" of vintage Strat tones -- suitable for any music where the prototypical Strat vibe is desired. I think you'll be extremely pleased with them.

If by chance you find the bridge pickup a skosh too bright, connect it to your lower tone pot to afford some control when needed.

HTH

Arjay

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Post subject: Re: Which pickups for surf style music?
Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2011 9:02 am
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The consensus pick among the Strat players on Surf Guitar 101 is the '62 American Vintage Reissue with those 57/62 pickups.


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Post subject: Re: Which pickups for surf style music?
Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2011 12:04 pm
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Thanks for the comment. Even better, thanks for the introduction to a website that I was unaware of. I'll have to spend some time on Surf Guitar 101.


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