in my "stratobastard" i've got a hot rail in the neck that i'm thinking i'll finally move to the bridge where it's supposed to be. it's got a ton of bass and thickness where it is, and it sounds awesome, but i think i'm ready to admit its probably going to sound better where it's meant to be.
so, question is - i need to find a neck pickup (single or humbucker, i've got room) that's really clean and noiseless and great with reverb... suggestions? thanks.

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~Dan

Clean AND noiseless? That's gonna be tough. For example, EMG actives are without hum, but never really have that clean tone you can get from passive pickups. A passive humbucker like a Dimarzio Super Distortion would be good, and virtually noiseless.

You might want to talk with Bro Dave about tone capacitors.

super distortion was one i was looking at already. then i found this, anyone have experience with these? it claims it will retain it's clarity even through a lot of effects, and it comes in yellow to match the pickguard i'll be putting it in.
http://www.musiciansfriend.com/accessor ... pro-pickup

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~Dan

Tough in what way? There's nothing tough about it whatsoever.
A Super Distortion? This is your recommendation for clean and noiseless?

lame, don't list to a single word of that nonsense. What you are looking for is either a humbucker or a stacked single coil but with low output, not some screaming demon like a Super Distortion. First off the neck position does not require high output pups. High output pups were first brought to market to attempt to balance the neck with the bridge, which does require a higher output. The bridge requires higher output because the vibrational path of the strings is much narrower there.

Try a Kinman Mark III or maybe a Dimarzio Air Classic Neck or Humbucker from Hell or a Duncan Alnico II Pro, 59 or Jazz.

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Just think of how awesome a guitar player you could have been by now if you had only spent the last 10 years practicing instead of obsessing over pickups and roasted maple necks.

How about a Cool Rail I think they cleanup fairly well

thanks, guys. bmw, what do you think of the one i linked? or maybe a true velvet? after doing my own research i think i'm liking this idea - the Dimarzio dp151 in the neck, true velvet in the middle, and my hotrail on the bridge. thoughts?
what I'm hoping is that i can use the 151 and the hotrail for all my heavy distortion/ reverb/ effects loops, and use the velvet in the middle when i'm doing clean surfy type stuff with a little reverb. my only question would be how would these sound together in the between positions?
and i did look at cool rails as well, just for the sake of having it offsetting the hotrail on the other end, but all the reviews i read basicly said you could do better for the money. :/

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~Dan

Sorry, mang. Can't help you on that. I am not at all familiar with the PAF Pro. I looked it up on the Dimazio website and it's listed under medium output. I used to be a fan of hot and hotter pups and I do still have a couple of guitars with fairly agressive pups but I lean to lower outputs whenever I can these days. For what it's worth Slash has some Duncan signature pups and they're low-to-medium output so not everyone who plays kickass rock 'n roll wants the highest output they can find. For what you described as your intended purpose I'd start browsing the pup maker sites and study the lower output models. The terminology and buzzwords they use can be confusing sometimes but they will give you at least a rough idea how the pups behave. Don't overlook the single sized stacked buckers. They've come a long way in the last 20 years.

Beyond that I really don't want to get any more specific as everyone's ear is different and what may sound beautiful to me may not be your cup of tea at all. If we all liked the same thing there'd be only one pup made. My only real suggestion is look to the lower end of the output scale and try to sift through the jargon.

If you're lucky, Martian will weigh in here and give you some advise. I would defer to him any day.

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Just think of how awesome a guitar player you could have been by now if you had only spent the last 10 years practicing instead of obsessing over pickups and roasted maple necks.

I guess the question is, do you want your strat to sound like a strat? Fender has some low noise single coils available at just about any store. Personally, I LIKE the way stock strat pickups sound these days. They aren't anywhere near as noisy as they used to be. I owned a couple of Japanese strats in the 90s and I hated them both. I tried using EMGs and I hated those too. Since then, I've just taken out the time to sit in a store and play several Fender guitars before deciding on ONE. Each one is going to sound different. I don't know why but, it will. Going into your guitar's guts and ripping stuff out and replacing it with something you only HOPE will work better for you is like a dog chasing its tail. My point here is find a guitar you like the sound of right off the bat and BUY that one. LOL! If that isn't feasible, find a stock Fender pickguard and replace your neck pickup with a standard or upgraded Fender neck pickup and see where that puts you. I never liked Seymours or EMGs to begin with. If you want to play heavy metal, buy a Les Paul, or an Ibanez, Jackson, ESP, or whatever else will suit the bill. A Strat should sound like a Strat. Why would you want it to sound like anything else?

fair enough, bmw. i will definitely do more research on lower output stuff. thanks!
mortal, this guitar i'm working on is my black and yellow beater partscaster, it's a no-name body (i think it might be a mighty-mite, but there's no numbers or anything on it) and the neck is a squier neck i put on it a few weeks back. the single coils are also out of the squier, other than the hotrail. i like how the hotrail sounds with my ds-1. lots of nice crunch and thickness for all my grungey garage rock, but it's wayyy too thick for anything cleaner. the stock single coils are so weak (it was a bulletstrat) - i've played a lot of "real" fenders and loved the sound, and wouldnt go hacking on a nice new decent fender. but this thing is far from that. lol. and if i'm completely honest with myself, i have this dumb need to have some weird pickups that not everyone else here in nashville is using, you know?
but they do need to be plenty functional and sound really sweet. still doing my own research..... and as far as it sounding like a strat, i agree, that's why i'm looking really hard at the true velvets right now. supposed to be like stock strat pups but a little nicer, clearer, etc. from what i gather.

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~Dan

Nah, I was trying to steer Iame away from some of the harsh sounding active pickups.

Humbucker from hell is not bad at some 220 mv, it low end for uncovered pickups.
Covered pickups would include the PAF @ 200 mv or some that go even lower.
Look up the specs at the Dimarzio website for more.

Without any hesitation, I would say a Duncan JB junior in the neck to pair with that hot rail bridge.
I'm using a guitar right now that has a Dimarzio fast track2 in the bridge, hot rail middle, and JB jr neck. Freaking bomb. I love that setup.

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Noise is ur friend......

Especially with reverb.....

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I have to take issue with that statement - You'd be surprised how popular the Super Distortion is with clean players, it's just a damn good all round humbucker, with surprisingly good cleans. Compared to most modern 'hot' pickups, it's about as hot as a bowl of cornflakes, and certainly wouldn't dominate a Hot Rails. You might even have to lower the HR a tiny bit to get the levels to match.

I hear the ones aren't quite as good though - not really a problem, as you can pick up 70's or 80's ones for pocket change. I still have two laying around in the parts drawer waiting for some sort of project to come wandering past.