Whats your choice of Pickups?

[Diablo]

Passive. Tried EMG 81/85's in 2 different guitars. Nothing special at all. IMO some stock Gibson pickups like the 498/500's are meaner sounding although still not great.

I have yet to find a hotter and better sounding pickup that the Lado Shadow I got in '88. Wish I could find some more.
My second fave would be a SD JB. Nice all around pickup, can do anything well.
I'm messing with some Suhr Aldrich's in my LP right now. Not bad. Surprisingly I'm digging the neck pickup much more than the bridge, which is a little dark for my tastes.

[julienpier]

I seriously know nothing about pickups.
I know I've got Dragster humbucking Pickups on my Jaguar... and some dual-coil pickups on my Gretsch.

Probably a pair of Lipstick and a single coil pickup on my jB hand made Square guitar... still in reflection.

[Budda]

I like passive buckers, and I'm a duncan guy. That said, I will have J S Moore's in my 6-string and I think they'll work out phenomenally - as for production though, a '59 or Jazz in the neck and a good moderate high output bucker in the bridge of a singlecut and I'm set.

[Andy]

Passive humbuckers are where it's at for me. I have an Alnico 2 Pro neck and 59 bridge in my SG, which are fantastic. I find that using lower output pickups with a boost before the amp if needed gives me better clarity than overwound pickups.

[warse22]

I love singles, but lately I've been really wanting a P90 or humbucker equipped.

I would have to say my favorite pickups would be the Anderson TV series in my Tele...awesome pickups.

[rockgarden]

I abstain from voting. I decided that "humbucker + single-coil + Seymour-Duncan + other brands" would simply not add anything of value to the poll results.

The truth is, I have several different pickup configurations in guitars, from Seymour Duncan humbucking models to branded and unnamed single-coil pickups. I find that pickup positioning is at least as important as the design, though. For example, I much prefer a single-coil pickup where the 24th fret would be to get what I hear as the true sound of the guitar. However, when playing with large amounts of gain, the benefit of a humbucker in terms of noise reduction far outweighs the tonal difference (assuming a good humbucking pickup, of course), and for that matter, it could be argued that the tone difference is stylistically appropriate for high-gain sounds, anyway.

For bridge pickups, I tend to prefer both single-coils and humbuckers pretty equally. Sometimes I find the humbuckers tend to have an almost compressed sound (with no external compression applied, that is), compared to single-coils. Whether I prefer that usually depends on mood.

Originally Posted by screamingdaisy

You left out P90s.....

Arguably, those are single-coil pickups, but we do differentiate them from the narrower single-coil pickups. I agree it should have been a separate selection.

[Wired]

Always passive for me!

My ultimate fav, and my main stay for pickups is, and has been since I first started changing out pups, are Gibsons.

Gibson ES-335: Gibson Burstbucker II Pro / Gibson 500T
Gibson Les Paul: Gibson Burstbucker II Pro / Gibson Burstbucker II Pro
Gretsch Firejet: TV Jones Powertron / TV Jones Powertron
Epi ES-335: Gibson Bustbucker I / Gibson 500T
Tokai Tele: FCS Twisted Tele / Antiquity


However, I do wanna change out the bridge pickup on my Tele for something with more gain, but similar tone.

[gtone]

Me likey da humbucking side of the universe. Far from trying 'em all yet (Burstbuckers & Seth Lovers still on my "hitlist"), but some of my personal faves over the years have been Duncan '59's and JB's, DiMarzio Super Distortions, Gibson PAF's - different tastes for different styles of course. Special place in my heart for the Duncan Pearly Gates - yowza!!!

Single coils can still give me wood - good P90's and DeArmonds, in particular. I'm not a Fender kinda guy, but I had a Tele for 20+ yrs with a Lace Sensor Blue in the neck for the last half of it's life which was particularly tasty.

[warplanegrey]

I'm a big fan of passive humbuckers. I've tried EMG's and thought they sounded terrible. I've recently put an Anderson H3 in my SG....and holy cow, she sounds amazing.

[Stickman]

TV Jones Classics are killer. Chimey humbuckers that break up really nicely.

GFS Mean 90s are probably their best pickups. Aggressive P90's in a humbucker size. Really no good clean, but they kill with a bit of crunch on the amp.