SIGNATURE TONE

Signature guitars can be odd enough, but signature pickups? If only we could all sound like our heroes by just installing a set of their pickups. Dave Burrluck gives it a try…

With a couple of sets of signature pickups waiting to be loaded onto guitars, I couldn’t help but wonder, what is the appeal? We know artists help to sell whatever they put their names to, but when it comes to pickups, well, that’s a relatively small part of the signal chain, isn’t it? Put the wrong pickups on the wrong guitar and you may well create a sound that said artist would not wish to be associated with. That said, an artist association might help you find what you’re looking for over the myriad of standard pickup models.

So, yes, it’s all about marketing and that, of course, can be a double-edged sword. If an artist’s style and/or sound isn’t to your taste, it’s doubtful you’ll buy their pickups. As we touched on back in issue 471, call your pickup a ‘Super Distortion’ and it suggests a certain style, but call it a ‘Dual Sound’ and potentially a completely different player might be interested… even if it’s the exact same pickup with a couple of extra conductor wires.

Bare Knuckle Pickups’ Silo humbuckers were specifically designed for, and with a lot of input from, Rabea ‘Bea’ Massaad. We documented that story back in our Blueprint column in issue 460. “I need a pickup with the ability to create glassy, ambient leads and warm, clear chord tones,” says Rabea. “Equally, I need it to sound crushingly heavy and aggressive.”