Monday, November 30, 2009

Do lipstick guitar pickup casings affect the tone significantly?

I have a rockin vintage-style guitar equipped with lipstick pickups, and I am planning on getting a custom humbucker pickup built inside of the lipstick casings. Will the casings hinder the tone, especially for hard rock and metal?Do lipstick guitar pickup casings affect the tone significantly?



I'm not exactly sure I understand what you're doing. You have a lipstick cover and want to put a humbucker inside of it?





Your sound will largely depend on the windings and the magnets, not quite as much as the physical size of the humbucker or the casing that it's in.





I take that back. The size will matter, since less size = less windings, and less windings means in a general sense less output and more treble.





Your end result will *probably* be a midway point between single coil treble and humbucker chug. Your output will be lower than Invaders, that's for sure, but not necessarily much less than Evolutions or Duncan Distortions. Kind of depends on the magnets - alnico magnets will give somewhat lower output but a more vintage/smoother sound (think more Slash or AC/DC) for rock, vs ceramic magnets that tend to be hotter but more trebly and brittle (think more like most any modern hard rock or metal band).





I'd do it. A good amp will help deliver a quality tone anyways.





If you're really worried about output, put an onboard preamp in it. That'll give you a hotter tone, if you want, and may give you the ability to EQ and stuff like that.








SaulDo lipstick guitar pickup casings affect the tone significantly?
Lipstick casing for single coils make it sound more....chirpy and thrashy (somewhere along the line). Basically it adds more output.


For humbuckers, it may have less output. It may take out the power you want for hard rock and metal.
Who cares, try it and find out, it's only a vintage style, not like its a vintage, Squires are the best for playing Dr. Frankenstein though

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