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I have two guitars set up with Sliders '59s and they sound 'right', giving the desired tone.
I also have a guitar set up with Mojo Vintage pickups and they sound equally cool.
My '63 Strat has some USA made hand wound pickups from a guy in the US who specialises in recreating the original period pickups using the original materials, which I asked him to make especially for my '63 Strat. They sound terrific too and out of all of those four sets I struggle to set them apart, as they all deliver the tone. That said, they were all expensive.
Other pickups that I have are Seymour Duncan Alnico Pro IIs, Amalfitano Vintage, Kinman Traditional, Fender Noiseless, Tone Riders, Ironstone Vintage, Fender CS 69 and G&L pickups on my S-500. They are all amazingly good too and I personally rate the G&L pickups very highly.
The point I'm making is that all of my Strats sound very earthy and authentic for Shadows tunes and I think it's more down to the amplifier settings rather than any specific pickup.

Dave,

the point is with ANY pickups,if they are "scatter wound" each will sound different.The reason I mentioned "SLIDERS" is because I heard Phil Kelly playing "Frightened City" on youtube through a Meazzi,into a 1959 VOX AC15 and they sounded "RIGHT". I bought a set off Phil for £300. I have a 1964 JMI VINTAGE VOX AC30 (with top boost added) I also have a VOX AC15 HERITAGE AC15H1TV. I have had a Meazzi spec tape echo built for me by a guy called LARS GORAN KARISSON.Who also built one for Kurt Froberg of the "RYDERS".Kurt said he was VERY impressed with the modern ECHOMATIC 1/2 You can hear this echomatic in a LINK I left in ECHO THREAD yesterday. If your like ME we are always striving for those extra percentages. Maybe "THAT SOUND" is objective. I will definitely KNOW when "I AM HAPPY".

Steph.

I have a custom made Jazzmaster fitted with SD P-Rails. I don’t like these p/ups and would like to change to P90’s with the Humbucker type fitting.

I can’t afford the most expensive however - I would be interested to read people’s thoughts regardless of price.

I use this guitar for Rhythm playing 60’s and 70’s numbers. I use D’Addario pure Nickel 11 - 48.

Any suggestions gratefully received!

Dave

I have a MIj Fender Jazzmaster to which I fitted Seymour Duncan Jazzmaster pickups, not the expensive Vintage ones, just the normal ones. The Jap pickups were very thin sounding and I was told deliberately made to sound more like a Strat, which is why I swapped them. It now sounds like a proper early Jazzmaster (think Ventures) if that's what you are looking for.

I have a MIj Fender Jazzmaster to which I fitted Seymour Duncan Jazzmaster pickups, not the expensive Vintage ones, just the normal ones. The Jap pickups were very thin sounding and I was told deliberately made to sound more like a Strat, which is why I swapped them. It now sounds like a proper early Jazzmaster (think Ventures) if that's what you are looking for.

Jetblack56 wrote:Dave,

the point is with ANY pickups,if they are "scatter wound" each will sound different.The reason I mentioned "SLIDERS" is because I heard Phil Kelly playing "Frightened City" on youtube through a Meazzi,into a 1959 VOX AC15 and they sounded "RIGHT". I bought a set off Phil for £300. I have a 1964 JMI VINTAGE VOX AC30 (with top boost added) I also have a VOX AC15 HERITAGE AC15H1TV. I have had a Meazzi spec tape echo built for me by a guy called LARS GORAN KARISSON.Who also built one for Kurt Froberg of the "RYDERS".Kurt said he was VERY impressed with the modern ECHOMATIC 1/2 You can hear this echomatic in a LINK I left in ECHO THREAD yesterday. If your like ME we are always striving for those extra percentages. Maybe "THAT SOUND" is objective. I will definitely KNOW when "I AM HAPPY".

Steph.

The problem here is ta he Meazzi tape echo doesn't exactly sound like the machine used by Hank as his was an early drum variant of the Meazzi. It may sound OK, but that isn't what it was so the comparison is meaningless. You may as well use a Binson or Echolette, they too sound very close but it isn't what it was.
Using my AC30/4, any good echo machine and any of my Strats do the job - it's the tone that matters. With this amp a budget guitar sounds very close also.

dave robinson wrote:I have a MIj Fender Jazzmaster to which I fitted Seymour Duncan Jazzmaster pickups, not the expensive Vintage ones, just the normal ones. The Jap pickups were very thin sounding and I was told deliberately made to sound more like a Strat, which is why I swapped them. It now sounds like a proper early Jazzmaster (think Ventures) if that's what you are looking for.

Hi Dave. Many thanks for your reply. I’ll check them out. I’m not necessarily looking for a Ventures sound - although I’m deep in Ventures territory here in Japan. Many thanks. Dave (R)


OK no problem, I was just highlighting that the standard Seymour Duncan pickups were enough to get the guitar to sound as it was originally voiced back in the day.
I for one, don't want all my guitars to sound like a Strat as I enjoy the different textures that my guitars offer tonally.

Dave,

the tape echo I have,is voiced to give that unmistakable "SONIC TONE" and is all valve,with the "magic" EF86 PRE AMP.So it sounds like the Echomatic 1 and 2 that Hank used. The proof of the pudding is in the eating.

https://app.box.com/s/w4d512g7e1wktfw9lk01dbih6k6wjwu0 Kurt Froberg of the Ryders playing the NEW Meazzi. first going through what this echo can do, then playing Shads tunes with backing tracks.

The link doesn't seem to work.

Christian and his VST system is a great example of getting the recorded sound very close to original.

He does not use a tape machine or drum machine. As far as I am aware he uses eTap2 software plugin and 10-46 strings. There are usually elements of compression and tape saturation type drive , sometimes with reverb and EQ. VOX amps are used too.

He manages to get his recordings very close to those recorded by the shadows. This tells me that the echo whilst important, is not everything.

Check Christian 's uTube channel out.

https://www.youtube.com/user/springer16900