Middle pickups...

Alright everyone, who really uses their middle pickups?

I almost never use mine. Sometimes I'll use it while playing clean leading praise and worship or something, but other than that, I almost never use it. How bout ya'll?

I use just the middle on my strat whenever I want that SRV sound. Heavy strings and really hit them hard, and it sounds a lot like that sound.
I also mix with the neck or bridge pups in the strat for all the 'typical' Fender bell type tones.

On the rest of my 3 pup guitars I usually only use them in comination with the neck or bridge for clean sounds.

Middle pickups are for those who cannot make up their minds!

I usually use neck or neck and middle on my Yamaha with three singles.

Barry wrote:Middle pickups are those who cannot make up their minds!

Hehe

I rarely use mine. On my strat I generally swap between bridge and neck. The only positions I use less than middle are the two in-betweens (see, girlfriends and guitars aren't that similar after all).

To me, the middle pickup is the most neutral one, you get a bit of the roundness and depth of the neck while retaining the sharpness of the bridge.

More songs need to be recorded with the middle pup. They're like the red headed stepchild of pick ups, sad really. SRV did his best to help them out, but they're still largely ignored and beat up by picks everywhere.

I'd like to try a triple humucker guitar one day to see how that middle humbuggy performs.

The Chad wrote:...I'd like to try a triple humucker guitar one day to see how that middle humbuggy performs.

One word: sux.

Barry wrote:

The Chad wrote:...I'd like to try a triple humucker guitar one day to see how that middle humbuggy performs.

One word: sux.

Well that's not good! What did you try it on? You see those Gibby's with that middle humbuggy and it looks cool. Sound however, maybe something else. Just something to beat up with your pick.

The Chad wrote:...You see those Gibby's with that middle humbuggy and it looks cool...

We have a couple of 3-pup Epi's and Gibby's in the shop. With some custom switching perhaps you'd have better options but with the standard 3 position switching you can't turn the bloody centre pup off or access the centre pup independently so what's the point eh? 3-position pickup selector gives you bridge-middle / all three! / neck-middle.

Besides, 3 pups are just wrong on an LP.

..Just something to beat up with your pick.

Exactly.

Hmmm.... dunno about the three h/b in a real world situation, i.e. gigging etc., but I liked the APII LC 440 that I tried at Dons place at Easter; bags of tone in that thing....

The Chad wrote:More songs need to be recorded with the middle pup. They're like the red headed stepchild of pick ups, sad really. SRV did his best to help them out, but they're still largely ignored and beat up by picks everywhere.

I'd like to try a triple humucker guitar one day to see how that middle humbuggy performs.

I may be wrong, but it sure sounds like JY of Styx did most of his early work using the middle single pickup. Check out the tone on "Midnight Ride" off of Equinox, for instance.

..... feeling shamed as I read from Barry's comment about 3 P/U Lesters. I love what I get out of the Middle/Bridge position, but I agree about the limitations of a three way. The 5 way on a Strat though is just the way they were meant to be.

Too bad SLM never made an Electra MPC model with three pickups and the five-way OmniMode. Now that would keep you busy. ;-)

corsair wrote:Hmmm.... dunno about the three h/b in a real world situation, i.e. gigging etc., but I liked the APII LC 440 that I tried at Dons place at Easter; bags of tone in that thing....

I really want to try that 12 string ya got there in that pick - that is the Vantage correct?

sarcaster wrote:I really want to try that 12 string ya got there in that pick - that is the Vantage correct?

Yes it is, Vantage VA912, and it would have to be the nicest 12 I have ever played, and it is certainly one of the nicest guitars I have ever played; and it had tone to kill for...

... and looking at that LC 440, I am starting to think I may have been a trifle hasty in dissing the APII PE series; that changed line on the upper bout really does make the thing stand out...

That's interesting with the Gibby 3 way switch, I didn't think of that. Would make it weirdly limited, wouldn't it?! Ace Frehley uses a 3 pup LP sometimes, and I've always dug his tone. Especially live it would sound good, can't imagine he recorded anything with it. But you can't much go wrong with an LP through a Marshall stack!!!

I'll check out Midnight Ride, Brain. And John, that Aria II is gorgeous, love that upper bout! Looked like a super fun day for you and your son.

The Chad wrote: And John, that Aria II is gorgeous, love that upper bout! Looked like a super fun day for you and your son.

Not my lad but Dons... and that youngster is the owner of that VSH455 - the 335 clone - but at the moment his learning is being done on a blueburst Concord III that his father picked up cheap!!

And gotta love the Rush shirt eh. I just got my tickets for the new tour - can't wait for the new album - all reviews point to a new sound but more like their 70's style.

corsair wrote: and that youngster is the owner of that VSH455 - the 335 clone - but at the moment his learning is being done on a blueburst Concord III that his father picked up cheap!!

a blueburst Concord III?

now you gonna make me cry
that just sounds incredible. when are we going to see pics of that one?

http://www.matsumoku.org/ggboard/download/file.php?id=2535&mode=view