Rig-Talk

always come back to one of my les pauls with a jb in it for rock or drop tune brutals… something about the snarl always sits right with me vs more polished pups. just wish it was a little tighter in the bass..
anything out there super similar, but a more tight low end.??

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Holy Diver they say. JB Alnico 8 I say

On superstrats I use the BKP Holydiver

For Les Pauls, I would say the 500T. (To me it sounds what you’d think a ceramic JB would sound and feel like, tighter but still has some give).

Rebel Yells are up there too.

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I grabbed an RTM(Duncan DeMartini Custom shop) used here and it is very similar to a JB, the highs are a bit tamed and the mids less harsh, but still prevalent in a good way. Tight low end too...although I feel the JB can sound tight enough for me. It's like the sometimes harshness of some JBs are toned down in a good way. Great clarity. It's like a refined JB.

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Suhr Aldrich ... everything you like about the SD JB ... and nothing you don’t.

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This

Its not at all the same, so I'm really not answering your question, but the Wilde L500L/XL is a really tight passive pickup. Very quiet as well. And it has an attractive price tag to boot. It's probably my favorite passive, and it stays in my superstrat.

Suhr Aldrich!

500t are awesome. Cheap used too. I have one in a gibby V and one in an SG. Probably one of my favorite pickups overall. Everything is just perfect with it for me.

I have a 80's DiMarzio PAF pickup in a LP, it kicks major ass. Nothing like the current dimarzio PAF's though.

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Yeah I really like the overall tone and feel of the 500T, again it’s the closest thing to a ceramic JB you will find, but the one major drawback is that it is severely compressed. The JB, although also hot and compressed, still has some air about it that makes it ideal for anything from blues, jazz, to hard rock to metal. I keep going back to it all the time regardless

another vote for Aldrich

On the Pauls, agreed...i just cannot get away from the 500T. It's what's in all my Pauls now, nothing else in them even sounds right to me now.

FWIW, I think the Duncan Black Winter has a similar upper-mid grind compared to the JB grind with less stuffy lower mids and a bolder, leaner, faster bottom-end.

Motor city afwayu

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Wow, aren't the mids WAY different? I love the Afwayu, but it's much darker than any JB I've played.

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One of the Many i'd like to own.

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Well, I must admit that my afwayu is ceramic, not the normal alnico; and the only JB I have left is a JB under Jazzmaster which looks very different under the cover. Add to that my afwayu is in an ash body strat with a gotoh 510 and my JB is in a full mahogany hard tail jazzmaster. So maybe I'm not getting a truly accurate representation of normalcy or a truly relative base of comparison. Not sure how much the differences in pickup build to standard and the different guitars I have them in plays into it but my afwayu plays like a better JB to me... in fact, 2 weeks ago I ordered two new bridge model Afwayus to replace the Friedman Classic+ in my green meanies. The Friedman is a great pickup but I wanted more output.


That being said, "The man" "used jeff becks for years" and then switched to Afwayu so I wouldnt think they could be that strikingly different.

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DiMarzio Norton.

All the harmonics, crunch, but with a tighter low-end, and while still bright, the high-end never gets harsh.

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Another vote for the Suhr Aldrich, it's everything you described. Tight low end without the spikey midrange the JB tends to have and it seems to have more of an open sound even though it is very high output, I think 17-18K if I remember correctly.

Afwayu is probably my favorite pup, I need to get another..my experiences with them is only with my Alder Charvels, and in each the Afwayu replaced a JB and were very different to my ears. I found the Afwayu had more in common with a Duncan Custom than anything else I've had.
Fantastic pickup though...

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KRG 2C+ Coliseum 1X15 Combo w/EV, Road Case
1982 JCM 800 2204
HH M900
Lexicon PCM 80
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74 1960A w/GBs
Mesa Standard V30 cab
Peavey Butcher Cab w/K85s
2009 Charvel USA Candy Plum SoCal
2008 Charvel USA Candy Tangerine SoCal
1985 Ibanez Destroyer

I pretty much swear by the Dean DMT Baker Act. Think of it as a cross between a JB and a Dimarzio Fred

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I really need to try a Norton some day. Keep seeing folks say positive things like this about it.
And yeah the Afwayu has a similar vibe to the JB if you set it far away from the strings. But if set up the usual distance it has much fuller bass IME.
Aldrich is a good call. I agree it's the most JB-like I've tried.

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Fo' sho! They work well in different applications.
I had one in a Les Paul (with maple cap) and it's still in my alder-bodied Charvel So-Cal Pro Mod. So, quite different guitars in pretty much all respects.
(mahogany vs alder | fixed bridge vs. Floyd Rose (blocked though, with D-Tuna) | set neck vs. bolt-on | maple vs. rosewood fb | 24.75" vs. 25.5" scale...)

The only reason it's no longer in the Les Paul, is I found a DiMarzio AT-1 in double cream for a good price and it has possibly an even sweeter split-tone than the Norton with a bit more low-end, although the low-end is slightly looser than that of the Norton.
It has perhaps a bit less output than the JB and less compression, but more controlled across the range, with plenty Alnico V flavour going on. In a Les Paul it did a nice EVH-ish rendition.

JB=Katy Perry. Norton=Angelina Jolie. Makes sense?
Sometimes loud 'n brash with some jiggle just works (see my Kramer SM-1...a shred-axe).

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I have never had any time on an aldrich. Sounds like i should give it a try. I really dig the snarl that a ib has, but could just be a little tighter when it comes to real hard suffocation type palm mutes, or i wouldnt change a thing. Thanks. The boack winter sounds cool too. Had one a while back but never got a chance to wind it up to band volume and really chunk on it. I do remember it having a similar high mid gring to it.

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FWIW psychodave's clips all use a Suhr Aldrich and he covers quite a few styles in some of those clips and (to me) they always sound awesome.

I have an Aldrich Set that i need install in one of my Les Pauls but i just haven't had the time. I also need to listen to Psycodave's clips.

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His clips are usually in the Cameron or Jose themed threads...he has some really great clips in a thread about a Jet City mini head he modded to Jose spec. All the clips are an Alder body USA Charvel with an Aldrich.

I've never been so excited to listen/watch clips.

I absolutely love the whole modded Marshall Tone.

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Used to be DET1973 Not sure what Happened to my Old Account.

This thread makes me want to try the Suhr Aldrich.
Can’t believe all the praise for the 500t. Couldn’t get it out of my LP and Explorer fast enough.

I don't like that Pickup at all. I know that Al from Minstry loves that Pickup with his Marshall JMP-1. I prefer the Dirty Fingers to the 500T.

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Used to be DET1973 Not sure what Happened to my Old Account.

I have a bkp brute force in my other les paul, and ill do a comparison tomorrow when i get some new strings, and get both in the same tuning...

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I had a Suhr Aldrich in my Les Paul years ago and that pickup just kills. Not harsh, articulate, and great low end and cleans up unbelievably for a hotter pickup. I haven't had an actual JB in a guitar for years (I have the RTM in my Charvel but not technically a JB) and don't remember that pickup cleaning up well at all.

As others have mentioned, I'm not a huge 500T fan either. I mean it is ok but when I would play thru other pickups, I'd realize that it is not one of my favorites.

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Black Winter for sure!

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Not real common, but the Schecter USA Pasadena Plus in my Solo II Custom really has a polished JB vibe. I even find it harmonically richer and more percussive.

Well it is harmonically richer than a JB and pretty much the entire standard Duncan production. Great pickup, that is. Too bad Schecter's pickup catalog is not as hyped as some other brands

I will throw out a dirty Fingers. A bit different but it's still wicked. Also I will agree on the black winter.

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And a bunch of modded EPI VJR's.

I changed out a 300K pot with a 500K pot and the JB got much brighter and more aggressive. You might want to look at changing the pot to something bigger or smaller. It effects the entire voice.
Changing the value of the tone capacitor also effects the voice.
Contact Seymour Duncan and tell them how you want the voice to change. They might recommend a different magnet or other change. Maybe a different pickup.

What I'm saying is if you like the JB there is several ways to alter the voice.

I messed around with mine and ended up with a 500K pot and 0.047uf Orange Drop.

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The fact that Stephen appears from nowhere, is sentenced to death in an emotional public trial without anyone interfering at all and is then altogether forgotten as if nothing happened, is already suspicious.

@stephen

Good point. you can get very different results with different pot/cap combos. And it's way cheaper than a new pickup.

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BUILDS: 5F1, 1978X 18 Watt.
BUILDS IN PROCESS: AA165, JTM45.
And a bunch of modded EPI VJR's.

Another vote for MCP Afwayu. Great pickups! Really warmed up my Ibanez.

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Well, the Suhr Aldrich I didn't care for in my Les Pauls. Was the last pickup I had in my Custom, put in a 500T. It originally had Burstbuckers. That was the last experimenting with my Pauls...all now have 500T's, they just work for me. For whatever reason Ceramics work for me in Pauls. I give up some dynamics but the grind, punch and sizzle I dig.

Now my Tremonti II has a 500t and I don't care for it. Granted the Tremonti pup is supposed to be modeled off the 500t but I just never bonded with that stock pickup. Mids are different to my ear. I've had a few things in it; MCP Torque, Tone Zone, JB...and the closest I've dug is the 500t. Still that pickup is too congested for me in that guitar which is basically their version of a Les Paul. I still think Ceramic is the way to go "for me" with that guitar. Although I'm interestd in the Alnico 8 magnets. Cross between Cermaic and Alnico, hmm.

Super strats i.e alder, basswood, maple cap etc... first place I'll start is the JB. Back in the day all my ESP's had JB's in them. In fact the Suhr is going in my Charvel DK24 replacing the Full Shred when I have some time. Looking forward to checking that out. Tried Ceramics back in the day with my superstrats and always preferred alnico magnets. From my experience, I just can't stick with one pickup for all guitars. Loved JB's in my old ESP's, didn't like them in the Pauls.

Somebody mentioned the Norton above, very nice pickup and in fact back in the day I bounced between that, the Tone Zone and the JB years ago on my superstrats...always came back to the JB. Little more rude than the Norton, which was sweeter in the mids than the Tone Zone. Btw/ I've always used 500k pots as well.

In my humble opinion, I think the Duncan Custom checks all the boxes, for me, anyway.

Try an OLD Dirty Fingers. Trust me...

I really like the 498T... I find it somewhat similar to a JB...

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Aldrich.

Outside of the JB/Aldrich camp, I also really like the Nazgul (right now my favorite pickup of all time).

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I have an Aldrich in my masterbuilt Tele with Floyd. Simply an amazing sounding pickup. All the right tone and nothing irritating or grating.

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My three LP's are set with the 500t's. Think I'm going to try a Wolfetone BlisterBucker in the PRS or Duncan Distortion. If that doesn't work out I might try the DF. Usually with the DD, I end up taking them out after awhile because they are too dark but to me, the Tremonti and most PRS guitar I've owned tend to be bright sounding guitars so the DD may be the answer. My ear, taste and feel having always leaned towards Alnico's first but I just cannot get them where I want in my Les Pauls or the PRS.

Other than the Aldrich I don't think any of the other pickups mentioned in this thread sound like a JB.
I have owned or used all of them. Most of them are not even close. Good pickups... But don't sound, behavior or feel of a JB.

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The fact that Stephen appears from nowhere, is sentenced to death in an emotional public trial without anyone interfering at all and is then altogether forgotten as if nothing happened, is already suspicious.

Use a JB and turn the bass down a bit on your amp.

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The harsh cold winter gives way to a warm, rainy spring.

another vote for the afwayu. I have an underwound model in my PRS and it is super mean. Still has the big low end of the JB but feels considerably tighter in response. Loses the honky midrange and high end hair that JBs can get and gains some nice growl/grind in the mids. cleans are quite good if you care about that sort of thing. I love it for anything in BEADF#B or below.

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