« The Thickener  »

The Air Zone is just like its name says. It is a mix between the Air Norton and the Tonezone. It combines the Air Nortons sensitivity with the Tone Zones fatness. The Tonezone was one of Dimarzios most popular pickups for the longest time. It has like a super hotrodded PAF pickup. It has lots of mids and lots of low end with crazy compression and harmonics. The EQ on the tonezone is so crazy it kind of sounds like you have a wah on at times. The Air Norton is one of Dimarzios newer popular pickups. It is one of the preferred pickups of John Petrucci. With that pickup you got a more sensitive pickup that responded well to dynamics but was smooth enough for lead playing. With these combined pickups you get a pickup that seems to be designed for a very specific role. This pickup is very very fat. This pickup will thicken up just about any guitar that needs thickening. This is also its downside because it is so fat that it can become muddy and boomy if placed in the wrong guitar. This pickup is made for thickening up the bridge position of a thinner sounding guitar. If you wanted your Strat or Tele or even Ibanez to sound big and fat like an Explorer or Les Paul this is the kind of pickup you want. They make bridge and neck specific models and I do not recommend interchanging the two. Unlike the Tonezone if you put the bridge Air Zone in the neck of your guitar it would probably yield an unusable sound with way too much low end in the tone. If you have a guitar that made with some poorer tonewoods that has a thin sound a pickup like this will do its best to fatten up your tone.