« Rock pickup with Alnico 2's »

This is a straight rock and roll pickup. Its part of Seymour Duncans project to swap out magnets in their pickups to get cool new sounds. This pickup is a Duncan Custom but with an Alnico 2 magnet installed. Compared to the more common Alnico 5 magnets in most pickups these pickups are more laid back. They have more of a vintage tone. The Alnico 2 magnet gives you a very PAF like tone. All the frequencies are not as in your face as on most pickups. This pickup can be good at anything from Jazz to hard rock or really early metal. This pickup would get you a good Van Halen sound. EVH used pickups similar to these in his guitars to get his trademark brown sound. This pickup gets the same lose feel and heavy mids that Van Halen had in his sound. It is always important to match the pickup you are choosing properly with the guitar you want to put it in. If your guitar naturally has bright qualities you may want to balance this out this a darker pickup. In contrast if your guitar naturally has dark qualities you may want to balance this out with a brighter pickup. Or you may want to exaggerate these qualities entirely. Since it is so great for these types of music it is not too great for metal. Because of the low output it is not very tight for chugging metal riffs. Many people find that it is not tight enough for metal. It is like the pickup cannot keep up with the playing. The Alnico 5 version has a sharper attack so it will be better for metal. If you are looking for a nice vintage feeling pickup and dont intend on playing heavy metal on it the Custom Custom SH-11 is a good choice for you.