« Vintage style Dimarzio »

imarzio isnt really known for its vintage style pickups. Dimarzio has been making pickups forever and they are mostly known for their high gain and modern sounding pickups. They are used by people like Steve Vai and John Petrucci along with Joe Satriani. All these guys have a very modern sound and use decent amounts of gain. When most people are looking for a more vintage style pickup they may look towards Seymour Duncan or a boutique company. Dimarzio is looking to change that with this pickup. This is the 36th Anniversary PAF DP103. Everyone wants the PAF tone when they are looking at humbuckers. The PAF being the first humbucker means every humbucker nowadays has some PAF DNA in it. People pay tons of money for original PAF pickups even though they are like 50+ years old at this point and over time the tone can degrade from pickups. There are a ton of modern clones of PAF pickups but this Dimarzio is up there with some of the most boutique ones. This pickup is looking back towards the original. A decently low output PAF pickup like this one works well in just about any guitar. They have a low vintage level output but retain note to note clarity that you do not see often in low output pickups. Its easy for them to become muddy in tone when their output isnt cranked. I only tired this pickup in the neck position so I was mostly using it for cleans and lead tones. The lead tones from this pickup are excellent. The output is pretty low so the sound is not harsh at all and the clarity is great so you can still hear everything. With the lower output you can really play with your pick dynamics and it comes through really well. A high output pickup would just be brickwalled the whole time. If you are looking for a good modern PAF that retains more of the vintage vibe this Dimarzio should be something you look at.