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Hatsubai « Very thick and huge mids »
Published on 03/23/11 at 15:08The DiMarzio ToneZone is one of the most famous pickups to ever come out of the DiMarzio line. It’s an iconic pickup used by the likes of Paul Gilbert, Ron Thal, Vinnie Moore, Michael Romeo and a plethora of others. This is the pickup featured in most of the top of the line Ibanez J-Custom guitars, as well. It features four conductor wiring, slugs on one coil, adjustable screws on the other and an Alnico 5 magnet to help make everything sound huge without sounding sterile.
The ToneZone is the solution for those that want a fat sounding high output pickup with tons of mids but still need some dynamics going on. The ToneZone responds nicely to both hard and soft picking, as demonstrated by the ultimate alternate picking guitarist Paul Gilbert on many of his albums and instructional videos. It sounds nice split, and it cleans up when you roll the volume knob down.
This pickup is definitely a love/hate pickup. Those that love it really adore its strong low end and pushed midrange. The dynamics are also a welcome addition when so many other high output pickups can’t clean up to save their lives. Those that hate it think it is too hot and has too many mids. I have mixed feelings about this pickup, and I think it comes down to the wood. You need to match this with just the right guitar, or else it’ll sound too hyped in a certain frequency. I find that neutral to brighter woods tend to work better than those that are a bit darker in tone. This helps prevent any unnecessary amplification of the pickup’s already strong bass. If you have a brighter guitar, it would be a pickup worth testing out. Even if you dislike it, it’s a pretty easy pickup to sell on the used market, especially to Ibanez guys.
The ToneZone is the solution for those that want a fat sounding high output pickup with tons of mids but still need some dynamics going on. The ToneZone responds nicely to both hard and soft picking, as demonstrated by the ultimate alternate picking guitarist Paul Gilbert on many of his albums and instructional videos. It sounds nice split, and it cleans up when you roll the volume knob down.
This pickup is definitely a love/hate pickup. Those that love it really adore its strong low end and pushed midrange. The dynamics are also a welcome addition when so many other high output pickups can’t clean up to save their lives. Those that hate it think it is too hot and has too many mids. I have mixed feelings about this pickup, and I think it comes down to the wood. You need to match this with just the right guitar, or else it’ll sound too hyped in a certain frequency. I find that neutral to brighter woods tend to work better than those that are a bit darker in tone. This helps prevent any unnecessary amplification of the pickup’s already strong bass. If you have a brighter guitar, it would be a pickup worth testing out. Even if you dislike it, it’s a pretty easy pickup to sell on the used market, especially to Ibanez guys.