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King Loudness « Actively lead »
Published on 10/11/11 at 09:32The EMG 60 is a pickup that is a variation on the typical EMG humbuckers. It is commonly paired in the neck position of a dual humbucker loaded guitar with an 81 or an 85 at the bridge position. I have one as stock in my ESP Eclipse II and I can certainly see the appeal in this pickup for active pickup users. Compared to the 81 or even the 85 it's a a fairly bassy sounding pickup, and it has a certain tightness in the low end that is optimum for really thick sounding lead work. Compared to the 85 as a neck position pickup, the EMG 60 definitely has more output going through it which makes it ideal for higher gain applications. The 85 is a bit more vintage in character and has a slightly more classic quality to it to my ears.
I'm not particularly a fan of this pickup's clean tones. This is where you really start to hear the output that this pickup has. I don't find it to be a particularly dynamic pickup either. Played into clean amps, I find the tone to have too much gain and compression to sound good. It is kinda cool if you're going for that broken up clean tone, but I wouldn't say this pickup is pristine. The drive tones on thr other hand, are wonderful and I think the EMG 60 makes for an excellent compliment to the 81 in my ESP. It's very thick and fluid, and the harmonic overtones are simply astounding. For what it's worth, I still have an issue with the compressed nature of EMGs, but I find that this pickup has a great fluid tone for modern rock or metal riffage. I don't think it's a dynamic enough humbucker for blues or classic rock - that's a job for the 85. All in all I think the EMG 60 is a cool pickup for someone looking for a killer high gain pickup to compliment something like the 81. Though it lacks some dynamics and headroom, it's still definitely worth checking out if you're an EMG player doing hard rock or metal music.
I'm not particularly a fan of this pickup's clean tones. This is where you really start to hear the output that this pickup has. I don't find it to be a particularly dynamic pickup either. Played into clean amps, I find the tone to have too much gain and compression to sound good. It is kinda cool if you're going for that broken up clean tone, but I wouldn't say this pickup is pristine. The drive tones on thr other hand, are wonderful and I think the EMG 60 makes for an excellent compliment to the 81 in my ESP. It's very thick and fluid, and the harmonic overtones are simply astounding. For what it's worth, I still have an issue with the compressed nature of EMGs, but I find that this pickup has a great fluid tone for modern rock or metal riffage. I don't think it's a dynamic enough humbucker for blues or classic rock - that's a job for the 85. All in all I think the EMG 60 is a cool pickup for someone looking for a killer high gain pickup to compliment something like the 81. Though it lacks some dynamics and headroom, it's still definitely worth checking out if you're an EMG player doing hard rock or metal music.