single coil vs hums, for guitar

ohmeplateau · #1 11-24-2007, 01:06 AM

alright i was jamming tonight and my friend had two guitars and two amps. basically a squier bullet and a faded g-400 sg. and a really ****** traynor amp and an epi firefly 30dsp.

right so i was really diggin the bullet in the cheap traynor over the epiphone. i played both guitars through both amps and messed with the EQ... and the SG just sounded muffled. not, to me, what a guitar should sound like. come to think of it i found the amp muffled too

i might have to pick up a strat or tele.

as far as bass goes, i really dig the pups on my epi thunderbird over my vint mod squier jazz.

soo... i figure i should ask a question. what a boring thread. are all humbuckers gonna have a kinda dull muffled clean tone... and is there difference if theres two single coils wound together as a humbucker

Deacon_Blues · #2 11-24-2007, 02:57 AM

I haven't owned a bass with humbuckers so I don't really have a clear opinion about that, but I love the single coil sound on my JB's.

On guitars, I nowadays prefer humbuckers over single coils. They have a much fatter tone that cuts through better (don't believe it's the high crisp that makes a sound cut through, it's the low mid-middle frequencies). I like to play jazz, but it just doesn't sound right to play it on my Strat. I need to get a Les Paul or something to get the right sound....

When I started out on guitar, I didn't like the humbucker sound because it sounded dull to me. I wanted that crispy single coil sound that was easy to play with, and bought a cheap mexican strat and later a thinline Tele. The latter I traded in when I bought my first bass, because I never felt the sound was "mine". It was just too thin sounding for me. I've been longing for a les paul for many years now, but as my main instrument has been bass the last 6 years, I haven't been wanting to spend money on that.

The SG sound is also great, but it's more suited for rock than jazz as it has a harder and more "direct" sound than an LP. So I wouldn't buy an SG, but it's just a matter of personal taste. If I played a lot of AC/DC, an SG would be a must-have.

tplyons · #3 11-24-2007, 10:29 AM

On a guitar, I, too, prefer single coils. I love the sound of a Strat. I love P90's. I love Telecasters... however, I believe any proper guitar collection requires something with humbuckers.

lunarpollen · #4 11-24-2007, 01:39 PM

Not all humbuckers are the same. For instance, I put TV Jones humbuckers in my Epiphone Les Paul to replace the stock humbuckers. The difference is like night and day, seriously. These have the sparkle and detail of single coils, but the breadth of tone of humbuckers. They are most definitely not dull sounding. The original stock humbuckers were definitely muffled sounding, but these new pickups sound bright and extremely clear.

You'll find a lot of variety among common single coil guitar sounds, too. You have your standard Stratocaster and Jaguar pickups, your P-90s and their variants (thicker-sounding than Strat pickups), Burns Trisonics (thicker-sounding as well, but in their own way), etc.

superbassman2000 · #5 11-24-2007, 02:59 PM

I wonder if it's the amp?
I know that I am a humbucker guy for guitar, but I have had a similar experience when I was playing a squier strat through a squier 15 watt combo--it sounded good to me, and I wonder, since humbuckers seem a little more "bass-y" to me, I wonder if it's just the amp's inability to reproduce those lower frequencies well that makes humbuckers sound so dull through little combos?

ohmeplateau · #6 11-24-2007, 03:10 PM

could be man.

thesteve · #7 11-24-2007, 03:10 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by superbassman2000

I wonder if it's the amp?
I know that I am a humbucker guy for guitar, but I have had a similar experience when I was playing a squier strat through a squier 15 watt combo--it sounded good to me, and I wonder, since humbuckers seem a little more "bass-y" to me, I wonder if it's just the amp's inability to reproduce those lower frequencies well that makes humbuckers sound so dull through little combos?

that actually seems to make sense in my head.

I do know that I have a Seymour Duncan JB in one of my guitars and it sounds fine. I prefer single coil tone most of the time, but I definitely wouldn't say it has a bad clean tone at all.