Humbuckers and clean tones

victorludorum

As Haych says above, sort your clean sound and then ram that with a pedal (maybe a multi would be better as you will probably need to stack) for your high gain bits. It does sound like a pickup change may be in order though too, and don't tell us that that doesn't bring a little GAS induced smile to your face ;-)

Jonathanthomas83

hubobulous said:

Just buy a cheap EQ pedal for switching between the two sets of guitars.

How would I go about EQ'ing...just volume up to bring the Strat up to volume I guess...or vice versa for the humbuckers.

victorludorum said:

As Haych says above, sort your clean sound and then ram that with a pedal (maybe a multi would be better as you will probably need to stack) for your high gain bits. It does sound like a pickup change may be in order though too, and don't tell us that that doesn't bring a little GAS induced smile to your face ;-)

Haha, usually it would, but the Cold Sweats are new - as in last month or so. I love them, genuinely...and the lower output original pickups that were in the PRS had a similar issue anyway. I don't really want to go too low as has been mentioned by @guitars4you, I'll lose the high gain side of things - tightness and chug, that I love.

Like has been said, it's rare to get something that can do everything I need in one package!

hubobulous

Jonathanthomas83 said:

hubobulous said:

Just buy a cheap EQ pedal for switching between the two sets of guitars.

How would I go about EQ'ing...just volume up to bring the Strat up to volume I guess...or vice versa for the humbuckers.

That's pretty much it. You might want to change a little of the EQ depending on the woods/tone if you are worried about things being lost in a mix, but essentially you are just using the pedal to compensate for volume differences.

Jonathanthomas83

@hubobulous perfect, thank you! :-)

ESBlonde

Lower the Pickups. Have lower gain into the amp input (either on the amp or use a pedal to do it. Turn the guitar volume down.
Ceramics can sound 'glassy' and harsh when super clean and are best used in overdriven tone imho, but that doesn't preclude them from clean use.

guitars4you

Jonathanthomas83 said:

Think you may have misread my initial post (or more likely...my initial post was badly worded!)...but the PRS is no worse than my Les Paul for clean tones. I get the same grit on clean with the Les Paul and any humbucker. Granted, the grit is a little less on the Les Paul due to the lower output, but it's still there. The only clean I get is with single coils. 

I'm basing this on a dead clean channel, no gain, grit or overdrive.

yes it is easy to misread at times and generally far easier to evaluate when talking and demonstrating, but hopefully you have some input from above to mull over - good luck

victorludorum

It does sound like a compressor might be in order here too. Do you have one?

Voxman

I have a handmade pedal given to me and signed by my friend Bob Webb of Joe Webb guitars.  Its called a Quasi Tap and is just brilliant - effectively giving any humbucker guitar coil-tapped tones but without the volume drop, and with an easy foot stomp on/off.  Its a regular part of my rig where eg for rehearsals I might just take one guitar eg my SG but want brighter single coil tones too with reduced gain.

Sporky

jellyroll said:

If you want to drive across a field don't buy a Ferrari.....

Back on topic, though, how about changing the coil tap to a series/parallel control for the humbucker, and having it on a push-push which is much quicker and easier to operate?

Bowks

 @Jonathanthomas83  do you use the middle position on the 3 way selector switch often?

If you don't, changing out the selector switch to offer the middle position giving you one coil per HB in parallel gives a good clean tone.  

Bowks

Voxman said:

I have a handmade pedal given to me and signed by my friend Bob Webb of Joe Webb guitars.  Its called California Sunshine and is just brilliant - effectively giving any humbucker guitar coil-tapped tones but without the volume drop, and with an easy foot stomp on/off.  Its a regular part of my rig where eg for rehearsals I might just take one guitar eg my SG but want brighter single coil tones too with reduced gain.

The HBE Detox EQ pedal was also designed for this purpose: 

Homebrew Electronics Detox EQ review | MusicRadar 

Voxman

Bowks said:

Voxman said:

I have a handmade pedal given to me and signed by my friend Bob Webb of Joe Webb guitars.  Its called California Sunshine and is just brilliant - effectively giving any humbucker guitar coil-tapped tones but without the volume drop, and with an easy foot stomp on/off.  Its a regular part of my rig where eg for rehearsals I might just take one guitar eg my SG but want brighter single coil tones too with reduced gain.

The HBE Detox EQ pedal was also designed for this purpose: 

Homebrew Electronics Detox EQ review | MusicRadar 

Interesting - yes, the quasi-tap isn't really the same thing - it's designed to be a coil-tap tone in a box, and perhaps doesn't 'clean-up' like the Detox.    

(Actually, re its name California Sunshine was part of the inscription on the back - it's actually called a 'Quasi Tap' coil tap simulator pedal).  

I used it on an amateur demo I did a few years back with my Les Paul & Laney Cub. Not the best quality video, tone or playing I know, (pretty raw in fact !) but it will give you some idea as to what the Quasi Tap does.