Tag Archives: paf pickup

The Railways Guitar Festival … Top 3 Funny Comments from “Lookers”
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A few rarified geetars at the Railways Guitar Fest

A few rarified geetars at the Railways Guitar Fest

One of the fun things about this little hobby is when I get asked to do a mini guitar show and sale. My pal Robin Munroe – who set up the Railways Guitar Festival in Barrie, Ontario – allowed me to have a booth. Given that it was Promenade Days, there was A LOT of traffic, but the level of inside knowledge of vintage guitars was, understandably, low… of course! – just like I am lost at a car show – and I certainly can’t fault the “lookers” for their sometimes unintentionally hilarious comments.

One of the “litmus tests” that my booth secretly presented to me, was that there was a very pretty Gibson Custom Shop Reissue Aged Sunburst Les Paul that was worth a few thousand… but right there… being constantly over-looked… there was a REAL vintage 1956 Les Paul Gold Top “Conversion” with real 50+ year old PAF humbucking pickups… worth about $25,000. Only, one person recognized the REAL gold and went straight to the Gold Top that day!

1956 Les Paul Gold Top "Conversion"

1956 Les Paul Gold Top “Conversion”

So let’s get to the top 3 comments “Letterman” style… I might add that all three of these folks looked supremely thoughtful and pensive and intelligent as they made their comments – as if these pearls of wisdom deserved a lot of weight (and maybe they do – but not for the reasons intended!).

#3 Funniest Comment: A young lady walked up and stared at my Funk Farm “Hughbie” amplifier – an amp brand that my pal Pete Medvick came up with a couple of years ago for his custom made creations – just to give them a name – anyway, as she stared at the amp, she said longingly: “Funk Farm… I haven’t seen one of those in years!”. Ha! Ha! OK…

Da Funk Farm

Da Funk Farm

2. OK.. comment #2 in the list of funniest comments. A young man looked at my ’64 Stratocaster and said: “Those are worth a lot of money because they have a Jamaican Redwood neck!” I said: “You mean Brazilian Rosewood?” He thought hard for an inordinately long and awkward moment and replied: “No, it’s Jamaican Redwood..” and then walked away… Hilarious!

1. And finally, the #1 comment at the booth… Two guys about age 30 were looking at my 1956 Gibson Les Paul Special in TV yellow finish… the guitar was clearly and boldly labelled “1956” and I made a point of re-iterating it a couple of times. Now I should give you the background that I am aged 50 something… and I’ve been told that I look young for my chronological age… SO… The comment from one of the guys? With a straight face… “Did you buy it new?” Ouch!!!!!!! It’s the only time I made a comment back to someone else’s comment that day – because I could tell he was serious – so I actually said … “jeeze, man, I wasn’t even born when this guitar was made!”. But a very funny comment!!!

The "older than me" 1956 Special!

The “older than me” 1956 Special!

 

 

Gutting and Re-Wiring a Vintage ES-345 Doesn’t Phase Me!
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None More Red!

None More Red!

 

Gotta Be Red!

Gotta Be Red!

 

G.A.S. got me again, and I drove to Sudbury (3 hours each way, give or take) for this 1962 Gibson ES-345… a nice outing for me and the wife (who co-incidentally had a piece of her Mum’s furniture to pick up there… so it was “all good”).

The skinny – there’s a Bigsby repair, and a re-fret, but not much else touched. Even the pickups are still sealed! I just can’t live with Stereo or Varitone, so the first thing I normally do with these is rip out the Varitone and harness and put in a premium mono harness with great caps and pots. Better tone – plus a savings on the weight – this guitar now Varitone-less, weighs in at 8lbs 5oz. I actually bought a teeny weeny little circular saw for my Dremel Tool – my best bet at opening one pickup to flip the magnet, before gently re-soldering the cover back on. You may not know this, but most ES-345s have the pickups out-of-phase. It doesn’t affect the middle position when you’re using 2 amps in stereo, but it sure does if you use one amp! When I say “most” ES-345s have out-of-phase pickups, according to my 300 series guy, Charlie Gelber at OK Guitars, this was a bit “random” at the Gibson plant, and some ES-345s actually have in-phase pickups…

Well, low and behold! It’s a miracle! This ’62 has in-phase pickups! And it’s double good fortune, because these are sealed PAFs, and although I was prepared to molest one (delicately) in the name of TONE, I actually don’t have to.

Let me add that this guitar is a monster! The tone is full yet articulate.

The Bigsby works great – SO GREAT, that I wasn’t prepared to pull off the “Custom Made” plaque and use the pre-drilled stop tail holes (often another “standard practice” for me) to ditch the Bigsby and save another 1/2 lb or so. The neck is wide and a medium depth front to back, yet it has “shoulders” – and is therefore very comfortable to play.

All-in-all, I’m smitten (again).

Never messed with...!

Never messed with…!

 

Finding Your Voice… The RIGHT Guitar
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OK, we’re into serious “guitar geek” territory here. But I am talking to the right people here… “singing to the choir” – as they say. Sometimes I forget that not everyone cares about this stuff! After years and years of listening to me go on and on about this stuff, my wife still got the following question wrong in a game of Trivial Pursuit: “The Les Paul is… (a) a Gibson guitar (b) a Fender guitar.” … so not everyone cares about this stuff!

Bashing out the tunes on a Blues gig

Being a gigging musician (when I can get a gig!), I have a chance to run different rigs all the time, and so I get a chance to hear instruments in a band context as well as in the music room. Obviously, different guitars inspire different playing styles as well as taking one into uncharted musical territory. At a recent “Les Paul Fest”, full of both vintage and modern guitars, I earmarked a certain newish Collector’s Choice “Beast” Les Paul for it’s superior tone (yup, it surprised me a bit that a modern Lester can go toe to toe with vintage wood), and I now own it. I have to say that this guitar is so solid in the mid-range (and clear) that rolling back the treble pickup a tad inspires the country boy in me – no need for a Tele! It is also, surprisingly, is also a fairly aggressive and higher output (for a PAF style set of pickups) guitar. I love it! It takes me where I need to go! It inspires a new voice!

The Beast – a new treat from Gibson

It’s interesting that for many years I used to play Strats and nothing but Strats… now I’m seen with my beloved Underwood Tele, a few Lesters, and my workhorse guitars – the DGTs. I won’t spend any more time on the DGT – I’ve done that in several previous posts, but it should suffice to say that the PRS DGT was NOT the intellectual or instinctive choice for me. But man, it sure scratches my itch!!!

I think it’s also worth saying that an integral part of finding your voice with a guitar is finding the amp that works with a particular model of guitar. For example, my Dr Z “Z Wreck” seems to be the perfect amp for a Telecaster… this is no surprise because the first Z Wrecks were built for Brad Paisley. If you are a Tele-meister, I highly recommend the Z Wreck.

Dakota Red Underwood T – as good as it gets!

Da ‘Most Inspiring’ Z Wreck Amplifier

Check out one of these Z Wrecks with your favourite Telecaster… the “Comfort” and “Speed” switch is very cool… it changes the plate voltage of the output tubes for either a stiffer, cleaner, louder tone or a slightly “browner”, richer, softer tone. No, I don’t sell these amps! And you can’t have mine! 🙂

I recently read something about how: “you can’t buy happiness, but you can buy a guitar… and that’s almost the same thing!”. Find your voice or die trying! Life is good!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Do Those Old Tele and Les Paul Bridge Pickup Tones Really Converge?
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Nasty, nasty… Broadcaster bridge pickup

Just as nasty… Lester bridge pickup.

The other day I was watching a clip of Joe Walsh, and then I was struck by something he said: “A great old Tele bridge pickup will sound and feel quite close to a great old Les Paul bridge pickup!”. Right on, I thought! (hey, I’m a child of the 70s culture… I still say “right on”… but, fortunately, I no longer say: “solid”). Anyway, this is something that I myself have come around to over the years – a great old bridge PAF in a resonant piece of wood (that doesn’t weigh a ton!) will have single coil articulation and clarity… but with just enough “fur”. A great old Tele in the bridge position will have the same thing – the clarity you would expect, but with a nice microphonic bite, no harsh trebles, and a bit of fatness in the mids and low end.

As far as traditional guitars go right now, I use Les Pauls and Telecasters – and I think there’s no accident there. There is THE CONVERGENCE of these models. Look at the “Rev” – Lesters and Teles (or Esquires)… not a lot of Strat action there. My tone pal (and general all-round pal) “PF” agrees – it always seems to be the measure of a good Les Paul. Particularly in Gibson-land, the Les Paul sort of became something different from the 50s to the 70s and 80s… and not in a good way. A lot of the younger guys seek out the 70s Les Pauls – maybe due to nostalgia or something, but I wouldn’t seek one out. Oh sure, there are “happy accidents” where a great piece of wood came together with an unusually fussy Gibson factory worker, but generally, I believe the thread was lost (although it may have been recently found again).

’52 Les Paul Conversion with some Sweet PAFs

I guess that’s why we seek out “old wood”… and a killer pair of 50s or early 60s humbuckers… we’re not fooled! We know what a Les Paul CAN sound like! Above is my ’52 Gold Top. Converted and reset neck by Russ L. and then a very cool distressed finish by Kim at Historic Makeovers. Oh sure, it has had the mandatory “Gibson smile” (headstock break), but dang if it doesn’t sound a whole lot like my Underwood Broadcaster when I crank it up!

I should really say that this doesn’t mean that there’s no place for a good old Stratocaster… heck, I’ve had a few myself…

Choose Your Weapon!
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I’ve been through many, many guitars in my day… and many have been the coveted vintage instruments that are so treasured today. First thing, I should say that we are definitely in the midst of a Golden Age of instrument building! 80% of the higher end guitars are great – plus there are some absolute gems out there! We even have an advantage over the guitars from the 50s in that, these days, rather than just making guitars (like they did in the 50s), builders actually think about the design of what they are building and the effects on tone and playability. I believe that, while they did design guitars in the 50s and 60s, it was more of a “shoot from the hip” approach. I’m one who believes that the big advantage of the “good old days” was the proponderance of old growth, toneful wood stocks. I think we can take a different example – pickups to illustrate the point of “intention” in guitar building. In the early days, it was just a matter of winding a bunch of wire on a magnet. These days, we really think about what makes a great sounding pickup, plus there are many, many different flavours available. And even in the case of old pickups – say PAFs – there are lots of “duff” sounding examples (I know, I’ve owned some!), while there are some amazing sounding ones too! (my ’61 ES-335 has a killer set. But even in the case of pickups, it’s speculated that the materials were of much higher and purer quality. My pickup making pal, Mike Turk, says that he finds it much easier to make a great sounding pickup with old wire, whereas it’s a trickier (but very do-able) proposition with most new wire. The old wire just defaults to a great tone. Let’s take a picture break…I think I’d better throw in some guitar porn … so here’s a vintage treat for ya…

A pair of Gibson ES-355s from the early 60s.

Now in meandering ’round to my point, I can safely say that lots of new guitars have found their way into my Classic Rock band. I still have a few great vintage instruments, but most of what I play is from this century! For example, somehow, the Paul Reed Smith DGT “found me”. I feel like those guitars found me rather than the reverse. I’ve never been a huge PRS fan – and they have all come and gone – at least until the DGT! I have 3 and a 4th on the way! Great pickups that sound like over-wound PAFs, great (the best, actually, IMHO) coil taps (3/4 taps – 1-1/2 coils), 2 volumes for easy blending, super-smooth playing, a traditional trem that stays perfectly in tune for me, uber-resonant all mahogany or maple topped mahogany body, plus a comfy clubby medium rounded neck profile with big frets – what’s not to like!? Here are my 3:

3 Paul Reed Smith DGTs Relaxin’ – 2 Standards and a Maple Top Gold Top.

I also play a great 1 pickup Les Paul that was recently built for guitar man Jimmy Wallace. I have one other Les Paul… a black wrap-tail Custom (recent build) with humbuckers and a ’55 style “V” neck… lightweight at only 8.3lbs …add a couple of Underwood Teles and a Relic Strat (all my vintage Fender stuff is gone)… plus a 1960 one pickup single cutaway Melody Maker for slide… that’s about it… But I can’t really play the Strat after the DGTs… a traditional Strat trem just dosn’t cut the mustard after a DGT trem…

Oh yes, I do still have the Gretsch Jupiter Thunderbird Billy Bo that is part of the banner on my site (beautifully designed by guitar player extraordinaire and artiste Pete Faragher)… the one that Mr. Dave Connery of Connery’s Custom Paint pinstriped… BTW that guitar has been modded to death… big stainless frets, TV Jones Filtertrons, added Bigsby,… and of course, the added paint. I love that guitar! 🙂

Fragment of a Billy Bo geetar

The Great PAF Pickup Debate
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Here’s the culprit… a Gibson Humbucker (or 2)!

DISCLAIMER: Before we get too far down the “rabbit hole” when discussing the ins and outs of humbucking pickup tone, I would respectfully suggest, should your head start to spin when overburdened with all these bizillions of small details , that you set it all aside for a bit and learn how to play the guitar. The best tone isn’t worth #$@% if you can’t play. I might add that I am currently looking in the mirror as I type these words!!! Ultimately, it’s about THE MUSIC! …END OF DISCLAIMER!

OK … got that over with, now let’s talk about humbucking pickups. I have really been exploring the tones for a couple of years now. To get the ball rolling let me start by saying that it should be noted that certain sets of pickups mate well with certain guitars. For example, the PAFs that were in the “Stills” Les Paul when I got it – a set of ’61 (ish) short magnet PAFs sounded fundamentally different when I swapped them to another LP. Short magnet PAFs do tend to sound quite bright. I had some in my ’61 SG/Les Paul (they were original to the guitar). Now in the case of the SG, I tried a set of Sheptone Tributes. These are a bit darker sounding, and they sounded stellar in the SG – a guitar that is “bright” by design. Those Sheptones actually sounded better to me than the short magnet PAFs – go figure! They also sounded amazing in my 1994 McCarty. But the Sheptone Tributes really did not “turn my crank” in a single cut Les Paul. So there’s one thing… it very much depends on the marriage of guitar to pickups!

 

I recently installed a set of long magnet PAFs in my 2011 Gustavsson Bluesmaster. Tone chef Pete F. and I noticed that these pickups had…  1. A percussive quality and…   2. And ability to “clean up” extremely well with a lighter attack. These qualities really weren’t as present in the other Gustavssons that we used for comparison. Those other two guitars had Peter Florance Voodoos in one and Duncan Seth Lovers in the other – both superb pickups in their own right. But definitely not “PAF” clones.

 

One of the advantages of modern boutique pickups is that you can get away from that typical range of PAF tones… plus, you can split the coils. We all remember the coil splits that have (to quote JR from The Sandbar, Canada) that “doink-doink” sound. Not so good. But my beloved DGT Standard has killer splits… pretty much like a Tele when the bridge pickup is split. I might add that I compared my DGT to my ’61 ES-335 with PAFs and the DGT sounded tonally very, very similar – but just louder and more gainy – kinda like the 335 on “11” or maybe “12”! Then I remembered that Paul Smith and David Grissom used Grissom’s beloved 1959 ES-335 as a benchmark when designing the pickups in the DGT. Makes sense – another piece of that puzzle!

 

I tend to agree with PF’s assessment of the pickups that he has evaluated in his post, but I’ll give some opinions… forgive the repetition…

Mike Turks – big and clear – best of both worlds. Neck and bridge are perfectly balanced. Neck pickup is warm, yet it “cuts” and is great for soloing!

Haussels – bright and clear. Almost single coil in character.

Throbaks – quite bright and often microphonic to the point of being a use-ability issue.

Voodoos – lots of heat and compression, I like ‘em. Nasty!

Burstbuckers – these are a moving target. They keep changing the formula. The “Bloomfield’ LP pickups are a case in point… amazing! I have BBs in my ’55 Wraptail LP Custom and I wouldn’t change them. Early BBs can sound overly thin, bright, ice-picky IMHO

Duncan Seth Lovers… great but bright… sometimes not the best in the bridge, but sometimes just dandy!

Duncan Antiquities – like a funky Seth Lover pickup!

Sheptone Blue Skies – balanced, lovely, great middle position tone

Duncan ‘59s – the clarity and balance of Alnico 5. A great buy on a budget. Can sound stellar in the right guitar.

Duncan JB – I love them… supposedly “hot”. With a 250k pot in the bridge position of a Fender … “yes!” Like a hot PAF.

PRS DGT – Like a hot PAF although the neck pickup is very traditional in output and tone. Great splits!

Duncan Bonamassa’s – Great vintage tone. A bit understated. No ice-pick. Very easy on the ears. Patterned after one of Joe’s favourite vintage sets.

 

I could go on and on with more pickups… but I think that’ll do for now!!! Time to practise (or maybe I’ll just have a nap!)

Who The Heck Is Jimmy Wallace?
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Dy-No-MITE!!!

…oh, no, that’s right… that’s Jimmie Walker!

So who is Jimmy Wallace?… Legend in the Les Paul Guitar community, fine player, vintage dealer, organizer of the Dallas International Guitar Festival, early friend to SRV, member of Bugs Henderson and the Stratoblasters (later just the Stratoblasters)… Here’s a youtube clip of Jimmy (while it’s up..) and he’s really got the schiznitz!…

Anyway, the thing that started all this was my “accidental aquisition” (dang ebay auction!) of a guitar that Gibson made for Jimmy in 2011. It was his demo guitar for the “Jimmy Wallace PAF” pickup ( although, regretfully, at this point in time, they seem not to have gotten off the ground). This guitar is a beast! A little less than 8lbs of pure tonal bliss with one single Jimmy Wallace PAF pickup mounted in the bridge position only (the Rev. would LOVE this guitar!) – and quite a “looker” too.

Gibson Jimmy Wallace Les Paul 2011

This all started for Jimmy Wallace in the early 80s when his store special ordered Les Pauls to his specs (he took Gibson his ‘Burst as inspiration) … all the resulting guitars had “Jimmy Wallace Model” on the truss rod cover and the serial numbers were done in a vintage inked-on style – and starting with an “8” (representing 1958) or later, a “9”, on some examples. Features like thin cutaway binding, bigger necks, ABR-1 bridges, beautiful figured tops (you get the picture) were standard. These guitars were made right up until the mid-1990s. Here’s a picture of the first one, a 1980. It’s recently been for sale for $15,000 on Ebay and at Route 66 ClassicGuitars:

First Jimmy Wallace LP from 1980

DY-NO-MITE!!!

 

Welcome to the Blue Hugh Blog… and Mike Turk Limited Humbucking Pickups
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G’Day and welcome to the Blue Hugh Music Blog… !!!

I’m going to be posting as frequently as I see fit, and today’s a good day to start!

As many of you know, I have been working with pickup guru and genius winder Mike Turk to create a set of PAF style “limited” pickups – limited because we intend to do a run of maximum 100 sets and minimum 50 sets. I am pleased to say that we are pretty much ready to go!

These new pickups will be based on Mike’s highly regarded “Killer ‘59s” that were originally sold through Mark’s Guitar Loft (…based on… but not the same – for one thing, the original Killer 59s used Alnico 5 magnets and Mike has gravitated towards Alnico 2 for this run). The nice thing is that Mike has had quite a few “mini-epiphanies” since those original Killer 59s – Mike’s got very good and fussy “ears”! I am delighted to say that I think he’s nailed it! Mike talks about the complexity of the PAF tone, and replicating that is a priority here. It’s interesting to me that the toughest job – getting the nuance right in the neck pickup (you need clarity and warmth WITHOUT losing the punch and articulation… plus the ability to solo on the neck pickup) – has been the first thing that’s come together for Mike. In this whole process, Mike’s done stuff like taken the wire and magnets from a 50s P90 and wound a perfect PAF with these materials – just so he knows he can do it!

In the last couple of days, armed with a nice R9, loaded with the Mike Turk Prototype Limited set, I’ve been A/B-ing the new pickups with all my other sets… REAL PAFs, Sheptones, Duncan Bonamassas, the newer Burstbuckers, Voodoos, Throbaks… and I am pleased to say that not only do these pickups sound as good as anything I’ve tried, they actually kick some of these aforementioned pickups to the curb. My pal, and a man with very good ears (and fingers), Mr. PF, has been instrumental in helping me assess these new “bad boys” (and you’ll be hearing about our Tonefests – often followed by a good and proper Vietnamese noodle bowl or perhaps the best Chinese BBQ pork in the City – in future Blogs – hey, you gotta eat sometime!).

Here are a couple of quotes from Mike regarding his research… a time in which he did a fair bit of “tail chasing”, he says… I thought I’d share them, because they say something about the man’s passion:

“I have always used a certain PAF magnet as a reference for strength when building my pickups. For example when I get to the magnet part of assembly I get out this PAF magnet and take measurements of it with my gauss meter and slip in different magnets to find one with the correct gauss level and adjust if necessary (usually, it is necessary)…”

“I have programmed the winder to wind in multiple steps to replicate the scatter and pattern of what I was doing when I was hand winding.”

I could go on, but I’ll let you decide if you just don’t think that they’re the best… the Blue Hugh Music Mike Turk Limited pickups will be sold un-aged and uncovered, in various black/creme bobbin configurations… $299 a set (SHIPPED) and if you don’t like ‘em, I’ll offer a FULL REFUND (INCLUDING SHIPPING BOTH WAYS) FOR 30 DAYS AFTER PURCHASE!

Hugh H.