rockabilly69

Those double white DiMarzios look much better than the zebras that were in there. But I would really like to see that guitar with some covers on the pickups. That’s just too upscale of a top. Also, some better reflector knobs the ones that really reflect. That top is worth it. It’s a great looking, Guitar. Glad to hear that. It sounds great too..

I think the raspy sounds like the amp/rig he's playing through, you can tell as he turns up the gain. In my opinion this demo is totally missing the great sonic aspects of this type of guitar.

sounds like connection to me

That is one great looking guitar. Congrats on your new guitar day. And how cool is it that you brought home the best of the lot, the one that you felt a connection with! Rock on!

Cool looking guitar Brent. I love ebony fingerboards, and cool Sperzel tuners, much better than the Grovers. What the he*l did that guy do to his thumbnail though in that picture of the back of the guitar Looks like he was a player. He turned the neck pickup around. A lot of people do that to get a slightly brighter sound and clean up the neck tone, especially when you drop the pickup into the ring and bring up the pole piecers a bit. Check out my Guild. It made a significant difference tonewise.

I just don't get this mystique, but maybe I play the wrong kind of music to appreciate these pickups. A close friend of mine used to be a Heritage dealer so I've played a few sets of HRWs, but I always preferred the sound of Duncans in the Heritages I've heard, with my favorite being the Antiquities or Seth Lovers. One thing I do like though is the double adjustment screw for the angle as Iike the pickups to be parallel with the strings. I wonder why more people don't do that and just supply the pickups with new rings.

In my experience if you can a great clean sound out of guitar, it's nothing to get a great dirty sound, and I heard all that I needed to hear in the clean section of your demo. Those pickups really sound good. I love how clear the neck pickup sounded, and there was some great harmonic content in the chords that you were playing on the bridge pickup. I would leave those pickups in that guitar, it's a great match.

Not horrified, just wishing you record that current setup so we can hear the tone of that beast.

yeah Rich's post already mentioned that along with the wider headstock, push/pull tone pots, and the weight relief. Personally I am not a fan of any weight relief. I like my standard H150s, especially because I modded them with all the electronic and hardware choices that I like, and the one that I bought used was cheap, I got it for right around a grand! Even with the pickups and hardware changes it came in under $1600. My new one I paid around $2300 for and still had to upgrade. Which is still cheaper than a Custom Core these days:) I also had to recuit the nut and dress frets on the H150s. And both of them are considerably heavier than the lighter Custom Cores. I also like the aesthetic touches of the Custom Cores better, especially the bigger headstock, the slightly different lower horn, and the body carve, which I love the look of. That said, I don't like the custom core tuner choices, or the hardware. And most likely I would replace the pickups as I'm not a fan of potted pickups. That's why I don't own one. If I didn't have to upgrade, I would buy a used one.

I see the Standard II to be a more modern guitar, with much more than a different neck size. see Rich's post... Doesn't the Standard II have different bridge, it looks like a thinner ABR type, with the Standard having the older Nashville style?

Although while they're are doing it, they have seriously upped their quality control game. You don't hear many people complaining about file marks along the bindings and fretboard, or ridiculously bad cut nuts these days And I think their custom core LPs rank with some of the best guitars to come out of Kalamazoo.

what a beauty!!!

I love the custom core headstock!

One of the best rock and roll tones that I ever heard in my life was a very early 70's Les Paul Custom plugged straight into a '68 Silverface Twin. Some guy had traded it into Guitar Center and a very good guitarist friend of mine who worked at the store for a while was checking the pair out. It was after closing time so he cranked it and it was awesome. Total rock and roll! If I could afford it at the time I would have bought the combo on site.

I was checking out this video from the Howard Stern show of Kate Hudson's band, and her guitarist used a Custom Core for a few songs. On the original song he does some nice fills, and the rhythm on Vasoline sounds good too.

You could always swap the pickups in the H150 and the LP and see if the tone follows the pickups, then you'll know the answer to that What do I think? Because those pickups aren't potted, I think it's the wood.

This might be a little off course, but if you are looking for low output style PAFs, check out the Duncan Jazz pickup in both neck and bridge, I was taken a back at how good these pickups sounded. A realsleeper set! I liked them better than the Seths and 59's! Great clarity in the neck, and the bridge was perfect for on the edge of distortion sounds with a great mid honk. Here's a set plugged right into my Marshall...

This is the post you were looking for...

This makes the most sense to me.

If you're going to tap frets make sure to have some super thin superglue and accelerator on hand to wick into the fret slots. I can't count the amount of times I've seen tapped in frets pop right back out. As for fall off, I think it's more successful on lower radius fretboards like Fender 7.25" and 9.5" radius boards, where you have to deal with the string choking on higher fret bends, but I've never needed to do it on a 12" radius or higher fretboard, and with a proper levelling I've got ridiculously low actions. Most people that play my guitars don't like how low I get those strings IMNSHO levelling beams are superior to radius blocks in getting a good fret level, while taking the least amount of metal.

you can make a levelling beam from scratch...

Do you have a levelling beam or radius block? I don't see you doing that step in your pics?

With that Zebra pickup, I think that guitar would look cool with a 5 ply pickguard like this... https://www.ebay.com/itm/295617504808

The Rat pedal is made by Daredevilpedals.com

Great looking guitar, I bet it sounds as great as it looks. Let us know what you think when you finally get that thing plugged in!