Boutique pickup/guitar comparo

[cobo]

As some of you know, I sold my fully hollow Heritage Prospect a couple weeks ago (sniff, sniff).  In preparation for that sale, I decided to record how it sounds and include that in the ad.  After I was curious how my other guitars would sound given that same recording setting.   I decided to record the same tune (as best I could repeat playing it ...) with my other Heritage guitars that have non-production pickups.  I also threw in a Telecaster with Lollar P90's for comparison.  In case any of you wondered what an H140 or H535 sounds like with ThroBak's or Sanford Magnetics, have a listen to this:  Guitar / Pickup Comparo

[buzzy]

Nice!

I did not expect to like the tele as much as I did.  I should have turned from the screen for the first listen and then found out which guitar that I liked on the second listen.

[cobo]

1 hour ago, buzzy said:

Nice!

I did not expect to like the tele as much as I did.  I should have turned from the screen for the first listen and then found out which guitar that I liked on the second listen.

Indeed.  That's a testament to the Lollar P90's and also a good example of just how much difference pickups make in the overall tone of the guitar.   The Tele and the Prospect couldn't be further apart construction or tone wood-wise (solid alder body w/ a 25.5" scale maple/maple neck vs fully-holllow laminate maple body w/ a 24.75" scale mahogany/rosewood neck).  You can certainly hear a tonal difference between them (the Tele is brighter and has a little more snap), but the common Lollar P90's give them more than just a slight family resemblance. 

For that particular song in the comparison, I like the Prospect the most; probably because it sounds familiar (Tracy Chapman originally used a Gibson hollow body with P90s for the rhythm).  For other styles, I like the Tele with the P90's (e.g., David Gilmour's solo at the end of Another Brick in the Wall Pt 2 comes to mind).  And of course the solid-body 140 and semi-hollow 535 with humbuckers excel in various other styles.

How can it be so obvious to us why we acquire so many different guitars in the elusive pursuit of perfect tones, and yet I'll bet most of our better halves just sit there shaking their heads? 

[rockabilly69]

I wasn't too much a fan of the lead tones on any of them, just a different tone than I personally like for lead, but I LOVED the rhythm tone of the H140 with the Throbaks! Thanks for making the recordings!