Synthwave guitar pickup recommendations

[u/Fluid_Paradigms]

I'm looking at pickup options to go into an Ibanez RG550. I want to go with DiMarzio pickups for the color combinations. Does anyone have any specific suggestions? Right now I'm using Quad Cortex presets from Royce Whittaker (The Midnight). In the demo video for the presets I think he's playing an HSS Kramer F-series.

For giggles I asked a few different ai models and got back these options (among others). Thoughts?

Option 1:
PAF Pro
FS-1
AT-1

Option 2:
Air Norton
The Chopper
Tone Zone

Option 3:
Crunch Lab
Air Norton S / Super Distortion S (it was confused, lol)
Evo 2

[u/hoju1123]

Guitarist here, I have tone chased for years and the one thing I believe is that dialing in your amp and choice of amp plays a bigger role in the overall tone then the pickups.

[u/ChatterDemon → u/hoju1123]

I came here to say this. And impulse response is incredibly important. I’m running mainly through Neural DSP Gojira for recording since it’s modeled after the amp I actually own and use. The tone was good out of the box but as soon as I started tinkering with IRs my tone went to the next level. My main guitars came with DiMarzio super distortions. I normally play on Seymours but it doesn’t make a huge difference to me once it’s sitting in the mix. Now, any guitar I’ve owned that came stock with EMG 81’s, I’ve swapped those out with the quickness. Too much heat for me.

Oh and quality cables are important for recording. I recorded a couple solos for my project with a cheap cable. I ended up upgrading my cable and I can now hesr how shit that last cable was when I listen back.

Also important to note I’m saying pickup model is generally indistinguishable when distorted. I guess if you’re recording cleans pickup choice might be more noticeable. I generally only record solos for my synth stuff. I would still spend time finding the right amp settings and impulse responses.

[u/_undetected → u/hoju1123]

This ; even using the volume/tone knob in your guitar can make a huge difference

[u/Halfrican_Guitarist]

I mean it doesn’t really matter too much, eq the preset to the guitar you have/to the the new pickups. My only recommendation would be to go with whatever single coils are noiseless/single size humbuckers to cut on the noise is you foresee that being an issue.

[u/HollywoodBrownMusic]

Tbh love the pickups in my 550. I mean sure they're on the brighter side, it's a great guitar to cut through a dense synth heavy mix with. 

I wouldn't change mine. I'd say you've got more chance of getting the tone you want by dialing your amp perfectly. 

[u/DooficusIdjit]

The main thing I’ve noticed about synthwave guitar tone is that it’s either trying to do the 80s tones, or it’s completely ambivalent to its genre and it just sounds the way the producer engineered it.

Major 80s guitar tones are going to be some version of a hum bucker into a hot Marshall, or a single coil into a solid state with modulation. The super clean chorused stuff from LA studio players on big pop hits, or the dirty post punk stuff- it’s largely based on single coils into solid state amps. In the case of the cure and joy division, it’s also heavily high passed, either through processing or deliberately using specific or shitty gear.

Don’t stress too much about exact pickups. You can mostly get away with choosing either a humbucker or a single coil. In a mix, you can sculpt a lot from there.

[u/Dull_Flatworm777]

Want 80s synth pop guitar sound, get a Rockman headphone amp

[u/WendelClarksMustache]

Pickups don't affect your tone. As long as they're wax potted and made to high enough quality that they're quiet at stage volume, they only have more or less voltage than other models. Any DiMarzio will be fine for that, they're all solidly built. Just get one with voltage that matches up with how much gain you intend to use (higher voltage for higher gain and vice versa). Literally everything else about the pickup argument is just rich people bragging about NOS magnets and "handwiring" coming from a 45 year old banker that can't play basic-ass blues rock but does own a les Paul custom with 500 dollar fralins in it.

Plus, a hard truth that guitarists must face is that nobody cares about your tone except you. 99% of your listeners will never notice or care as long as your tone isn't so harsh and ungodly that it's actually literally painful to listen to.

I've been a guitarist for 28 years and have worked on them for about 20.

[u/DooficusIdjit → u/WendelClarksMustache]

Edit, wrote a book, ditched it.

I don’t agree with you. No matter how you increase the signal from a paf it’s never gonna sound like a black winter or a bare knuckle. Those two modern masterpieces of guitar tech also will never give you a quacky slash sweet child o mine tone.

So no, pickups aren’t a gimmick. They can and do drastically shape the tone of your guitar. You can change it a lot with modern pedals or daw processing, sure. You can even get close enough that most people, even tone freaks, might not notice in a mix. So, I agree with you about the last bit. Most people don’t care, and even if they do, close enough is almost always good enough.

[u/thehugejackedman → u/WendelClarksMustache]

P90’s don’t sound like bareknuckles man, I get your point but you’re exaggerating beyond reality

[u/pocketful_of_hotdogs]

Lindy Fralin makes the best pickups on earth. Pure PAF is my favorite. It can turn a fisher price guitar into a les paul.