Passive PU recommedation

[Splat88]

I've got a beautiful black 1980's Aria Pro II Cardinal Series guitar with an Ash body, Maple neck and rosewood fingerboard that I need some new pickups for. I replaced the original pickups in it many years ago and what a mistake that was. It has never sounded the same since. I cannot find the original pickups to put them back in. This guitar is extremely bright, and everything I have had in it is a major step down from its stock condition. I put EMGs in it in 2001 and a Dimarzio Tone Zone, some time later. Results were less than desirable. Ironically, I currently have a Duncan Designed pickup based on the Duncan Distortion in it and it sounds tolerable, but nowhere near what I had achieved before.

Can you guys recommend some warm sounding passive bridge pups that may fatten this guitar up and make it less shrill on the top end? Its a beautiful guitar and plays great and I would love to get it back up to record parts of my album with.

http://www.matsumoku.org/models/ariaproii/catalogs/1981cs/81cs_a_pg1.jpg.html

 

[gorath23]

Bare Knuckle Holy Diver- one of the darkest pups BK make: http://www.bareknucklepickups.co.uk/ZH-holydiver.html Its worth the cash, provided you can spare it.

 

[Splat88]

I have no doubt that those are amazing pups, but I would prefer to stay within Dimarzio and SD price ranges. It does make me very curious, however.

 

[Trevoire520]

seriously, bite the bullet and get some bareknuckles, i know they're a fair whack more but the difference is huge, plus you can phone up the owner (i belive his name is Tim) and talk about your guitar, what sounds you like etc and he'll either reccomend what pickup he thinks will suit you, or if theres something specific you want he'll custom build one for you,

dont get me wrong, duncans are good, i've got a jb and some hotrails in my yamaha and i like them, also got a rio grande pickup in my prs se which is very nice, but the nailbombs in my ibanez sz are the reason it gets played more than any other guitar i own, bareknuckles are just compared to other p'ups i've tried. clear, powerful, musical, dont think i'll ever buy any other brand of pickup again...

 

[ConspiracyBass]

The darkest sounding pickup I own is a GFS Crunchy Rails. Cheap as shit and actually really, really good sounding. For only $35 i'd say its worth risk ordering one. Plus you can return it if you don't like it.

 

[Rex Rocker]

I think the DiMarzio Super 3 can do you very good! I loved it the one time I tried it (I think it was an Ibanez I tried it in)... that's a BIG-sounding pickup... Think of it as a slightly darker, slightly tighter version of the DiMarzio Super Distortion!

 

[t-rave]

the dimarzio breed is fat and has a roll off in the treble frequencies..

 

[SickBoy]

Maybe a SD Custom Custom or Alnico II Pro then, as Alnico II magnets tend to soften the sound, which should help taming your bright guitar.

 

[gorath23]

Maybe a SD Custom Custom or Alnico II Pro then, as Alnico II magnets tend to soften the sound, which should help taming your bright guitar.

Alnico II Pro's are awesome pups too, but are very low output, even for recording [Metal].

Custom Custom is a poor pickup imo, thin and scratchy. I had one in an Ash Strat for a while.

 

[SickBoy]

Alnico II Pro's are awesome pups too, but are very low output, even for recording [Metal].

I don't see this as an issue with modern (too) high gain amps.
With such insane amounts of gain available even moderate output pickups like Alnico II would saturate more than enough IMO... If nothing, the usable range of Gain knob would expand with such a pickup...

 

[gorath23]

I don't see this as an issue with modern (too) high gain amps.
With such insane amounts of gain available even moderate output pickups like Alnico II would saturate more than enough IMO... If nothing, the usable range of Gain knob would expand with such a pickup...

I agree to some extent, providing you have the luxury of cranking the amp to bring out the lows, something that isn't such a problem when using higher Output pups. Hell I'm all for lower gain pickups, and I love the AIIPro, just saying it'll be harder to get that big low end at bedroom recording levels.

 

[JoeJackson]

Check out the SD SH-5 for the bridge.

 

[gorath23]

Check out the SD SH-5 for the bridge.

Thats the Custom right? Great pickup, but personally I think it'd still be too bright. Ash is really, really bright, it needs an almost unbalanced (wayy bassy, incredibly smooth highs) pickup to compensate. I had a Strat that was Swamp Ash, and no matter what I put in it, it was too toppy. Swamp Ash is warmer than regular Ash too.

 

[Metaltastic]

If you want a bassy pickup, it's hard to get much better (or worse, if you're using mahogany like I was ) than the Dimarzio Tone Zone, yeesh

 

[Notuern]

If i where you i would get either the MMK45(Arias stock pickups in most of their guitars that really kicks monkeysballs), or the DiMarzio X2N that is supposed to sound kinda like the MMK45, but a bit hotter.

 

[Splat88]

Thanks for all the responses guys. I was leaning towards one of the darker Dimarzios but I actually just scoured my garage and ending up finding the original MMK45 pickups that I took out years ago. I think I'm just going to put those back in because they did sound great and I don't remember the guitar sounding better with anything else. I'm just waiting to get some new pots and selectors to do a clean wiring job from the ground up.

 

[Notuern]

Thanks for all the responses guys. I was leaning towards one of the darker Dimarzios but I actually just scoured my garage and ending up finding the original MMK45 pickups that I took out years ago. I think I'm just going to put those back in because they did sound great and I don't remember the guitar sounding better with anything else. I'm just waiting to get some new pots and selectors to do a clean wiring job from the ground up.

Good call!

I love the MMK45, and most people that have played alot on Aria guitars think that it is the most fitting pickup to them.