Single pickup builds and tonal range.

A lot of guitars here are built with a single pickup, usually only a lead-rarely a neck pickup. I think I understand the lure of the minimalism of the single pickup: it's simple and there's less to concentrate on-if it fills the bill.

But if you have a single pickup, say, a single coil lead, can you use EQ to achieve a fuller sound? Or, is it irrelevant because anyone who only uses a lead pickup won't care about the fullness of the neck pickup? I recently played a 1953; a blackguard of course. I expected to be completely underwhelmed. But within a few seconds of having picked it up I realized 2 things: 1st, it was very light. Like, really really light. 2nd, the neck was narrower than I expected, although much wider and shallower than a typical Stratocaster neck.

I'm not sure how it was wired or, should I say rewired, because something was obviously up with the neck pickup. Frankly, it sounded like you needed to be rebuilt. It sounded like the tone had been turned down all the way. No highs at all. The bridge pickup sounded fine, just like you'd expect. It was a nice instrument, just not $48,000 worth of nice instrument. Anyway, my point is telling bridge pickups are pretty jangly. Do they do anything else?

The original Tele wiring, as on the '53 you tried out, was so that the "neck position" on the switch was the neck pickup with a set tone capacitor to mimic a bass. The "middle position" on the switch was the normal neck pickup sound and the "bridge" is still the bridge (no setting for both pickups simultaneously). They later switched to the now conventional neck/both/bridge switching.

As for the variety of sounds a single pickup guitar can bring, a lot of it depends on the pickup, its placement, and what it's plugged into. For example, I have a home-brew Esquire with a hot rail pickup that I use for slide in open E with .015-.052 gauge strings. With the tone control set wide open and the volume down a click, it can be very bright. With the volume wide open on the tone down a little above halfway, it's extremely fat sounding through any larger amp (still sounds pretty thick on the small ones).

I also have some slide Strats I've build that only have a middle pickup. The middle position is great because it has the bottom end of the neck pickup without the comb filtering effect on harmonics that the typical neck pickup placement has (I use harmonics a lot in slide playing). Combined with a tone control, you can cover a lot of ground.

I still have yet to experiment with Varitone circuits yet, but those seem like they would add even more to a single pickup guitar's tonal palette. I've seen some demos of them and they seem to add a wide range of tones.

+1 on the strat middle pickup, great sound!

You'd be amazed how much variation you can get by changing up your playing style. Picking closer to the heel of the neck will give you a darker sound, and picking closer to the bridge will give you a brighter sound. There are other ways to mix if up too like the force of your picking attack, palm muting, pinch harmonics, etc etc.

I don't know how much I buy into this, but the theory is that single pickup guitars have less magnetic pull on the strings and therefore have less resistance on the string so it will vibrate over a wider frequency and sustain longer.

I like the idea of a single pickup guitar as a lightweight, mechanically simple, inexpensive, purpose-built instrument. Minimalism and all that. But I'm also hoping to do some experimenting with cocked wah, varitone, etc on future single pup builds to try to expand the tonal possibilities.

I liken it to my mountain biking experience. When I started in the late 80's, there was no suspension so you had to develop an eye, pick a line and learn fine balancing and maneuvering skills. I saw a kid flying down a trail the other day looking completely bored as his suspension soaked up constant 6" hits. In guitar speak, an Esquire will teach you how to induce different voices from your guitar with different picks, different picking techniques, pinch harmonics, etc, etc. Making due with less can and has led to some very creative players. I see this as a major difference between the Strat and Tele communities.

Rob

I liken it to my mountain biking experience. When I started in the late 80's, there was no suspension so you had to develop an eye, pick a line and learn fine balancing and maneuvering skills. I saw a kid flying down a trail the other day looking completely bored as his suspension soaked up constant 6" hits. In guitar speak, an Esquire will teach you how to induce different voices from your guitar with different picks, different picking techniques, pinch harmonics, etc, etc. Making due with less can and has led to some very creative players. I see this as a major difference between the Strat and Tele communities.

Rob

Very wise words. OpenG Capo4 is also correct; vary your picking location and combine that with some tone tweaking to yield totally different sounds.

I love my 1-pickup LaCab clone.

The original Tele wiring, as on the '53 you tried out, was so that the "neck position" on the switch was the neck pickup with a set tone capacitor to mimic a bass. The "middle position" on the switch was the normal neck pickup sound and the "bridge" is still the bridge (no setting for both pickups simultaneously). They later switched to the now conventional neck/both/bridge switching.

That's exactly how it was setup! I've heard this over and over, but it just didn't register that there were always just 3 positions. So, the 4 position switches were never OEM Fender, but an aftermarket mod? Is it OK to rewire a vintage instrument with a modern scheme?