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Bill Lawrence Keystone Tele
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Reviews
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Views
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Date of last review
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6
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27662
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Sat April 7, 2012
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Recommended By
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Average Price
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Average Rating
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100% of reviewers
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$62.33
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8.8
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Posts: 7,721
Registered: March 2003
Location: Park Ridge, NJ
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Author
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fiddler59
Registered: July 2004
Posts: 24
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Review Date: Thu September 7, 2006
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Would you recommend the product? Yes |
Price you paid?: None indicated
| Rating: 10
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Pros:
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Nice and smooth but with some sparkle, no mushiness like Alnico 2 can be
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Cons:
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none
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My take on the Keystones;
The bridge PU is meaty twang but still has some nice high end chime going on. It is exactly what I have been looking for..excellent !!
The neck pickup is just as impressive. It is a nice mix of strat and mini humbucker vibe is the best way I know how to put it. It balances perfectly with the bridge. The two together is a sound all of its own. They seem to have a little more output than vintage.....stock tele offerings. Overall I'd say the set as a whole has this great smooth midrange without loosing the tele character. This is a different than the alnico 2 stuff (no mushy wound strings). They are most definantly staying in my Tele.
fiddler
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Scotland
Registered: March 2003
Location: Aberdeen, Scotland, Yewrup
Posts: 8346
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Review Date: Sun May 4, 2008
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Would you recommend the product? Yes |
Price you paid?: None indicated
| Rating: 10
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Pros:
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Sounds like a "real" Tele should.
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Cons:
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None
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I thought the Holy Grail ended with my Hamels...I was wrong !
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All those who believe in psycho-kinesis, raise my hand !
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Nash
Registered: March 2009
Location: Fullerton, CA
Posts: 764
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Review Date: Wed December 30, 2009
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Would you recommend the product? Yes |
Price you paid?: None indicated
| Rating: 10
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Pros:
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Everything
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Cons:
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Not traditional Tele tone, I like it though others may not
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The bridge pickup is very full and articulate. When clean each note is clear and present with absolutely no mud or other hindrance. It did take me a while to get the pickup height where I liked it on the clean channel though. These pickups are very responsive to pickup height. Overdriven the bridge just growls and bites with a nice, subtle midrange hump. It's perfect for blues and classic rock, it'll even do a passable AC/DC with some amp tweaking. I play some funk stuff with it too and while I don't play much country, but what I have dabbled in this pickup covers perfectly and others seem to agree.
The neck pickup is more Strat than Tele, but not overly so. It's recognizably Telecaster with that glassy tone we'e all come to love, but it has a very Sratocaster-like character. This pickup is best while clean where it can full and warm or bright and punchy depending on pickup heights. Again, this pickup is very sensitive to the height it's set at. The neck pickup is the definition of clear. Even when overdriven the neck pickup retains all of it's articulate and full nature.
The middle position is just like a Tele should be, these pickups are very well matched and when put together they work in perfect harmony.
Overall the Keystones will cover just about every genre possible and while they are a bit more modern sounding than the typical Tele pickups, what some may consider a downside, they are perfect for me because they make for more versatile pickups that still sound 99% tele.
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Some people are wise and some are otherwise.
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MrDJoers
Registered: January 2010
Location: Milwaukee
Posts: 963
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Review Date: Mon July 19, 2010
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Would you recommend the product? Yes |
Price you paid?: $64.00
| Rating: 6
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Pros:
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Very quiet single coil pickup
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Cons:
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Screws stripped, sound thin, not matched volume/output
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I sent an e-mail to BL asking for their suggestion as to which set would fit my playing style. Never heard a word from them. I ordered the Keystone set because it got rave reviews on this site.When I ordered the only confirmation of any type I got was from PayPal, nothing from BL. OK fine, not a big deal. Pickups took roughly 3-4 weeks like their site said to come.
Bridge was not very vintage sounding. Twangy and brightness was there, but not much honkiness. The screws on this pickup stripped for no apparent reason. That bugged me. A little thin and plinky sounding too.
Neck was very clear and bright. Pretty surprised by that; not your standard tele neck pup. I had trouble getting the same level of 'loudness' from this pup. It had to practically touch the strings to be the same volume as the bridge dropped lower than I would have liked. I would have liked more low end from this pup too. Also a thin sounding pickup.
Overall, better than a stock set of Fender pickups. Both were whisper quiet despite being a true single coil. Otherwise, I wasn't blown away by them by any means. The neck cover is plastic and the bridge bobbins look/feel that way too. They just look cheap to me. Their only real selling point is that they are easy on the wallet. And in that price range, who are they competing against? Fender, GFS? These weren't for me, but everyone should probably try them at that price. That's why I would recommend them.
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Hack
Registered: October 2009
Location: Lancaster, CA
Posts: 71
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Review Date: Fri August 6, 2010
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Would you recommend the product? Yes |
Price you paid?: $65.00
| Rating: 7
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Pros:
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Inexpensive, seemingly well made, quiet, handwound
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Cons:
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Not the "holy grail" of tone many claim them to be by any means
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In general, I agree with everything in the , review just above.
NOTE: This is a repost I copied from my entry on the Dialing in Keystones thread here on TDPRI. I just discovered the reviews section, so I reposted here:
Followed all the suggestions for set-up (starting with the two-nickles dial-in) and got a thin, flat sounding pickup in the bridge, and a ok-but-not-exceptional sounding neck PU. Raised them up some, but no big improvement. Got frustrated, and the thinline went in the case and back in the closet for six months.
Pulled it back out a week ago with the intention of yanking the pickups to sell them, but I am going to try a few more things first, like maybe 500k pots and more height adjustments.
Still not real impressed with these Keystones. I can see these sounding good if you play rhythm guitar in a folk band, or something real mellow like that - at least as far as clean tones go. Are any of you guys that are in love with these playing in bands?
Its one thing to hear your guitar on a nice little 10 watt tube amp in your living room, but its a while different thing when you are playing with a band, live, and trying to get a good mix through a PA. I'm not meaning to bash or anything, I'm just wondering because I'm just not seeing what has so many people raving about these pickups. The DiMarzio Broadcaster pickups I have in my other tele sound way better to me, my bandmates, and evidently to people who come to see us play, judging by comments I've had.
Context - I play mostly clean. I run my guitars through a Visual Sound Rt. 66 (TS 808 OD + compressor) I almost always have a little compression on, and sometimes kick in a little OD for leads or a song that need a little more dirt. I use either a Blackface Bandmaster head/2x12 cab or a Blackface-converted SF Deluxe Reverb, depending on the venue and sound system. I play alt-country, bluegrass, and rockabilly.
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Televised
Registered: April 2009
Location: Portland, OR
Posts: 1457
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Review Date: Sat April 7, 2012
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Would you recommend the product? Yes |
Price you paid?: $58.00
| Rating: 10
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Pros:
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Quiet, Rich, Clear, Articulate Pups
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Cons:
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None
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Love these Pups!
Best Bang for the Buck I have come across with guitar gear.
These Pups are not for Metal but with a 4 way switch can cover about everything else tone wise.
They have a great Fendery 6L6 sound, (or maybe they are the blank slate and I'm finally hearing what my guitar and amp sound like), and turned my MIM Tele into something very special.
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"In life......no matter where you go.....there you are...."
Adventures of Buckaroo Bonzai
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