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Morse Pickups too Dark for me....

Butch Snyder

Butch Snyder

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Hey all,

I have been playing a little with a Country artist and trying to use my Morse. The humbuckers are just too dang dark for me. I took them out and installed an Air Zone (bridge) and an Air Norton (neck) and replaced the 250k pots with 500k. Not bad, but I think I can do better.

I had an Axis copy (OLP) awhile back and installed a Fred/PAF Pro combo. The Fred had a really nice Tele/P90 bridge pickup snap to it while maintaining the humbucker warmth. The Axis is basswood though. What pickups do you guys think might give me what I'm after in the Morse's poplar body? Also, should I keep the 500k pots in there?

Cheers,
 
Last edited:
G

guitarman23

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Aug 22, 2007
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well i think i know what your going.....ummm....well thats why I mostly use my y2d, my y2d is a lot brighter for thing i love to do, well of course i love my other morses the same, but i use the y2d for a lot more things, just something(Maybe) If You Like The Tone On The Y2d, Change The Pickups and put them from the y2d pickups witch you can buy on GC MF, thats what i would do if i only had one morse and i wanted a brighter sound..... dont mind me its just my noobish opinion, lol good luck :)
 
NorM

NorM

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I was going to say turn on the lights.

I think a SiLO or a y2d are awesome suggestions.
 
Butch Snyder

Butch Snyder

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My first Morse was a Y2d. To my ears, it didn't sound that much brighter. The single coil/bridge humbucker combo was brighter than that combo in my Morse though. I actually traded my Y2d for a standard Morse.

I think I might just fix up my Tele and call it a day....
 
G

guitarman23

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"I think I might just fix up my Tele and call it a day...."

lol what are you going to do with your morse then???
 
Bierschinken

Bierschinken

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Your try to change the electronics is not bad!
I tuned my Petrucci 6 string same way because it lacked highs for my style of playing.

If I were you, I´d go for no-load-pots or at least 1M pots.
This should boost the highs, as you recognized by putting 500k pots in your Morse. Then if you don´t use the tone-control take it off the circuit or use a no load pot so it is disconnected when there is no need for tone-control.

That should give you more highs...lots of highs :)
 
koogie2k

koogie2k

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I am no expert by any means here...but, I have seen Morse play some country type tunes and the tone was great. Could it be amp/effects? The Dregs are more countryish.....and the tone was great. But, who am I? ;)
 
G

guitarman23

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yea, also you have to think about your tone, if steve morse can sound great with his mm then it must be your settings cause i always have one setting and i get mine really bright, what amp do you own? may I offer some help with your settings.... but i dont play much country, but im good with steves solo sound, if your interested. :)
 
beej

beej

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The Morse bridge p'up has a lot of midrange. I wouldn't characterize it as dark, personally. Though, if you roll down the volume you'll lose some highs (as with most guitars). If that's part of the equation here you could install a treble-bleed cap.

With the same pickups and larger pots you'll get brighter output. You don't want to go too far or the single coil won't be very useful to you. Whether or not you keep the 500ks will really depend on the pickups you choose.

As said ... Morse can get some bright tones from his guitar. He often plays in the neck+bridge position for bright clean tones. If you can't get it from this guitar you might want to check your EQ.

You can definitely mess around with other pickups if you know exactly what sound you're going for. But I'm not sure a lot of guys here will recommend changes (maybe the single coils, which a few of us have tried swapping) as most seem pretty happy with the stock HBs. Maybe call your favourite vendor (Dimarzio, etc.) and ask 'em what will sound brighter with a poplar body.
 
Butch Snyder

Butch Snyder

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It seems that the neck pickup is very dark to me and the bridge pickup has a lot of mids like Beej said. I might be looking for a solution that can't be found. Yeah, Morse plays some Country type tunes; however, he usually uses the neck and bridge pickups together or the bridge humbucker and slanted single coil from his #1 together. Those combos yield more of an LP or Strat cluck type tone and not a Tele bridge pickup tone. With my Y2d, I was able to get somewhat of a beefy Tele bridge pickup tone using the bridge pickup and single coil together; however, with that setting, the wound strings were still kind of fat and not really spanky.

With my Standard Morse in that setting, it doesn't sound at all like a Tele; just a muddier version of the bridge pickup. The bridge pickup by itself is brighter than using both the bridge pickup and the straight single coil.

Again, I think I'll get my Tele set up for "Tele use" and use my Morse for the Rockier stuff.
 
Butch Snyder

Butch Snyder

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Okay, we gotta lick this thing. My Morse is too good of a guitar to go down like this. If I sit here and think about it, my amp settings aside - as I have them set like they need to be...

Let's think of some pickup combos that might be a better solution for me in that guitar. I had an Axis copy and installed a Fred/PAF Pro combo and the bridge pickup sounded awesome. It had enough punch and spank to emulate a good, meaty Tele bridge pickup; while still maintaining the warmth an fatness of a humbucker. The PAF Pro was kind of like a fat Strat neck pickup with the fullness of a humbucker. I used a 500k volume pot without a tone pot...

Any other suggestions?
 
tommyindelaware

tommyindelaware

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a dimarzio dp156 is the brightest hummer going. (dimarzio humbucker from hell)
it's gonna be as twangy as you can get w/ 2 full coils fired up.
also the eric johnson model is a little more fat.......but still on the bright side of full hummers.
i get my tele tones w/ the original morse bridge.....using a tiny coil splitting switch. ( just what the morse guitar needs......ANOTHER switch !!!!!:eek:)
but it works VERY VERY well for me.
i couldn't live w/out that morse full bridge hummer selection.
:)



beej said:
The Morse bridge p'up has a lot of midrange. I wouldn't characterize it as dark, personally. Though, if you roll down the volume you'll lose some highs (as with most guitars). If that's part of the equation here you could install a treble-bleed cap.

With the same pickups and larger pots you'll get brighter output. You don't want to go too far or the single coil won't be very useful to you. Whether or not you keep the 500ks will really depend on the pickups you choose.

As said ... Morse can get some bright tones from his guitar. He often plays in the neck+bridge position for bright clean tones. If you can't get it from this guitar you might want to check your EQ.

You can definitely mess around with other pickups if you know exactly what sound you're going for. But I'm not sure a lot of guys here will recommend changes (maybe the single coils, which a few of us have tried swapping) as most seem pretty happy with the stock HBs. Maybe call your favourite vendor (Dimarzio, etc.) and ask 'em what will sound brighter with a poplar body.
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