The Best Strat Pickups Seymour Duncan 50's California Set SSL-1

To all of us who have been searching for that sweet sound!

This video is to help you decide.

These are the deal,
No Lindy Fralin, No DiMarzio, no Custom Shop, and definitely to hell with crappy Texas Specials.

Stay away from them, Seymour Duncan California 50's set is the real vintage strat tone.
So true that even Mr. John Frusciante has them on his vintage strats (and before he discovered that he thought they were originals)

These pups are not to bright, neither to muddy, neither to warm, or whatever. Perfect balance.
If you can't get an awesome tone out of them you have serious problems


Got this sound just plugging a 1991 American Fender Strat with All Parts SMO-V neck, and vintage callaham bridge straight through an 15 watts vox amp.

Amp
Vox Pathfinder 15 watts

This ends the quest for tone.

Category:

Music

Tags:

• Pickups
• Seymour Duncan
• Frusciante
• Red Hot Chili Peppers
• Jimi Hendrix
• Lindy Fralins
• DiMarzio
• Comparison
• John Frusciante Tone
• John Frusciante Sound
• SRV Tone

[zsup2]

Im not getting as good a tone as this with a 1000 euro marshall amp, I have an ssl1 in the neck. Did you make any other modifications to the strat ? This is a scooped sound right? low mids, high base and treble, neck pickup at the start right?

[Jocaluiz23]

@zsup2 Hey man! Could be a lot of things, make sure your guitar is setup properly. Did you adjust the pickup heights? It has too be in good position to get the correct highs and lows.

As far as equalization of the amp, any number I give you might or might not do well on your amp, so you'll have to mess around yourself.

I'd bass is around 6, trebble is 7-8, you have to put a little of drive/gain, just a little. The rest of the gain you get with the volume knob,

[Jocaluiz23]

@zsup2 just push it until you feel the sound is about to break up, you want to stay on that edge between the clean sound and the distorted.

[terryboring]

can anyone tell me the difference between ssl-1 and california 50's (if there is a difference)? seymour duncan doesn't really explain it on their website.

[Jocaluiz23]

Hey Terry, the set is just a name they gave to the box containing the 3 SSL-1 together ;)

[luka09]

Hi ! I bought the same pickups and tried them today. It sounds GREAT ! Love it !

But just by curiosity, what does give you this crunchy sound ?

[Jocaluiz23]

@luka09 Hey man, the crunch is just a little bit of drive from the amp itself.

If you're looking for an awesome crunch try the mxr boost pedal it's just amazing how it makes your tone fat yet cutting!

[mrflash777]

I never really liked the sound of any Vox amp, but this combination sound pretty good.

And although John Frusciante really uses Seymour Duncan Antiquity pups on his strats, these seem to have a lot of that vintage strat thing to them.

[ManitouPL]

Did you ever tried Antiquities? Would be awesome to hear what are differences between them and SSL1. Price for sure... anything more? :D

[ManitouPL]

I was almost sure to buy Antiquity Surfers, but now... im not sure. lol. It really sounds like John pickups.

[ShyL0rd]

@zsup2 no, in order to get a nice rounded tone like that scooping the mids out is the very last thing you want to do. A sound like that needs lots of mid.

[liligman]

@TonyPaj LITTLE WING MAN lol, you're on a strat video and u didnt know that XD

[kruse26]

@Jocaluiz. Do you think a ssl-1 or ssl-5 sounds better in the bridge? Thanks

[rlowe97]

LITTLE WING!!!

[airstorm83]

Jocaluiz23, do you have tab of melody from 0:00 - 0:55? Sorry for my english....

[Bobby59]

"Crappy Texas Specials",,,,,,huwahhh???

[TonyPaj]

What a beautiful sound man! What Hendrix song was that your playing around 1:07?