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Thread: Fender Custom Shop 69`Pickups for Blackmore Tone

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    Fender Custom Shop 69`Pickups for Blackmore Tone

    Heyy everybody!
    I started to think of the Custom Shop 69´Pickups for a Blackmore-ish tone.
    I´d be very happy if some of you can share some experiences and opinions.
    Thank you very much in advance.

    Jannik

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    Forum Member ch willie's Avatar
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    Re: Fender Custom Shop 69`Pickups for Blackmore Tone

    Quote Originally Posted by Jannik3012 View Post
    Heyy everybody!
    I started to think of the Custom Shop 69´Pickups for a Blackmore-ish tone.
    I´d be very happy if some of you can share some experiences and opinions.
    Thank you very much in advance.

    Jannik
    Gutentag, Ich dinke das die PUs sind nah zu Blackmore. Aber wass für einen Verstärker haben Sie?

    My German has become really bad, and my New Years resolution is to study German again and learn the language properly. I learned mostly by playing in bands with Germans who sometimes spoke ungrammatically.

    Welcome to the forum. Remember that effects and amps have a lot to do with the sound you get. What year was Blackmore's main Strat? Were his pickups custom wound? All I know about his Strat is that he took out the middle pickup.
    If we'd known we were going to be the Beatles, we'd have tried harder.--George Harrison

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    Re: Fender Custom Shop 69`Pickups for Blackmore Tone

    Quote Originally Posted by ch willie View Post
    Gutentag, Ich dinke das die PUs sind nah zu Blackmore. Aber wass für einen Verstärker haben Sie?

    My German has become really bad, and my New Years resolution is to study German again and learn the language properly. I learned mostly by playing in bands with Germans who sometimes spoke ungrammatically.

    Welcome to the forum. Remember that effects and amps have a lot to do with the sound you get. What year was Blackmore's main Strat? Were his pickups custom wound? All I know about his Strat is that he took out the middle pickup.

    Right now there´s a Ritchie Blackmore Custom Shop model available for about 6.600€.
    In the beginning he used early 1970´s strats. Later on he changed to Lace Sensor Gold pickups.
    Right now I have a JCM 900. I´m planning on a Marshall 1987x or a 1959. I also had a post at the marshall forum
    about building a replica of the Major 200.

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    Forum Member ch willie's Avatar
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    Re: Fender Custom Shop 69`Pickups for Blackmore Tone

    Quote Originally Posted by Jannik3012 View Post
    Right now there´s a Ritchie Blackmore Custom Shop model available for about 6.600€.
    In the beginning he used early 1970´s strats. Later on he changed to Lace Sensor Gold pickups.
    Right now I have a JCM 900. I´m planning on a Marshall 1987x or a 1959. I also had a post at the marshall forum
    about building a replica of the Major 200.
    You've got a great setup and obviously know well what you're doing. I hope you get there in the tone chase. Have you ever tried modeling devices which may have downloadable presets for Blackmore's tone. I'm a tube amp guy, but I have gotten some really close Clapton and Gilmour sounds when I used one of the kidney shaped PODS.
    If we'd known we were going to be the Beatles, we'd have tried harder.--George Harrison

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    Re: Fender Custom Shop 69`Pickups for Blackmore Tone

    Quote Originally Posted by ch willie View Post
    You've got a great setup and obviously know well what you're doing. I hope you get there in the tone chase. Have you ever tried modeling devices which may have downloadable presets for Blackmore's tone. I'm a tube amp guy, but I have gotten some really close Clapton and Gilmour sounds when I used one of the kidney shaped PODS.
    Right now I´m playing my JCM900 with a 2x12 (Vintage 30) and a Fender Stratocaster Std. Mexiko.
    I build myself a Dallas Rangemaster Treblebooster with original old components from the UK.
    Sounds pretty good so far, even if the JCM900 is a bit too agressive.
    Right now there is no alternative to the old Major 200 out in the market.
    Of course I can get one built with the original schematic but that woukd cost me 2800€.

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    Re: Fender Custom Shop 69`Pickups for Blackmore Tone

    I've found Ritchie's sound to be a tad tricky to nail. I'm a fan of the Made In Japan sound, the bloody loud Marshall Major tone with the tape deck preamp. I saw some guy who made a mini-Major rig that did quite a good job although I don't remember where I read (and heard) it.

    There's a '70 strat for sale on TGP, for a princely sum but I can't help but to feel drawn to it. I'd keep the middle pickup but I might lower it like he used to before he just omitted it completely apparently.

    His sound tormented me when I first started playing, I had a Princeton Reverb and I wore out the speaker trying every fuzz box I could get my hands on trying to get that Marshall on steroid about to explode sound. It didn't help that the '74 Strat that I bought new was an absolute piece of shit. I just thought it was me who couldn't get it to sound good.
    "Live and learn and flip the burns"

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    Forum Member ch willie's Avatar
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    Re: Fender Custom Shop 69`Pickups for Blackmore Tone

    Now I'm getting excited about getting into some Deep Purple on Spotify. Been a while since I listened to them.
    If we'd known we were going to be the Beatles, we'd have tried harder.--George Harrison

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    Re: Fender Custom Shop 69`Pickups for Blackmore Tone

    Quote Originally Posted by Jannik3012 View Post
    Heyy everybody!
    I started to think of the Custom Shop 69´Pickups for a Blackmore-ish tone.
    I´d be very happy if some of you can share some experiences and opinions.
    Thank you very much in advance.

    Jannik

    Die sind wirklich sehr toll. Ich mag Fat 50s besser in meinen zwei Stratocasters, besonders mit Fender Verstärkern... Aber das ist ganz persönlich, viele Leute lieben die 69s.

    Mein Deutsch ist auch total verrostet. Mein English ist doch wahrscheinlich nicht viel besser, aber trotzdem...

    Let's continue in English or I'll be punished by the mods. Willie, this was all your fault, I miss speaking German a lot. I used to be quite fluent.

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    Re: Fender Custom Shop 69`Pickups for Blackmore Tone

    Quote Originally Posted by DanTheBluesMan View Post
    I've found Ritchie's sound to be a tad tricky to nail. I'm a fan of the Made In Japan sound, the bloody loud Marshall Major tone with the tape deck preamp. I saw some guy who made a mini-Major rig that did quite a good job although I don't remember where I read (and heard) it.

    There's a '70 strat for sale on TGP, for a princely sum but I can't help but to feel drawn to it. I'd keep the middle pickup but I might lower it like he used to before he just omitted it completely apparently.

    His sound tormented me when I first started playing, I had a Princeton Reverb and I wore out the speaker trying every fuzz box I could get my hands on trying to get that Marshall on steroid about to explode sound. It didn't help that the '74 Strat that I bought new was an absolute piece of shit. I just thought it was me who couldn't get it to sound good.
    Back when we formed the band we used to play a handful of Purple songs. Actually I think sounding like Blackmore is more about measuring the gain and the attack than a matter of amp/pickups. Most strats will do the job pretty close to what he did.

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    Forum Member S. Cane's Avatar
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    Re: Fender Custom Shop 69`Pickups for Blackmore Tone

    Quote Originally Posted by ch willie View Post
    Now I'm getting excited about getting into some Deep Purple on Spotify. Been a while since I listened to them.
    They rocked! Made in Japan is one hell of a live album! Certainly one of the best ever recorded back then!

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    Re: Fender Custom Shop 69`Pickups for Blackmore Tone

    There is a guy on Youtube, who build a Mini Major himself and also build a few for other Youtubers.
    The price is still the same as I told you.
    Sehr interessant, wie verbreitet die deutsche Sprache hier doch ist
    I think one of the most important aspects is, that he played his amps freakin loud....

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    Re: Fender Custom Shop 69`Pickups for Blackmore Tone

    Quote Originally Posted by Jannik3012 View Post
    There is a guy on Youtube, who build a Mini Major himself and also build a few for other Youtubers.
    The price is still the same as I told you.
    Sehr interessant, wie verbreitet die deutsche Sprache hier doch ist
    I think one of the most important aspects is, that he played his amps freakin loud....

    Yes, this is something many people don't pay attention to while searching for tone. Back in the late 60s and 70s those cats played VERY LOUD. Some things you just don't achieve with smaller amps and lower volumes... The opposite is also true, though.

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    Forum Member Offshore Angler's Avatar
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    Re: Fender Custom Shop 69`Pickups for Blackmore Tone

    Blackmore's sound wasn't it the pickups. It was in him.

    Of all the parts of a rig that make someone have a signature sound I'd say pickups are pretty darned far down the list.

    Jimi sounded like Jimi on a flying V or a Strat.

    EC sounds like EC on a Les Paul or a Strat

    Page sounds like Page on a Tele or a Les Paul.

    I can go on.
    "No harmonic knowledge, no sense of time, a ghastly tone, unskilled vibrato, and so on. Chuck is one of the worst guitar players I know" -Gravity Jim

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    Re: Fender Custom Shop 69`Pickups for Blackmore Tone

    Quote Originally Posted by Offshore Angler View Post
    Blackmore's sound wasn't it the pickups. It was in him.

    Of all the parts of a rig that make someone have a signature sound I'd say pickups are pretty darned far down the list.

    Jimi sounded like Jimi on a flying V or a Strat.

    EC sounds like EC on a Les Paul or a Strat

    Page sounds like Page on a Tele or a Les Paul.

    I can go on.
    Yes. Pretty much what I said above. All these guys had a whole lotta things working for them, like amplification, guitars, dynamics... But their tone was mostly in their fingers, settings and especially VOLUME. If you get loud enough, all you need to do is hold the wheel well.

    A friend of mine says that volume is like altitude when you are a pilot. The higher you fly, the safer. The louder you play, the easier to dial in tones.

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    Forum Member ch willie's Avatar
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    Re: Fender Custom Shop 69`Pickups for Blackmore Tone

    Tone is different from how someone sounds. I could have a similar tone to a player, but the idiosyncrasies of the physical playing, the differences in woods, and the vast array of eq, amp, effects, etc--impossible to nail another player completely. I could take Gilmour's Black Strat, plug it into his rig, and I'd still not sound like him.

    But pickups do make a difference in sound. I never liked Texas Specials, and the ones in my Player Strat project sound like them. I wanted a hot set of pickups, so i looked around and chose a set of Duncans voiced more like Gilmour's. I watched video demos on youtube, and folks don't sound like Gilmour with them, but I do like the panoply of sounds I heard.

    I used to chase tone and was disappointed, with one exception. I've always loved the Ric sounds on Sgt.Pepper, my favorite bass playing on any record ever. I had my Ric for 37 years and was disappointed with how it hardly sounded like a Ric, and much less did it sound Macca-ish. I had tried for decades to adjust pups and eq, had one of Nashville's best luthiers to take it for a while and see what he could get out of it. Finally it clicked that I could replace the pups in a holy relic. After my experience with the modern Ric pups with the rubber points, I wanted to try the vintage Ric pups. Put them in, and the bass came to life. And I do get closer to the Sgt Pepper sound--not there but enough of the quality of that tone that I'm satisfied. Even better, the bass sounds better for any kind of music I play on it, and 99% of that is not Pepper-ish.
    If we'd known we were going to be the Beatles, we'd have tried harder.--George Harrison

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