Seymour Duncan SH-13 Dimebucker

Another recent install was the Seymour Duncan Dimebucker. Naturally, it went into my Washburn Dime 333. Having the pickup designed by Dime in the guitar he played before Dean came back to life seemed like a good choice. Having tried the Bill Lawrence custom pickups that Dime used before the development of the Dimebucker, I can say that they are basically identical. They have the same tone, the same output, and the same personality. If you want to capture the groove metal tone pioneered by Dime, you can easily do it with this pickup. The pickup has very strong magnets and bars instead of individual pole pieces. These features lead to amazing tone with great string definition in any tuning from standard all the way down to C or below. Output is remarkable for a passive pickup. The EQ of the pickup provides great lows and highs, while the mids are very distinctive. Normally when one goes for a metal tone, the mids are scooped quite a bit. This pickup is unique in my experience because the personality of the tone changes pretty dramatically when you adjust the mids on your amp, distortion pedal, or EQ. I have found it nearly impossible to get a bad tone out of this pickup, clean or distorted. You can make it a screaming, powerful, mid and treble lead machine or a thick, smooth (almost creamy) rhythm pickup. Even just playing with the volume and tone pots can net some really cool results. Palm mute, and this pickup chugs along with the best. The responsiveness of this pickup means that every subtle nuance of your playing comes through. Your picking style, where you hold your palm mute, where you hit a harmonic, and so much more come through even under the heaviest distortion I can get. Add in the Floyd Rose bridge and dive bombs or screaming artificial harmonics really shine. The tone when you pull an artificial harmonic up with the tremolo is exactly what you hear at the end of Cemetery Gates. A cool feature of the Washburn itself is that the wiring is set up so that turning the bridge volume all the way down lets a little of the neck pickup audio through. This lets you achieve a tone exactly like the outro to Floods. Just listen to some Pantera, Damageplan, or Rebel Meets Rebel, and you will hear what this pickup can do. I love everything about it!

Stay tuned for a review of the Seymour Duncan '59 that is now in the neck position of this guitar (completing the setup used by Dime). It's all awesome!