McCarty 594, pickups and tone chasing; 5 pickups in 5 days

Any McCarty 594 owners out there, could someone please post a YouTube video showcasing the 594 with high gain? Like some heavy rock tones think Alice In Chains or any old 90s heavy bands. All the people who post the demos of the guitar play clean blues and I wanna hear what it can do with a high gain amp. That would be superb
 
dammit that was the only one I couldn't get a hold of. I actually looked in tried to buy 53/10.

there was just zero, not available.

I will certainly try a Claude Van Damme cable. it has twice the van damage. it seems like it's going to have twice or double the impact.:)


If you want to try a 5310, I would consider sending you mine to try. You could complete your assessment of the 594 with the 5310 bridge.

Not interested in letting it go but I'd let you try it.
 
Any McCarty 594 owners out there, could someone please post a YouTube video showcasing the 594 with high gain? Like some heavy rock tones think Alice In Chains or any old 90s heavy bands. All the people who post the demos of the guitar play clean blues and I wanna hear what it can do with a high gain amp. That would be superb

you've probably seen the one YouTube vid that says PRS 594 McCarty – metal, and I think you can hear it just barely gets there, the LT pickups are not really capable of flourishing in the area, it's sort of like Michael Jordan playing baseball, you know he's extremely good at it, but you also know there's a ton of different guys that are way better at it, that's why people are swapping out at least the bridge pickup to get more in that territory. It's extremely satisfying in that middle gain territory and it can stretch, but not live there.
 
you've probably seen the one YouTube vid that says PRS 594 McCarty – metal, and I think you can hear it just barely gets there, the LT pickups are not really capable of flourishing in the area, it's sort of like Michael Jordan playing baseball, you know he's extremely good at it, but you also know there's a ton of different guys that are way better at it, that's why people are swapping out at least the bridge pickup to get more in that territory. It's extremely satisfying in that middle gain territory and it can stretch, but not live there.
I’m not even a metal guy per say, I play heavy rock music like 311, Incubus, AIC, other 90s bands of that nature. I use Custom 24s with the 85/15 and I love it. I feel like I could get away with keeping the stock 594 pickups as the amps I own have ridiculous amounts of gain such as my Dual Rectifier Tremoverb. I was just hoping someone could do another video, but I’ll probably get the guitar regardless. Selling a 96 McCarty and a 01 Custom 24 to get it, they’re posted on reverb if anyone’s interested
 
Any McCarty 594 owners out there, could someone please post a YouTube video showcasing the 594 with high gain? Like some heavy rock tones think Alice In Chains or any old 90s heavy bands. All the people who post the demos of the guitar play clean blues and I wanna hear what it can do with a high gain amp. That would be superb

The McCarty is essentially a Blues machine you know.

Well it's not really high gain. But I did mod my Marshall Plexi to go more late 60's. Then I played some high gain (for me atleast) Hard Rock with a Green Rhino Kicking the front end of the amp a bit. You can check out my video if you like


Double Vision \m/
 
I love that song, very good LP tone. that's why 75% of guitar players own a tube screamer.

ALSO AN UPDATE: I put the original 58/15 LT back into my 594 ! I took the pearly gates out mostly because it sounded identical to my other guitar. The PG really works well in that guitar so I highly recommend it. BUT, there is no sense having 2 guitars sound the same. the LT really does open up a beautiful low gain tone which you can easily layer distortion on top of with things like a tube screamer. really a wonderful sounding, and playing guitar.
 
So I’m getting my pickups swapped. The bridge is going to be a Bareknuckle Mule 8.4K. I feel that there’s too much top end zing and too few low mids there.

The neck I’m going Custom Shop with a Seymour Duncan. I’m asking them to voice it the same as this with a tad lower on the bottom and high end and a hair higher on the upper mid range

I think these are the best pickups period. If your after woody tones! Take a listen to early PAF equipped recordings and chances are these fill that slot with perfection.

However I’m more of a woody Duane Allman Neck and slightly charged Kossof, Cream, Page and oddball Knopfler Guy in the bridge. Having used Mules earlier I feel a custom voiced one works well the bridge.

Thoughts?

Karan.
 
So I’m getting my pickups swapped. The bridge is going to be a Bareknuckle Mule 8.4K. I feel that there’s too much top end zing and too few low mids there.

The neck I’m going Custom Shop with a Seymour Duncan. I’m asking them to voice it the same as this with a tad lower on the bottom and high end and a hair higher on the upper mid range

I think these are the best pickups period. If your after woody tones! Take a listen to early PAF equipped recordings and chances are these fill that slot with perfection.

However I’m more of a woody Duane Allman Neck and slightly charged Kossof, Cream, Page and oddball Knopfler Guy in the bridge. Having used Mules earlier I feel a custom voiced one works well the bridge.

Thoughts?

Karan.
I think the mules are highly thought of in general, I've had so many different PAF, they do all sound remarkably similar, the one thing that I can usually differentiate is the EQ, my favorite ones are the bright ones. stops the pickups from getting muddy. hot winds make them darker. but each guitar needs what it needs fit to your ear.
Pearly Gates (it is a 59 PAF clone)
Gibson burstbucker 2 and 3
Gibson burstbucker Pro
I have to throw the 5815 LT in there as well great PAF nice and bright.

all the rest seemed slightly too bassy or too middy for me.

Slash alnico II slightly dark, but very close.

so I think you can custom order that fit your own ear, for most of those boutique makers tell them that you want more or less 8.4 is slightly hot wind will have a tendency to be slightly more bass. once again the brass saddles make the 594 slightly more dark sounding I feel like bright pickups work better with it.
good luck on the experiment.
 
I think the mules are highly thought of in general, I've had so many different PAF, they do all sound remarkably similar, the one thing that I can usually differentiate is the EQ, my favorite ones are the bright ones. stops the pickups from getting muddy. hot winds make them darker. but each guitar needs what it needs fit to your ear.
Pearly Gates (it is a 59 PAF clone)
Gibson burstbucker 2 and 3
Gibson burstbucker Pro
I have to throw the 5815 LT in there as well great PAF nice and bright.

all the rest seemed slightly too bassy or too middy for me.

Slash alnico II slightly dark, but very close.

so I think you can custom order that fit your own ear, for most of those boutique makers tell them that you want more or less 8.4 is slightly hot wind will have a tendency to be slightly more bass. once again the brass saddles make the 594 slightly more dark sounding I feel like bright pickups work better with it.
good luck on the experiment.

So I could not agree with you more on many of these points.

I think Burstbuckers have garnered an unnecessarily bad reputation though. I don't know about the #3 but with hands on experience with the #1 & #2, I don think they are bad at all really! Infact they're rather irritatingly well balanced with each other. Yes they're not as clear as you'd like when rolling off the volume and could have a little more this & that in the higher sound registers but not far off the mark. I have a second guitar with them and I probably would leave them be.

The Pearly Gates in the neck is nice and top endy, scaringly similar to the 58/15LT but the bridge in my opinion just slams the bass up. Think of it, they do say that original bursts were/are supposed to have woods that are very balanced and the PG is an exacting replica so maybe it worked on that Les Paul magically and the Custom repros had woods selected to be close to that Standard (pun unintended)

I'm not a big fan of the Slash bridge pickup it was my first experiment with mods years ago. I think it's got way too much mid range and thinness for my comfort but then again, exacting replicas wont always work on every guitar, that's why Duncan has a tone wizard.

On my 594, It's a tad of a bright guitar by itself for some reason. I oft find myself playing acoustically when the tubes are warming up and having to remind myself that I need to flip the standby. Set to the bridge, tone round 7.5ish, I slowly turn up the volume only to be greeted with too much jangle and little to no bottom/low mid.

Got my fingers crossed on That Mule do deliver o_O
I have made all the points on the trouble available to them for a custom wind

Fingers crossed.
 
I’m not even a metal guy per say, I play heavy rock music like 311, Incubus, AIC, other 90s bands of that nature. I use Custom 24s with the 85/15 and I love it. I feel like I could get away with keeping the stock 594 pickups as the amps I own have ridiculous amounts of gain such as my Dual Rectifier Tremoverb. I was just hoping someone could do another video, but I’ll probably get the guitar regardless. Selling a 96 McCarty and a 01 Custom 24 to get it, they’re posted on reverb if anyone’s interested

I think I found what your looking for


This man is French
 
There are some custom winders with good reviews out there now that wont break the bank. Geppetto Guitars comes to mind.

I've tried. Vintage Mira's, HFC/Vintage Bass, and Dragon II's so far I like the D II's best... so far.
I just purchased a set of 57/08 TM's, looking forward to checking them out.
 
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I think the mules are highly thought of in general, I've had so many different PAF, they do all sound remarkably similar, the one thing that I can usually differentiate is the EQ, my favorite ones are the bright ones. stops the pickups from getting muddy. hot winds make them darker. but each guitar needs what it needs fit to your ear.
Pearly Gates (it is a 59 PAF clone)
Gibson burstbucker 2 and 3
Gibson burstbucker Pro
I have to throw the 5815 LT in there as well great PAF nice and bright.

all the rest seemed slightly too bassy or too middy for me.

Slash alnico II slightly dark, but very close.

so I think you can custom order that fit your own ear, for most of those boutique makers tell them that you want more or less 8.4 is slightly hot wind will have a tendency to be slightly more bass. once again the brass saddles make the 594 slightly more dark sounding I feel like bright pickups work better with it.
good luck on the experiment.


Finally got it all in place.
Upgraded pickups and a new wiring harness. 50’s spec but 1 twist. The neck has a coil split on the tone pot and is wired out of phase.

In the process of putting together a before & after video. Bear with me till I do.

The differences are huge! The 58/15LTs certainly are worth their weight. They have a clarity to them that I havn’t found a match to. But in the bridge they come at the expense of power and ooze off too much treble response for Heavier blues Rock!

The Mule is a perfect match for the bridge! It’s doing what it should, letting the guitar’s natural sound through so the amp can handle the remaining show. The Seymour Duncan Neck is woody as can be. Not as clear as the 58/15LT but overall it carries a mid range that was lacking in the LT so it’s a trade off between the 2 I have to live with
 
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Finally got it all in place.
Upgraded pickups and a new wiring harness. 50’s spec but 1 twist. The neck has a coil split on the tone pot and is wired out of phase.

The pictures are below and in the process of putting together a before & after video.

The differences are huge! The 58/15LTs certainly are worth their weight. They have a clarity to them that I havn’t found a match to. But in the bridge they come at the expense of power and ooze off too much treble response for Heavier blues Rock!

The Mule is a perfect match for the bridge! It’s doing what it should, letting the guitar’s natural sound through so the amp can handle the remaining show. The Seymour Duncan Neck is woody as can be. Not as clear as the 58/15LT but overall it carries a mid range that was lacking in the LT so it’s a trade off between the 2 I have to live with

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Old wiring & Pickups
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New wiring & Pickups
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The pics don't seem to work here for me?
 
The pics don't seem to work here for me?
I suggest you use Imgur photo hosting website.
Load the pictures onto the website.
click on the image that you are interested in
it will show you 4 different ways to share the image.
Click on the copy button next to....
BBCode (message boards & forums)
then just paste that link, Ctrl V, into the message.
you won't see the image until you send to the forum.
 
Finally got it all in place.
Upgraded pickups and a new wiring harness. 50’s spec but 1 twist. The neck has a coil split on the tone pot and is wired out of phase.

In the process of putting together a before & after video. Bear with me till I do.

The differences are huge! The 58/15LTs certainly are worth their weight. They have a clarity to them that I havn’t found a match to. But in the bridge they come at the expense of power and ooze off too much treble response for Heavier blues Rock!

The Mule is a perfect match for the bridge! It’s doing what it should, letting the guitar’s natural sound through so the amp can handle the remaining show. The Seymour Duncan Neck is woody as can be. Not as clear as the 58/15LT but overall it carries a mid range that was lacking in the LT so it’s a trade off between the 2 I have to live with

as I said in previous post I removed the pearly gates I put the 58/15 LT, bridge back into the guitar, for last 7 months, but in response to your last post over a month ago, the 58/15 LT just really was too low output for the bridge, I reinstalled the 85/15 full wind, just to experiment a little more, I'm finding the 85/15 has a little more clarity of string attack than the pearly gates did. But quite similar pickups actually slightly different EQ.
I keep surprising myself when I pick it up and play it, because it sounds so good, whereas I kept picking it up with the LT, low turns and having to turn on a distortion pedal automatically.
however I extremely love the neck position for the 58/15LT.

So I'm extremely happy with the 58/15 LT in the neck, and the 85/15 uncovered in the bridge.
The tone chasing is almost complete.
 
Kinda interested but not serious enough , the you tube videos seem to not catch my ear.
my perception is they lean towards the dark side, and I greatly prefer brighter pickups.
it seems like they're not popular. but certain guitars and players and certain amplifiers could be perfect with them.
I am definitely bonding with the 85/15, it seems pretty darned vintage, I hear people say that it's slightly more modern.
but it just seems like a very clear voiced simply great pickup, a nice slightly unique voice, yet seems very vintage. super easy to dial in the EQ, and very responsive to volume and tone controls,
stronger than the 58/15 LT so I believe they are cousins.
 
as I said in previous post I removed the pearly gates I put the 58/15 LT, bridge back into the guitar, for last 7 months, but in response to your last post over a month ago, the 58/15 LT just really was too low output for the bridge, I reinstalled the 85/15 full wind, just to experiment a little more, I'm finding the 85/15 has a little more clarity of string attack than the pearly gates did. But quite similar pickups actually slightly different EQ.
I keep surprising myself when I pick it up and play it, because it sounds so good, whereas I kept picking it up with the LT, low turns and having to turn on a distortion pedal automatically.
however I extremely love the neck position for the 58/15LT.

So I'm extremely happy with the 58/15 LT in the neck, and the 85/15 uncovered in the bridge.
The tone chasing is almost complete.
Sorry about the lack of accessibility to images.

The video is ready and up for you guys to scrutinize.

I apologize if any lags are there in tiny bits here and there in it, I'm working on having it fixed.
 
Sorry about the lack of accessibility to images.
The video is ready and up for you guys to scrutinize.
I apologize if any lags are there in tiny bits here and there in it, I'm working on having it fixed.
mm I have a set of Mule's in my HBii - I might see how they go in a 594.
I was thinking of grabbing an Abaraxs set to try out as well, I think they could be pretty good for me in a 594.
Did you consider the Abraxas at all for yours?
 
Sorry about the lack of accessibility to images.

The video is ready and up for you guys to scrutinize.

I apologize if any lags are there in tiny bits here and there in it, I'm working on having it fixed.

Even though the recording and room reverb was not the best, the pickups sounded epic, the response to the volume and tone knobs just fantastic.
Those are exactly my kind of pickups, bright but almost never harsh, creating lush harmonic overtones,
I'm assuming that you're extremely digging them, not sure if you had a phaser on, but you have the Peter Green out of phase setting at 16:05 on LedZep sound great.
your middle pickup setting is out of phase I think.
Good job
 
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