Find the Tone You Want From Your Guitar With Gibson P90 Pickups
Gibson is a household name not only for their guitars but also for all types of guitar-related equipment. Since every guitar needs pickups to get its tone calibrated and sounding right, Gibson has also made it a point to produce pickups, particularly its P90s. From SG's to Les Pauls, eBay has you covered for every type of Gibson P90 pickup that you could want.
General features of Gibson P90 pickups
Gibson P90 pickups typically use Alnico V magnets, which are permanent magnets with a rectangular cross-section that give any guitar equipped with them unusually high output. Their tone also sounds fatter than anything produced with the help of the Alnico II or Alnico IV magnets generally used in other P90 pickup brands. Despite this, the tone still retains the warm feeling typically associated with most P90s. The height of each of the polepieces can be adjusted individually using a small screw.
How do P90 pickups differ from other types of pickups?
Affordable Gibson P90 pickups are just one of the three major types of pickups that you'll find available for electric guitars. The other two Gibson types are single coils and humbuckers. Here is how to tell the three apart. In seeing this comparison, the general features of P90s will be easy to see and understand:
- Single coil: These use a single magnet and generally have a brighter tone than humbuckers or P90s. They handle low levels of distortion competently and are generally used in country and surf music.
- Humbuckers: These are like two single coils working together. They have a much warmer tone than single coils, which makes them ideal for playing jazz, but they also handle high levels of distortion, making them a natural choice for playing hard rock and metal.
- P90s: These strike a balance between humbuckers and single coils. They have less output than humbuckers but more output than single coils. The tone they produce steers a middle course between humbuckers and single coils in all of their essential features.
Guitar pickups and output
The term output refers to the strength of the signal that the pickup sends to the amplifier. The stronger the signal sent to the amplifier, the more distortion the amplifier ends up producing (unless the amp is specifically designed not to distort). New and used Gibson P90 pickups are moderate output pickups.
Content provided for informational purposes only. eBay is not affiliated with or endorsed by Gibson.