More info on Lindy Fralin Blues Special Tele® pickups here: warmoth.com/pfg14 More info on Lindy Fralin Vintage Hot Tele® pickups here: warmoth.com/pfg11
The Vintage Hots sounded like my Cavalier “Holy Grail” Nocasters by Cavalier Pickups. Those pickups are basically the overwound version of the original Nocasters with A3 mags and 43 AWG wire. I put a four-way switch in mine so I could get a hum-canceling effect with more oomph in position three.
Listening to the recording I was expecting the Blues to have be the warmer more mid scooped Tones. I didn’t hear it that way. I hear the vintage having those tones and if I were to pick one over the other (both sounded great) I’d pick the vintage. Thanks for sharing.
I have a Blues Specials set in my Nashville Tele (because I wanted a little more Strat tone overlap across the set) that I absolutely love. Lindy Fralin makes great pickups.
Yes, I found the Vintage Hots in the middle position to have the most difference, a little extra punch or bite. Although I like the Vintage Hot pickups more, I wouldn't pay extra for them as, like you said, the difference was generally subtle! Thanks for the video.
I like the deep tones of the Blues Special, very clear. Vintage Hots seem to ring nice for full chords too. "Pickup Height" is a Great Take-away point, each pickups' character can probably be dialed in to preference. 😎👍🎶
Another Fralin option to consider is their Split Steel Poled Tele bridge pickup. It's a beast. Noiseless, P90 mojo -- my favorite Tele bridge pickup hands down.
I found the sound differences in these shootouts are due as much to which piece of my gear I'm listening to them on. The Klipsch's in the studio make it much clearer then the Behringer's in my bedroom. After re-watching this in the studio, I agree with your findings. BTW Love the Warhead headstock. It's my favorite of ALL the headstocks out there. Fender-esque yet unique and more graceful that the Strat. No wonder I have 23 of them including 2 bass necks.
Your observations were spot-on. I enjoyed the extra mid-range grease in the Blues Special bridge, but the Vintage Hots middle had the classic Tele spank. Both sets had exceptional quality though, and you wouldn't expect anything less from Lindy single-coils. Your Pepto-B Tele was the perfect test-bed too! Perhaps a good compromise would be to go for the Vintage Hot in the neck and Blues Special in the Bridge 👍
I just got a set of Vintage Hots for an American Standard Tele I have that came stock with a Twisted Tele neck and Broadcaster bridge and I did not like those at all. I wish I had seen this before I bought the Vintage Hots because I really like the the Blues Special middle position the most. But I think they both sound great and either would be better than the Fender "custom shop" pickups my Tele came with. Thanks for the review.
I said it before, ill say it again: Sounds versatile....i would have liked the playing to be a tad more versatile though! I love vintage pickups tbh, the higher outpout ones tend to become barky or flat. Nice pickups overall!
100%! I kinda wish we got a sample of the middle position with that setup haha. The neck pups were super close, but the Blues Special had just a little extra sweetness to it that I liked.
heard a bit more highs in the vintage hot _neck_ , otherwise everything sounded pretty darn close to the same point well taken about how the differences are way more evident in the feel to the player than in what the listener hears! probably true for the vast majority of guitars and guitar gear anyway big fan of fralins, i have his 10k high outputs in my tele; he knows how to greatly overwind them while still keeping the clarity
Dunno - obiously - how they sounds "in the room", but through my system the Vintage Hot have a kind of "fullness" down to the mid/low-low frequecies that i like more thant the "bite" in the Blues Special (that - in case - can be helpfull in a dense mix). Anyway... both can be conducted in their respective territories with the amp (and/or pedal like a tube screamer) controls.
Although there was no great difference in the tonality between the two I would go for the Blues Specials. This is purely based of the slightest warmer overall feel I got from them…but I’m sure I’d be happy with either
Less mids and more highs in the vintage hot set vs the blues set. I bet both sound great but I would guess the vintage ones would sound more chimey in person.
Both are a bit too hot for me. I really like the Fender Nocasters that I got. Low output and sweet. The Highway 1 originals were way too hot and compressed sounding.
Lol. They sound similar. Have a set of blues specials, and a set fender 64 reissues. They both are similar slightly hot. Vintage output has that twang and the hotter it gets the thicker it sounds. Till it becomes something completely different. Noticed ever Tele has different needs. Like a light weight ash maple tele sounds great with vintage output, chimie beautiful. But say a heavier alder rosewood tele, the vintage output sounds too tame and I go with a much hotter output to get that throaty sound.
Too similar to make a significant difference,The only difference that was evident to me was at 02:05/10 when you cranked the bridge a bit. The Vintage Hot had a slight edge to them.
You gotta guitar and you wanna the weak tone gone. Install Fralin anytime(Dirty deeds vocal style). Dirty tones and the pickups are sweet.....dirty tones and the pickups are sweet.
