Metropoulos Forum

Played a Les Paul Traditional the other day.

All I can say is: wow....

Those 57 pickups sounded awesome.

Wonder what's everyone's verdict on the Classic 57's? Think of replacing my Les Paul's Antiquities with a set 57's

I have to admit that I played a Les Paul at GC that had the 57's,and it sounded awesome. It was the best sounding one there,as far as thier Les Paul stash. It was a very heavy one though. It was a very honey/amber looking burst finish.

I recall that it had a very sweet open quality to it's tone, whereas most of the other model's had a very rough grainy type sound going on.

I think the '57 classic's are very similar to the pearly Gate or '59, but have maybe a bit less bite.

Ruben wrote:Wonder what's everyone's verdict on the Classic 57's? Think of replacing my Les Paul's Antiquities with a set 57's

Tone Slinger wrote:I have to admit that I played a Les Paul at GC that had the 57's,and it sounded awesome. It was the best sounding one there,as far as thier Les Paul stash. It was a very heavy one though.
I think the '57 classic's are very similar to the pearly Gate or '59, but have maybe a bit less bite.

I always heard '57's as sounding good, but probably the least "authentic PAF" of some of the competition, such as Burstbuckers, and especially Antiquities.
Maybe it was due to the whole combination "working" in that specific guitar, or perhaps they changed the "formula" for 57's?? (Havent played a set in a while).

I've never been nuts about Pearly Gates (a bit too bright) or Duncan '59's (very generic sounding to my ear), but for the buck, Burstbuckers and Antiquities come pretty close to real PAF's, Ant's being a little closer, IMO.

Ruben, Im wondering if maybe "stock PAF" is maybe not the sound you're looking for? If it IS, I doubt you'll like '57's better than Antiquities. I have Ant's in one of my guitars, and actual '59 PAF's in a LP, and the Ant's are WAY closer to real PAF's than any '57 I've ever heard, so thats why Im wondering if its just the specific guitar they were in.

Great point's indeed. I'm thinking right know if I can remember playing actual paf's before. It might take me awhile to think back through all the haze of time . I do remember liking the pu's in my '78 Silverburst (I think those were T-top's ?) When I played it at the store before putting it on lay away.

I think Fillmore(brotha Ralph) is right on here, what is considered true paf is very speculative (on MY part anyway's) 'cause who has true reference articles to compare ?

Tone Slinger wrote:I think Fillmore(brotha Ralph) is right on here, what is considered true paf is very speculative (on MY part anyway's) 'cause who has true reference articles to compare ?

Brotha Ralph... good one!!

Thats a good point though, TS... lots of players only reference to an actual PAF is some mfr's clone of a PAF, and reviews of other players saying that the clone sounds a lot like a "real" PAF. And to confuse things a little more, "real" PAF's are very inconsistent. I've heard great ones and bad ones. I think I posted this once before, but Dave Belzer (a.k.a: one of the GC Burst Brothers ) used to run a small store in Lynbrook on Long Island. He got a '59 LP in trade and it had the worst sounding PAF's on earth. VERY thin sounding... no balls at all.
If THAT guitar was a players only reference point for evaluating an aftermarket PAF, almost anything would sound good!!
The other side of that coin is that a good PAF in a good guitar is pretty hard to beat though.
Its sorta like playing a bunch of old tweed Bassmans... you can play 10 of them, and 2 will sound "ok", 6 or 7 will sound good, and one or two will be magic. Thats how I see actual PAF's.

The thing about pickups like Antiquities, WCR's, etc is that they are extremely close to great PAf's, but they have one thing real PAF's dont have: Consistency. I've never heard a bad set of Ant's, and though I've only played a few sets of WCR's, every one of them sounded excellent. I think its safe to say that most other well known mfr's (Lollar, Fralin, etc) are like that too.