Always thought stupidly that these pick-up's were only for metal kind a music styles. An exiting style i like a lot but don't play myself (yet) . After a career on the road as a rock and country blues performer i enjoy to be a home-recording youtube artist nowadays. After some internet exploring and buying EMG 81 for bridge and 60 for neck i could see for myself what these pickups could do. For years not using a guitar pick anymore, the attack from thumb and fingers is totally different of course and i found that the gentle clearness of these EMG's make's life easier. And make's country style, rock and even jazz sounding truly convincing and sit quit well in the recording mix. Where in my case i sometimes had to accentuate like hell to get the sound in balance, these pickup's are a great help on the long road to get the recorded stuff right . The fact that they slightly compress is also an advantage in my humble opinion. Open style chords are like coming from a less cloudy heaven. But clear does not mean clinical. Oh no. These EMG' s do have a nice and pleasant 'edge' to them. Something wrong with the good old strat, lp, soapbar and so on (not active) pickup's? No way. Is it a good idea to try active pickup's if you are ready for it? Yes. There are many active pickup's with their own character, 81/60 does it for me. See for yourself. One thing to keep in mind: On the internet some people claim that cheap Chinese imitation's are allmost as good or even allmost equal to USA Santa Rosa made EMG's. A friend of mine bought a couple of them. The price of the imitations (they even shamelessly put names like EMG and Seymour Duncan on them) would be a good reason, say some, to order these copies. Please don't. So called neck pickup's are exactly the same as the other so called bridge pickup's. In a direct comparison with EMG they sound poor, that means; If your lucky. In most cases they sound crap. And are no option for serious musicians.
