Tell me about the Duncan Custom

[JackBootedThug]

Do you find it too scooped? It looks very scooped on paper.

iT IS SCOOPED BUT JUST RIGHT IMO....sorry about yelling...duh...

 

[napalmdeath]

My favorite for 25+ years and counting.

I'm a fan as well. Great in a Super Strat, or Les Paul. Tight, clear, punchy.

 

[hammered]

Do you find it too scooped? It looks very scooped on paper.

I’ve got one in an ash Strat style at the moment, had it in a alder Strat a few years back . Thru my Soldano or Splawn and Greenbacks my ears don’t find it scooped

 

[Rex Rocker]

I like the Custom a lot. One of my all time favorites, though I do also love the Distortion, Black Winter, and Nazgul. Like everyone has kind of said, it is a med-high output pickup with a slightly scooped midrange, tight low end, and balanced high end. For me, it's done well in a lot of guitars, and I am mostly playing drop tuned death metal. I just recorded this clip when I saw this thread with my Gutierrez Juggernaut with a Custom into my EVH 100S using my Driftwood Reactive Load and Celestion Speaker mix pro. Tuning is drop b.

https://app.box.com/s/eed0ckmq6k3btz3grasbfiwdyzdkp4k8

That sounds great!

 

[rbasaria]

Sounds good! I love the chugs on a Custom.

I know you were big on the Omega. How would you say the Custom and Omega compare?

Pretty different. The Omega is more mid focused and feels lower output by comparison.

 

[Lightning]

I found this article about the Seymour Duncan sh5 custom which I already knew BUT it wasn’t designed for Eddie.
“It’s not really old news to some people that Eddie Van Halen appears to have been one of the earliest big-name fans of the Duncan Custom. In an October 1979 issue of Guitar Player magazine, the Custom is advertised as “(Van Halen)”. The same ad was seen in the December 1979 issue, sans the “(Van Halen)”. LOL! That Eddie! For a guy that didn’t want people to copy his tone, he sure sells a lot of gear with his name all over it. HaHa!

But to be clear, Eddie was digging the Custom as an existing product and it is not a design that was made for him. The origin of the Custom model has more to do with how someone that was ordering some parts slipped up. Seymour made the best of the situation and came up with a new design to make use of an oddball purchasing snafu.”