New Pickup Day for the Great Pumpkin

[Sigmund451]

Since I got my Eastman 810 this guitar has just sat unplayed.
Aside from Aria's damn ugly finish its a good guitar after a lot of fiddling.

I call it the Great Pumpkin.

The pickup was a less than exciting humbucker so I ordered a Charlie Christian floater from Dreamsongs in Italy.
I installed it today. Its really a lot of fun.

While I love the sound of a carved archtop the dark smokey sound of a laminate is also attractive.
To celebrate differences I also went with flats instead of rounds
It got a new set of TI Swings.

[garybaldy]

Since I got my Eastman 810 this guitar has just sat unplayed.
Aside from Aria's damn ugly finish its a good guitar after a lot of fiddling.

I call it the Great Pumpkin.

The pickup was a less than exciting humbucker so I ordered a Charlie Christian floater from Dreamsongs in Italy.
I installed it today. Its really a lot of fun.

While I love the sound of a carved archtop the dark smokey sound of a laminate is also attractive.
To celebrate differences I also went with flats instead of rounds
It got a new set of TI Swings.

Is that an FA71?

[Sigmund451]

Yes.
Its a darned heavy archtop but I play sitting so it doesnt really matter.

[garybaldy]

Yes.
Its a darned heavy archtop but I play sitting so it doesnt really matter.

I got one a few years ago and thought it would be a winner being as Jim Mullen uses one and only £325 (like new). I haven't played it much having found my Loar to be more appropriate for what I was doing. The Aria is pretty loud and with the roundwounds that were on it it sounded more like a flat top. It was giving me a headache until I put flats on it! I don't mind the pickup but I think I should put on something different. I've been lucky enough to have been able to buy a few nice Gibsons recently so the Aria is less of a priority.

[Sigmund451]

After a couple of days Ive got to say Im in love with this pickup.

I got my Aria many years ago used but like new for less than 400 bucks. Sure, the new pickup in relation is expensive but if I ever sell it I will yank off the pickup and put the kent armstrong humbucker back on.

Its hard to sell stuff in my area and overall its a good playing guitar. It doesnt have the street cred of many guitars but if you put a good pickup on it and ingonre the finish you really dont know you are playing a cheap guitar.

Of course now it has me hankering for a carved top/CC experience. Im betting that is extra sweet.

I havent played other CC pickups but I really enjoy this one. Its got no harshenss. There is a soft sweetness about it. You can crank up the gain close to saturation and still retain its voice. Also Alberto at Dreamsongs was really easy to work with. He had no problems responding to emails in English (He is in Italy).

[Mick-7]

I bet a Charlie Brown pickup would sound even better than the Charlie Christian pickup in that guitar.

[Sigmund451]

Good one Mick haha!

If my patter stick this pickup will probably find its way to another guitar.

I seem to find a pickup I like a lot, put it on this guitar and eventually move it to something else.

Thats what I did with the tapped Armstrong single coil. It lived on the Great Pumpkin a while and migrated to my Eastman.