Your guitar pickups are similar to microphones with subtle differences and some are made to be snugged right up to the strings where they will perform much better. I set them close, so they will scream, and will also hear a great deal more that other pickups placed farther away. Some players use: Dimarzio, Duncans, Bareknuckle and others with their humbuckers bearing huge magnets. They are more powerful but in what way? They need to stand off from the strings for magnetic and vibration resistance reasons. But the biggest reason is NOISE. Big fat heavy pickups are noisy. Guitar strings will get pulled out of tune when they sense too much magnetic force in their orbit. A big fat heavy magnetic humbuckers will exert a lot of downward pull.
Why? Simply because it hampers string sustain and bends the strings by pulling downward on the strings. A downward pull on an in tune string equals, "out of tune" strings. Do you want to be in tune? Would you like more sustain or less? If you'd like more sustain then use a low wound pickup or one with a weaker ceramic magnet rather than an Alnico-2, 3 4 or 5.
Just because the magnet is weak doesn't mean you have a wimpy pickup. It just means you have to handle it differently. What you do is to raise the pickup all the way up (not so far that the strings bang the top of the pole piece) just below the strings where it can hear everything. You want an accurate reproduction of the sound.
What I'm suggesting is akin to a singer standing close up to the microphone versus singing 2 feet away. You want to be heard Right? Why sing so far away? Same with a good, well made low power pickup for your guitar. Get it CLOSE!
The even pole piece pickups are generally preferable to the staggered pole when trying to accomplish this better sound approach to getting your guitar heard.
Many players select staggered pickups simply for aesthetic reasons. This is great as long as you're just doing photo sessions and not really playing the guitar. Most players have no idea when to apply the use of a set of staggered pickups. That is why you're here! The reason to use that kind of pole stagger is when the radius of the neck is especially deep. The necks in the 1940's and 1950's required these because the radius was extremely curved with a deep radius. A well set up guitar will have a string radius matching the radius of it's particular fret board. At an extreme 7.25 Radius the pole pieces on the D and G strings were are far away they can not be heard very well (have you heard this somewhere before?). To solve the problem back then, a few of the poles were extended to be able to reach just under the strings to BE HEARD. Thus the staggered pole pickup was born. YAAAAY! It doesn't mean however that you need to run out and get a set. Most fret boards these days have a radius of 12" and higher. There is no need for the staggered profile set on newer guitars now otherwise-some of your strings will not be heard. Am I repeating myself? Good, you need to know this.
The important take away is get the right set of pickups. get the right pole piece setup and set your pickups at the proper height. Then get back with me and let me know how much better your guitar sounds.-Rick Mariner
