Acoustic Guitar Pickups

[JM Convert]

I do a bunch of home recording for myself and I used to use a (15 years ago) Seymour Duncan pickup I could mount into my acoustic guitar.

After a long hiatus I lost it.

Now I know putting a cheap pickup in the sound hole of an acoustic guitar makes a few of the forumites I really respect cringe but it worked for me.

As long as I write the right parts in the right registers it works for me.

I was going to buy the Seymour Duncan SA-3SC Woody pickup but I decided I would ask here in case someone is in the know.

My main acoustic (a Taylor a friend picked out for me) has a pickup. I need a pickup as my fingers and the pick hit the pickguard a lot and I record in a giant untreated room so traditional microphone techniques won't work for me.

I want to use this on my Father's 1970s Ibanez. It is a much mellower guitar. My Taylor is pretty bright. I want to work with blending both of them.

Thanks

[marqueemoon]

If you’re going for realism, recording any acoustic pickup direct is generally going to sound like doodoo compare to micing the guitar, even if the room isn’t ideal.

If a condenser mic is going to pick up too much unflattering stuff don’t use one.

If you have a spare boom mic or two you can drape blankets over them to help control the immediate environment around the mic and guitar a little.

I have some old guitars I don’t want to mod, and use an old Bill Lawrence magnetic soundhole pickup with those. It’s a darker sound for sure, but is at least flattering and pleasant to listen to. One fun trick is to mic the guitar and also run the pickup into an amp or amp sim with a little dirt on it and blend to taster. You can get a nice Americana-ish rhythm guitar sound that way.

I have a B-Band under saddle pickup installed in another, which I like well enough. It doesn’t do that awful quacky thing at least.

[fuzzjunkie]

There was an ‘80s band called The Alarm that played acoustic guitars with sound hole pickups through 50 watt Marshall amps. It was a jangling, crunchy sound that made for a nice alt-country rhythm tone as mentioned above, but they probably would have sounded better playing Les Paul Jrs.

[Jonesie]

I've had a few LR Baggs M1A's over the years, and I always thought that they did a really nice job. Not super expensive, either.

[JM Convert]

Thanks for the replies everyone.

It looks like a little more research is in order.

[UlricvonCatalyst]

Best of both words (in theory), but quite spendy, even if you could find a 2nd-hand one.