Creamery Pickups?

[ohm-men]

I'm gonna try his "58 Jazzmaster set. Alnico 2 short magnets (meaning they do not stick out at the back of the bobin), AWG 42 wire.
Curious to find out how they will sound.
Been looking for something a bit darker for my Ash body Jazzmaster for a while now.
I found a used set locally for a very fair price, so I'll give it a go....

I used to have a SD Ant. I set in a Jazzmaster a long time ago that I kind of liked, but it did not fit well in the mix in the band I played with back then.
So, I'm kind of hoping that the Creamery "58 set will be in the same ballpark. Although I "think" that the SD Ant I's were wound with Formvar wire where this set uses AWG 42 wire. But honnestly I have no clue if the wire makes any audible difference in sound.

From what I understand, I don't think the original 50's Jazzmaster pickups had Alnico 2 magnets... But 'm far from an expert on these....

Edit/Update;
Picked up the Creamery "58 set. The label on the back of the pu says " "58 - AL2 - May 2019"
I asume that "AL2" means Alnico 2.

Neck is : 7.39 K
Bridge is : 8.69 K

So, Installed these pickups in my Ash body Jazzmaster. (this had a set of Peter Leonard/pickupwizard in it) So I was hoping for a darker sound with this Creamery "58 set. After playing the guitar for over 1 hour, pick up height adjustment etc, the jury is still out on this set...
They sound good, no doubt about it, but snappy bright....they are somewhat brighter then the Pickup wizard set that I had previously in this guitar.
I was kind of hoping that the Alnico 2 magnets would sound smoother... But I guess that the winding of the coil is also an important aspect in the equasion.
I'm gonna play arround with the set for a while and see where it goes.

Does anyone have an e-mail address from The Creamery?
I'd like to shoot him a mail about this set. Since I'm "asuming" these have Alnico 2 magnets, without really knowing...
So my opinion on this set might be based on wrong info.

[gila_crisis]

Hi,

Jamie/Creamery email is jaime@creamery-pickups.co.uk

give him a bit of time, he's not the fastest replier on earth, but he'll reply you

I can say only good things about he and his pickups. I ordered a set consisiting of a Alt-88 mid range bridge and a 58 neck for my JM (a bit custom made, both with Alnico 4 rods, instead or 2 or 5) last year, and I love how the guitar sounds now!

[ohm-men]

Hi,

Jamie/Creamery email is jaime@creamery-pickups.co.uk

give him a bit of time, he's not the fastest replier on earth, but he'll reply you

I can say only good things about he and his pickups. I ordered a set consisiting of a Alt-88 mid range bridge and a 58 neck for my JM (a bit custom made, both with Alnico 4 rods, instead or 2 or 5) last year, and I love how the guitar sounds now!

Thanks! I will certainly e-mail him with some questions regarding the pickups I got.
I like his "58 set as it's veru consistent, it's just I got different expectations from it. (perhaps I'm just to biased towards the SD Ant I set)
Just curious to find what magnets the set has.

Edit, I send Jaime an e-mail regarding the 58 Jazzmaster set and this was his reply:
they’ll be Alnico 2 for both - I tend to make them a little brighter, with a little more clarity to make the tone pot that bit more useful for adding a little more warmth.
I use custom made coil wire 42awg, I don’t use Formvar but an equal thickness insulation that has better resistant to chemical/rust damage.
Shorter magnets just means, the magnets on a Jazzmaster are shorter than those found on regular Strat or Tele single coils
1meg pots are standard for Jazzmasters but I actually like to use 500k for slightly rounder, warmer sound

I found his answer very usefull and it cleared a few things up for me.
I have this set in my "Guitarbuild" Ash Jazzmaster body and I got to say it's really growing on me. I still have to experiment with the pu height of both pick ups but I gotta say this set sounds quiet good. It has a somewhat softer attack then my Jazzmaster with alnico 5 magnets.
It's brighter then the SD Ant 1 set ( which in retrospect sounded, very mid range and really dark)
But when rolling down some vol and tone on The Creamery "58 set (I have 1 meg pots in this jazzmaster) it really starts to shine. So I "might" try a set of 500K pots in the future as Jaime suggested, just to hear how it sounds.

I'm pretty happy with this set and glad I bought it. And I also think it's really kind of him to reply to given them fact I bought the set used from a private seller that had no affiliation with him.

[gila_crisis]

Great, super happy Jamie's reply helped you a lot!

[Guppy]

I was kind of hoping that the Alnico 2 magnets would sound smoother... But I guess that the winding of the coil is also an important aspect in the equasion.
I'm gonna play arround with the set for a while and see where it goes.

Does anyone have an e-mail address from The Creamery?
I'd like to shoot him a mail about this set. Since I'm "asuming" these have Alnico 2 magnets, without really knowing...
So my opinion on this set might be based on wrong info.

I think that alnico magnets of any type don't necessarily give less highs than ceramics but it's the "character" of the treble frequencies that makes them more pleasing. Higher wind might offset the treble content a bit by adding bass and mids (and losing some character along the way IMHO). You might invest some time, and a small amount of money, in getting the tone pot to work the way you like it and use that some more.

[garyptaszek]

Jaime is the man.
I use 250k pots (well one single volume pot) in my Jazzmaster so I’ve always got abit of high end rolled off as I don’t have a tone control.

How are the guitarbuild bodies? I’ve been looking at their site for a while but I’ve not met anyone who’s ordered one yet. I’d be interested to know how they come out.

[gila_crisis]

I'm almost tempted to change the tone pot to 500k instead of the standard 1M, after reading these posts.
Did anybody else try this out?

[Guppy]

I'm almost tempted to change the tone pot to 500k instead of the standard 1M, after reading these posts.
Did anybody else try this out?

I just went from 500k to 1meg. 500k is nice, but if you are looking for true "Jazzmasterness" 1meg is the way to go. There are always knobs you can work to turn down the brightness.
With 500k my Jazzmaster (with Pure Vintage pickups) sounded good but a bit nondescript. With 1meg it's much brighter but not shrill. But also bigger and brasher.

[gila_crisis]

I just went from 500k to 1meg. 500k is nice, but if you are looking for true "Jazzmasterness" 1meg is the way to go. There are always knobs you can work to turn down the brightness.
With 500k my Jazzmaster (with Pure Vintage pickups) sounded good but a bit nondescript. With 1meg it's much brighter but not shrill. But also bigger and brasher.

Thanks for the reply! Well my idea was to change only the tone pot, as I like the volume to be 1M.
With 1M at full you get a lot of punch and brightness, and I like a lot this trick that if you roll down a little bit the volume pot, you can remove a bit of that brightness while keeping almost the same volume.

[gila_crisis]

Well, I wrote to Jamie/Creamery and asked him what he would suggest (he likes 500k, and this gave me the feelings he may have designed the pickups with 500k in mind instead of the standard 1M) and since I had few 1M resistor at home I put one in parallel on the external lungs of both tone and volume pots (lead circuit only).
Well I like a lot the result: the sound is more warm and no more so high-end like with 1M pots, and surprise: tone-wise the lead vs rhythm circuits (note rhythm is still stock with 1M vol, and 50k tone) works a lot better, there's a better contrast between both, like it used to be with the original Japanese pickups (before the rhythm sounded to dull and dark compared to the lead, it was really to much).

[garyptaszek]

I had a similar experience going down to 250k pots. With the 1meg pots I was always rolling down the tone on the bridge, and sometimes just a little on the volume to tame the high end. Now I just use a single 250K volume pot, on both my Jag (which has Creamery Alt88 Mids pickups), and my JM (which has Creamery Extra Width pickups).
I don’t currently have a rhythm circuit installed.

Well, I wrote to Jamie/Creamery and asked him what he would suggest (he likes 500k, and this gave me the feelings he may have designed the pickups with 500k in mind instead of the standard 1M) and since I had few 1M resistor at home I put one in parallel on the external lungs of both tone and volume pots (lead circuit only).
Well I like a lot the result: the sound is more warm and no more so high-end like with 1M pots, and surprise: tone-wise the lead vs rhythm circuits (note rhythm is still stock with 1M vol, and 50k tone) works a lot better, there's a better contrast between both, like it used to be with the original Japanese pickups (before the rhythm sounded to dull and dark compared to the lead, it was really to much).

[jeremyrd]

I put a pair of Extra Width WRHB’s in my Am Pro JM. They sound great, and I’ve been really pleased. I’m contemplating a set of Alt 88’s for a Tele, and maybe something for a PRS that I’ve never loved the sound of

[JSett]

Does anyone know of any decent alternatives to Creamerys these days. UK-based (or even EU) if possible.

I think this last order of mine will be my last...I'm a pretty patient dude when I want to be but his lead times are out of hand. Quoting 35-40 days but, well, I'm on day 71 now - that's excessive in my book. They're not special pickups either, just normal 'off-the-shelf' models.

[GreenKnee]

Does anyone know of any decent alternatives to Creamerys these days. UK-based (or even EU) if possible.

I think this last order of mine will be my last...I'm a pretty patient dude when I want to be but his lead times are out of hand. Quoting 35-40 days but, well, I'm on day 71 now - that's excessive in my book. They're not special pickups either, just normal 'off-the-shelf' models.

MOJO pickups have always been good for me, had 4 or 5 different sets from them. UK based, lead time 30-40 days but my last order, a set of goldfoils, arrived after 2 weeks.

[garyptaszek]

Does anyone know of any decent alternatives to Creamerys these days. UK-based (or even EU) if possible.

I think this last order of mine will be my last...I'm a pretty patient dude when I want to be but his lead times are out of hand. Quoting 35-40 days but, well, I'm on day 71 now - that's excessive in my book. They're not special pickups either, just normal 'off-the-shelf' models.

MOJO pickups have always been good for me, had 4 or 5 different sets from them. UK based, lead time 30-40 days but my last order, a set of goldfoils, arrived after 2 weeks.

Yeah my last couple orders from Creamery have taken forever, lose to double the quoted time, and without any updates (unless chased).
I’ve got some MOJO pickups that are very nice, but I was under the impression he just rips off Curtis Novak designs? Unless I’m confusing that for someone else...