Thank you, and welcome back!Maniac wrote: ↑Wed Nov 25, 2020 10:16 amWow this is amazing! I was a member here years ago, but re-registered to say well done!
I'm lucky enough to own late CIJ Q serial number that I've had since new.
I'll continue following the thread as I'd be interested in the humbucker specs.
Seriously great job!!
That humbucker info could take a while yet. It has been about a year long investigation itself.
When Larry first told me about the pickup, he sent me a picture of Blue with the Duncan in it. So I automatically knew he was telling the truth, but since it was the first time anybody, as far as I know, had ever heard of them, I wanted confirmation.
I reached out to Seymour Duncan (the company) a few times and each time they were willing to help right until I mentioned Kurt Cobain and all of them were like "I can't touch on this any further." So it told me that it existed, but nobody was going to talk about it.
Larry told me that Seymour himself wound them. I tried reaching out to him, have heard no reply, but I think that is more due to not being tech savy. I reached out to MJ, and never heard a reply. I finally managed to reach out to Derek, Seymour's son, and I asked him if he he could confirm it with his dad for me. Derek mentioned that he remembered Larry and he used to spend the night with Larry's son. He had an interest in knowing about this pickup as well. I didn't hear from him since July until October. He sent me an update basically stating that he was still searching and apologized for it taking so long. Between covid and an influx of orders during everyones down time, they've been super busy. He told me that if I don't hear from him in a couple months, to hit him up.
As of right now, I have the specs of the pickup that went into Red 1.0 and it matches everything Larry could remember about it. If the custom shop comes up empty handed on Blue's, then I know where it is at and it may be out of reach. I know Larry gave Lee Bacon a copy of those specs. Lee is the guy who bought Kurt's childhood home and is trying to turn it into a museum. I believe that this was likely a customer copy. However, upon leaving Fender, Larry worked Artist Relations with Seymour Duncan. There is a small chance that Lee's copy is the original. I have not managed to find a way to contact Lee, so if anyone here knows how, definitely let me know. If Lee has the original copy, then I am going to take Larry at his word that both of these pickups were the same. I feel that after proving they existed and giving me specs that he remembered that ultimately checked out, it is safe to say that they probably are identical. But we didn't spend this much time researching to not look into it just in case. Lol.
Despite mentioning it above, I feel like I should add some context.
The pickup is essentially a normal 59 that you can pickup off the shelf today. There are a few differences but in terms of the coil windings, it is by all accounts a 59. So if you are trying to nail Kurt's Jagstang sound, a normal bridge 59 will get you there.
Most of the custom shop changes were minimal and primarily cosmetic but some of that kind of came with the times. For example, it recieved a short leg plate and in 1993, the 59 model only came with a long leg plate. So when you hear about some of these changes in the future, you may look at some of them and think it's ridiculous, so try to look at it through a 1993 lens. There is one very specific difference between the two and I can imagine that it would effect the way the pickup behaves, in a more Cobain like manner. I'm not an expert when it comes to pickups. I really should find a pickup maker, or a few of them, and ask them their take on that specific difference. I have a couple theories.
But we'll get into all of that soon enough. Lol. Sorry for being a tease. But you got something out of it.