Susanna Hoffs' Pickups

LenMinNJ · Post by **LenMinNJ** » Thu Jul 28, 2011 6:09 pm

As it came from the factory, the 350SH has a single humbucker in the bridge position and two toasters in the middle and neck positions.

Susanna's own Ricks have what looks like three humbuckers, but I've heard that they're really just humbucker tops stuck on Stratocaster single coil pickups. She's also swapped out the three-way toggle switch for a Strat-type 3-way or 5-way selector switch.

Anyone know for certain? What brand pickups are under those humbucker tops? And how is the switch wired?

LenMinNJ · Post by **LenMinNJ** » Thu Jul 28, 2011 10:12 pm

Now are those great pickups, or what?

johnhall · Post by **johnhall** » Thu Jul 28, 2011 10:36 pm

The earliest versions of her guitar did have some different pickups of unknown origin in them; this was in the time period that the HB1 was being designed. However, these were later replaced with the standard HB1 pickups as they became available.

Sorry, but I don't remember at all how the pickups were connected or even if it was different than our standard 3 pickup harness.

cjj · Post by **cjj** » Thu Jul 28, 2011 10:37 pm

LenMinNJ wrote:

Now are those great pickups, or what?

I don't see any pickups..

winston · Post by **winston** » Thu Jul 28, 2011 10:41 pm

That's a great looking guitar.

LenMinNJ · Post by **LenMinNJ** » Thu Jul 28, 2011 11:32 pm

I found this in the archives:

viewtopic.php?f=11&t=278&p=42289&hilit= ... %2A#p42289

by Scott Jennings (route66guitars) » Mon Jan 26, 2004 2:18 pm

I found this posting in the archives, and several more recent references to Susanna Hoffs' modified Rickenbacker 350SH models. I thought I should clear this up.

Not long after Susanna got the guitars her guitar tech convinced her to switch to EMG pickups. My in-house repair man did the modification on this instrument, which includes three EMG SA (Stratocaster) pickups under Rickenbacker humbucking covers and a replacement pickguard with a 5 way Strat switch. The guitar sounded great this way, although I do not recommend the necessary routing and epoxy required to do this mod...

Mystery solved.

Well, that's pretty interesting. I wonder if that's what she's still playing?

JakeK · Post by **JakeK** » Fri Jul 29, 2011 12:15 pm

This solves the mystery. I always thought it was 3 HB1 pickups with a 5 way switch, but I guess it's different pickups. I would assume she's still playing it this way.

For some odd reason, shortly after the guitar was introduced, Sue played this really odd hollowbody Telecaster of some sort on Saturday Night Live in 1988. Probably had the sound she wanted that she believed she couldn't get from her signature model with stock pickups.

Ain'tGotNoPokemon · Post by **Ain'tGotNoPokemon** » Sun Jul 31, 2011 1:49 am

I don't know about you guys, but the first thing I noticed about that picture wasn't the pickups.

weemac · Post by **weemac** » Sun Jul 31, 2011 8:22 am

Ain'tGotNoPokemon wrote:I don't know about you guys, but the first thing I noticed about that picture wasn't the pickups.

It was the holdups wasn't it!

emac.

jingle_jangle · Post by **jingle_jangle** » Sun Jul 31, 2011 1:18 pm

I think she picked up Aitch once...

antipodean · Post by **antipodean** » Sun Jul 31, 2011 10:22 pm

jingle_jangle wrote:I think she picked up Aitch once...

...in one of Aitch's dreams...

cjj · Post by **cjj** » Mon Aug 01, 2011 2:24 am

jingle_jangle wrote:I think she picked up Aitch once...

She must be a lot stronger than she looks...

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Susanna Hoffs' Pickups

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