EMG ACB Banjo Pickup System featuring Tim Weed
V-3547
Tim Weed stops by EMG Studios to discuss the new ACB Banjo Pickup System.
Video Transcription
[Banjo music playing]
[on-screen text reads: EMG TV. Tim Weed, Multi-instrumentalist Banjo Virtuoso. EMG - ACB Dual-Coil Banjo Pickup]
How Tim got started playing banjo
Tim Weed: So I first started playing banjo when I was 16 years old. I used to listen to the early Poco and Eagles records, and the banjo parts of those records really caught my ear. So I started to fall in love with the sound of the banjo, and I'd come home from school, run around my room, playing my tennis racket with the music blasting. It wasn't until my 17th birthday that my mom got me a banjo. From then on, I just practiced constantly. In about a year, I was in a professional band playing festivals.
So I began my career playing to large audiences on large stages with big sound systems, and usually eight to 10 live mics on stage, depending on how many people were in the band. So I always played through a microphone in the beginning.
Why Tim uses the EMG ACB pickup system
In the early 80s, when I began playing with drummers, that necessitated the use of having a pickup on my banjo. As soon as you bring drums on stage with a string band, the volume floor on stage goes way up, and you need to be able to compete with that sound.
I've probably used over a dozen different pickups of all different varieties. Some of them were piezo-based pickups, some of them were magnetic, some of them, I don't even know what the technology was. What I finally resolved to use was a magnetic pickup that mounted under the bridge, and that was the best amplified sound I'd ever used until this new pickup.
So the current pickup I'm using, the EMG ACB, is the very first pickup that I've ever been happy with purely the pickup tone, and I've used it now on many different stages, in bands with very loud stage volumes. Not only is the tone really full and rich, but I've had no problems with feedback. This pickup possesses an openness that is uncharacteristic of any magnetic pickup that I've heard. It possesses a roundness and a warmth that really makes you want to take a look at the sound.
My favorite features of the pickup, number one, are that they make the banjo louder, and they make the banjo louder in a way that sounds good. The microphonic qualities of the pickup make it sound much more natural and give it this airiness and openness that you don't find in magnetic pickups. I did a tour back east, and I've recently, just this past weekend, played two fairly loud gigs plugging in, and it's performed excellently. I'm really happy with it.
