Welcome to Zone Musical LLC, where our goal is to advance the "state of the instrument."
ZoneRanger
Pickups
Your Guitar's Voice.
Your Choice.
The humbucking pickup re-imagined.
The pickups are at the heart of your electric guitar's tone.
Do you change from the old, "safe" choice?
Only if the instrument still has its traditional
sounds, but also is more musically useful, responsive, and versatile - no matter what
and how you play.
Introducing the ZoneRanger pickup system.
The ZoneRanger pickup system replaces the traditional humbucking pickup and adds a new "Voice" control which replaces the traditional passive tone control.
The pickup is actually two humbucking pickups -- a "pickup inside a pickup" --- which are "tuned" differently, have different magnet strengths, and are combined with the Voice control.
The ZoneRanger system "cheats the physics" of the limitations of the two coils in the traditional full-sized humbucking pickup design, and also eliminates the problems with "coil splitting."
Result: Improved traditional sounds and also a new range of tones from your instrument.
Dial in the
tones that you need.
Clean to dirty, country to metal.
You probably know already that you need a pickup with "more mids, less highs" for higher gain crunch and distortion playing, and "more highs, less mids " for cleaner styles.
Usually that means single coils for clean, humbuckers for crunch and distortion. Maybe different guitars.
What about in between? What if you just need a little more "cut" to sound your best overall in the band mix, or a pinch more mids and less high end to sound right for that one song?
Will your next preset or switched-in pedal get you there? Will you have to tweak some knobs somewhere in your rig or go into a menu? Do you have time in the middle of a set or a song to figure it out?
Wouldn't it be better to be able to "dial in" your tone with one knob (or switch) onboard your guitar- to get the best-sounding pickup "voice" for your current song, rig, gain level, venue, while you play?
That's what the ZoneRanger system does.
The difference
that makes a
difference.
The ZoneRanger pickup is "externally voiced." What that means is that the pickup's basic tone character - it's "voice"- isn't fixed at the time it is made, but is set outside the pickup itself.
By you. Over a large range, with no "bad spots."
Bright, dynamic single-coil type sounds to darker humbucker sounds from the same pickup.
External voicing allows you to quickly adjust your instrument's "voice" to sound best with your rig , playing style, and gain level.
If you'd like to find out more, here's a closer look at the pickup, the Voice control, and the way it all works.
Four Rails and Four Coils?
Why?
ZoneRanger Focus-G
ZoneRanger Focus-F
Why is the ZoneRanger pickup a quad rail, quad coil design? Haven't I seen quad coil/quad rail pickups before?
Yes, you probably have. This is different.
Previous quad rail humbuckers were just two double-rail, single coil-sized pickups stacked together side by side on a common base. These typically have been "super hot," intended for high-gain playing, and used in the bridge position.
The ZoneRanger pickup is also two separate pickups - but the inner two coils on the ZoneRanger are one pickup, and the outer two coils are the other. We call this a "pickup inside a pickup" or a "concentric" design.
The inner and outer pickups have different electrical properties and sonic roles, but are both always humbucking.
These are combined together with the "Voice Control" board to give you a much larger range of tones than is possible with either a single pair of coils or a "stacked" side-by-side, four-coil design.
"Voice
Control" ?
What's That?
The ZoneRanger pickup comes with a "Voice Control" board.
This very small circuit board works with the pickup and the Voice pot (or existing "coil split" switch on your guitar) to control not just the high end, but also the key midrange frequencies of the pickup's sound at the same time.
This board doesn't just mix or switch the inner and outer pickups. It combines them in a special way - the "secret sauce" of the ZoneRanger design. It just looks really simple.
Versatile, sure.
But how good does it sound?
<Insert marketing fluff about how it sounds here.> Nope.
We've put a lot of time into listening and refining this design to make sure the ZoneRanger system will be the most musically useful tool for the largest number of players in many different styles. We think we have good ears, but you know how that goes ...
But, all that aside - we're getting something beyond what we expected out of this system.
When you have an opportunity, please have a listen to the upcoming sound demos on this site, or listen to a ZoneRanger artist, if you want to hear what this pickup system can do for your instrument.
Stay tuned. You will be hearing -- and hearing more about -- this.
We're starting this journey.
The ZoneRanger system is in production now and available in limited quantity to independent luthiers, guitar techs, and small-run production manufacturers.
Instruments with installed ZoneRanger pickups will be available soon online.
Please join the newsletter to be notified on the upcoming Kickstarter campaign which will take ZoneRanger to full retail production - packaging, manufacturing engineering, and supply chain.
Latest News
Pickups
Focus-G
Best choice for most Gibson and PRS scale length guitars.
Focus-F
Best choice for super clean punch for Fender scale length guitars.
