Longtime Seymour Duncan users or rock music fans—or, let’s be honest, fans of music in general—are likely well familiar with the six-string living legend himself, Slash. The Guns N’ Roses guitarist is the textbook image of the cool, stoic rockstar who lets the music do the talking, which is why he’s the go-to when anyone from Iggy Pop to Rihanna needs a blistering solo on a song. Not to mention his incredible work with Velvet Revolver and Myles Kennedy and The Conspirators.

But perhaps the only thing more immediately recognizable than Slash’s top hat is his tone: distorted but lucid, soaring yet heavy. Not only was his guitar playing a key part of what made Guns N’ Roses the legends they are today, but it also defined the sound of 1980s hard rock by way of the Sunset Strip.

Aside from his virtuosic abilities, a key component of Slash’s signature sound is his trusty ‘59 Les Paul copy, loaded with Seymour Duncan humbuckers. These are the pickups that inspired the beloved Seymour Duncan Slash Signature Set, and now the Slash 2.0 Signature Pickups are the latest addition to his tonal dynasty.

When Seymour Met Slash

The story of Seymour Duncan and Slash’s friendship and working relationship begins in the late 80s, when the guitar riffs were wild and the hair styles were wilder. The pair met when GNR was tearing up the LA rock scene but had yet to record a full LP. Slash’s Derrig guitar happened to have the Seymour Duncan Alnico II Pro pickups in it, which were an updated take on the classic early-60’s PAF humbucker design. Slash loved the pickups so much that he brought them into the studio to record Guns N’ Roses’ debut record.

The rest, as they say, is rock n’ roll. 1987’s Appetite for Destruction launched GNR to stratospheric levels of fame, went Platinum several times over—selling over 30 million copies worldwide—and is still considered one of the greatest hard rock albums ever made.

Today, the album’s tracklist reads like a greatest hits compilation—“Welcome to the Jungle,” “Sweet Child O’ Mine,” “Paradise City” and so on. And the throughline across every riff, power chord and solo? Slash’s show-stopping playing on his Seymour Duncan-loaded Les Paul, which he used to record nearly all of his parts on the album.

The APH-2 Slash Pickups: Recapturing the Destruction

Countless guitarists have searched for Slash’s elusive Appetite tone in the years following the record’s release. But capturing that sound wasn’t as easy as slapping an Alnico II Pro set into a Gibson Les Paul. In fact, Slash’s Appetite Les Paul wasn’t even a Gibson, but a faithful recreation by the late, great luthier Kris Derrig. To this day, Slash still considers his Derrig to be his number-one guitar thanks to its “unique tone and personality”—but unfortunately for fans, that uniqueness makes emulating Slash’s tone deceivingly difficult.

Slash and the Seymour Duncan engineering team both realized this around 2010, when Gibson launched the Slash Les Paul Standard, a model heavily based on his Derrig (down to its distinct bright lemon burst). The Seymour Duncan team sent over Alnico II Pros for Slash to put in his new arsenal of signatures for live shows, but to everyone’s surprise, the guitar sounded noticeably different than the Derrig despite having similar specs and identical pickups.

And so the task became to design a new pickup that allowed any guitar to get as close to the Appetite-era tone as possible. The result was the Seymour Duncan Slash Signature pickups, which used a different magnetic wire and winding spec than the Alnico II Pro to achieve the balance of bite, sustain and crunch that makes Slash’s tone so special. Not only are the pickups one of Seymour Duncan’s most popular models, but Slash himself still has them installed whenever he adds a new Les Paul to the collection.

The Seymour Duncan Slash 2.0 Signature Pickup Set

Lately, fans can catch Slash either touring the world with Guns N’ Roses or with Miles Kennedy and The Conspirators in support of his latest album 4. To bring even more raw, full-power rock to audiences every night, Slash wanted a slightly hotter pickup that still maintained his signature’s clarity and tone.

The Seymour Duncan team delivered on that request with the Slash 2.0 Signature Pickup, a familiar but louder take on the beloved Appetite sound. Although the 2.0 has many of the same features as the original—including Alnico II bar magnets, single conductor braided lead wire and wax potting—the key difference comes from the extra coil winding that combines the first Slash pickups’ familiar mix of growl, gain and headroom with an extra hit of volume that pushes your amp further, faster.

“The Slash 2.0 is basically the same as the Alnico II Pro: Same tonality, same great clarity, but with a hotter wind,” Slash explained. “I’ve found on occasion that I needed a louder pickup for certain live applications, since I don’t want to mess with tone or distortion levels onstage. I asked Seymour if he could make a version of my pickups that were a bit louder, and he did just that. Same tone; just louder.”

Red Hot, Ready to Rock

The Slash 2.0 is a modern update on a classic sound loved by countless guitarists, now with more power and versatility than ever. Naturally, these pickups will give you seething hard rock tones in no time, but they’re also equipped for a wide range of genres, whether it be thumbing metal, blistering punk, intricate prog rock, or even jazz and blues.

Ready to discover Slash’s newest signature pickups yourself? Learn more about the Slash 2.0 Signature Pickups and check out the rest of the blog for more tips on how to unlock your dream tones.

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