Mastery bait.

[popvulture]

Well this is interesting:

https://twitter.com/MasteryBridge/statu ... 7704951808

[Chankgeez]

Why does he have a photo of Merle Travis's Bigsby as his header?

[popvulture]

Maybe he's developing the Merle Mastery for those 10 guys out there who have em

[repoman]

Theres these: https://shop.tksmith.net/collections/tk ... ece-pickup

[karmablock]

IIRC he used to work for Bigsby or was inspired by him something like that. It's probably a JM pickup considering that is a huge chunk of his market and he works with Bilt Guitars a lot.

[popvulture]

Yeah my first guess would be JM too. Hope he does something unique! There are already plenty of awesome JM pickups out there... not that I wouldn't welcome more, but it'd be cool if something kinda broke out of the norm.

Also HOLY SHIT those TK Smith pickups are expensive! I didn't really think there was anything more expensive than Throbaks out there. That said, there are probably some even more ridiculous ones out there that I don't know about...

[repoman]

The thing with those TK Smith pickups is they are a lot more involved in manufacturing than something like Throbaks or other super expensive pickups as he fabricates the housing from sand casting and bobbins and makes most of the parts himself instead of buying previously manufactured components and assembling it like most boutique pickup companies.

[popvulture]

Yeah, was looking at the construction and imagining that it was all custom... makes sense. But still, ouch!

[karmablock]

EGC pickups are ridiculously expensive. I think its like $300 for one. At least for bass anyway. Not too mention the one in a million chance he chooses to respond to you.

[The Eristic]

I played the TK Smith guitars at NAMM. Dude was super cool, and the workmanship was good, but with a very much homemade vibe in the style of something your skilled-at-woodworking, Country-&-Western-loving Grandpa would make. The pickups DO sound incredible, though, and compared to the crazy prices of the guitars (the ones at the show ranged from like $6k-10k), they're a bargain if you really want that sound. I might spring for some if I come across the right body for them.