EMG 85 BK

I bought this, along with an EMG 81, for the classic EMG 81/85 setup favored by players like Zakk Wylde, Kerry King from Slayer and Elias Viljanen from Sonata Arctica. I was upgrading the stock BDSM pickups on an old BC Rich NJ Warlock guitar from 2004.

I was initially skeptical that I would hear any difference, so I recorded some "before and after" tracks. Well, let me tell you that I definitely did hear a difference from the very first minute after I plugged the guitar into my amp 😄.

To my ears, my guitar sounds much better now. First of all, there's a lot less static noise. But there's also a lot less noise when sliding between chords. Single notes also sound much clearer. And because the guitar sounds better, I suddenly feel like I've become a better guitar player overnight, even though I know that all that changed was the pickups.

I installed the pickups myself. This was my first pickup upgrade. Installing EMG's is a lot easier than most pickups, because you don't need to solder. All you need to do is plug wires into the right holes. I didn't even need to desolder the old wires from the old potentiometers — I just cut the old wires at the solder join instead. So you don't need a soldering iron at all.

From a non-guitar-tech perspective, EMG really do a great job of making sure that the pickup installation is as easy as possible. The fact that all the replacement components (potentiometers, input jack, wires etc. Even the hex nuts and washers, which are not pictured.) are included in the box and don't need to be sold separately is a huge plus to beginners like myself. Since I bought two pickups, it also means that I have some spare parts now, in case I break something 😄 Each pickup box also includes diagrams for how to wire your guitar for various pickup configurations.

Because my guitar wasn't built for active pickups, it doesn't have a battery compartment. I was worried that the pickup cavity wouldn't fit the battery bus and the battery that the EMGs need to work. In the end, I was able to fit everything, but just barely. Pro tip: don't take off the sticker from the battery bus and glue it to the wall of the pickup cavity until after you've wired everything and are absolutely sure that everything will fit!


Overall, I am a very satisfied customer. I would purchase EMG pickups again.

Ordered this pickup a while ago for a project, used it in bridge position (with SA in the neck).
There are lot of stereotypes of EMG pickups on the internet, but screw them. Does it sound like a 59 Les Paul pup? Hell no.
But it is not supposed to. It is bright, aggressive, but can be tamed with volume pot. It balances well with active single coil in the neck too, giving the middle position a bit of extra depth and complexity.

Obviously, if you want best active pickups on the market, completely ignoring the cost, go for the Fishman Fluences. However, EMG 85 makes a compelling option both for bridge and neck positions.

been a pro for many years, I am mainly a metal and shred guitarist but I play many other styles. I used nothing than the best passive pickups until now. But nowadays, if you record with computers (and who doesn't) actives are a must....got rid of all these annoying buzzes when you get near the computer screen, when you use a tablet (which is not grounded), when you touch the mouse, when you use lesser power supplies....all these stupid noises are a thing of the past. How did I manage until now?

This is my personal fav, the 85.....chunky low mids, lots of power, and even the price is frankly a bargain, I mean this is an American handmade pickup, usually they cost more. Top quality parts, and to top it all, no more dealing with that silly soldering stuff.....I installed this in my guitar with a single pickup and single volume control, and I was up and running in less than half hour.

And all that silly stuff I hear about how active pickups supposedly all sound the same, have no dynamics, etc.....it's all nonsense. These pickups sound as great as any greats I have used, this is top notch stuff.

EMG has another convert.....I could never revert to passives now. I'd now say that passives are for low gain tones.....if you play metal, these are a must, will kill all these damn buzzes and simplify your life in general, you won't have any of these problems anymore when recording, performing etc.

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in regard to the nonsense 'but I don't like batteries', as per EMG's specs, the battery for the single humbucker in my guitar, if I play every single day for 2 hours a day, will be about FOUR YEARS. Four years! Ridiculous.

EMG rules the kingdom of pickups.

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by the way, I am a musician first of all, not a tech, but a long time ago, when I first learned about noise gates (always used at least one at the input, if not a second one in the fx loop of the amp, too), I learned from a book that noise suppressors/gates will attenuate certain noises, and thereby WIDEN the dynamic range.

So this pretty much proves that with an EMG the dynamics aren't worse off, but better, at least at high gain settings: because by getting rid of all these 'impurities' in the sound, such as buzzes, the dynamic range widens. The same happens with mastering....if the signal is lower, you can boost it more. So if in your tone you have all these 'impurities' such as buzzes, you are already getting out of headroom, but since the EMG kills these buzzes, the headroom expands, and therefore you get MORE dynamic range.

Again I am not a tech or a sound scientist but a musician, my area of expertise is writing music and performing it. But chances are, I am still right.

I bought this pickup together with the 81 for my ESP Horizon from 2000, which had stock pickups. For the style we play in the band (thrash), the sound is a huge leap from previous pickups. For rock to brutal metal, it's highly recommended. Cleans on this one (neck) are also actually quite well defined and warm.

The second great thing is the solderless approach. It comes with the needed pots, and without having much guitar tech knowledge, I managed to install everything correctly, until I came to the point to solder them to the selection switch... this I got a tech to do, as I don't know how to solder. Nevertheless, very good idea from EMG.

Not sure what you can say about the EMG 85 that hasn't already been said - staple for high gain metal tones for decades, paired it with an 81 in the bridge position and couldn't be happier. While they're known for their high gain applications, I have to say the cleans are very nice too - definitely not a "warm" passive sound (obviously) but much more versatile than you might think.

I went EMG rather than Fishman mainly for the solderless install, literally idiot proof with very easy to follow diagrams, everything is colour coded. Also comes with the 25k pots and stereo jack, and all the cables needed of course - I would recommend grabbing their solderless 3-way blade or toggle as well but there are instructions if you want to keep the original switch for your guitar and solder to it. Each pickup comes with the pack of pots, bus, cables and jack - so you end up with two of everything but good to have spares just in case I suppose.