What is a humbucking pickup? What does it do? What does it sound like? And why is it called that?
A humbucking pickup is a type of pickup that is especially good at doing two things. First, they’re designed to solve the problem of suppressing external noise; built with two coils in a way that makes them cancel the annoying electrical hum and other extraneous noises that can affect single-coil pickups, while leaving the string signal intact. In other words, they cancel (“buck”) unwanted hum—hence the name. Second, this configuration has the advantage of producing a big, loud and warm sound that contrasts with the bright, snappy sound of many single-coil pickups.
