setting. The power and knowledge of Andrzej. Hell yeah. Run to Poliakow as fast as you can. I wholeheartedly recommend it. Pastyl
Show Less

was basically given a complete overhaul. It turned out really great. And on top of that, you can have a good chat with Andrzej — he’s a really nice guy. Best regards!
Show Less

ith the option at the time to switch the operating mode of the bridge pickup. Back then, I was installing pickups from companies such as BKP, Lollar, Seymour Duncan, DiMarzio, Kinman, Q-tuner and others — basically the absolute top of the standard and custom guitar market. I even had Kinmans and a set of BKP BlackDogs in one of my own guitars, which cost me a small fortune. So, once I had finished putting the client’s guitar together, I plugged it into an amp — and I simply couldn’t put the guitar down. Not because I had built some kind of masterpiece (it was a normal guitar, built with heart and to the best of my ability), but the sound coming from the speaker completely caught me off guard. The amount of harmonics coming from the speaker made me decide to get in touch with the person who designed these pickups. That’s how our collaboration began, and it continues to this day. I should add that APG has gone through further stages of development since then, resulting in other pickups that now power my guitars as well as those of other players. He’s a lifelong seeker of the Holy Grail, just like me. Obviously, the companies I mentioned above also make fantastic pickups. But with them, I don’t have the possibility of discussing the pickup parameters directly with Andrzej and having them tailored in such detail to a specific guitar and the client’s requirements. I think this is the most important thing — it saves us money when searching for the right pickup for our “axe”. The fact that Andrzej Poliakow used to build guitars himself (and has returned to that profession in recent years) means we can discuss all the parameters of the guitar in relation to the pickups. Sometimes you have to convince a client that their vision for the construction of the guitar will not work well for the sound they want to achieve, and that is also part of our job — to explain it properly. I’m very happy to have the possibilities I mentioned above, because the client ends up with a guitar configured specifically for them. And then they have years of playing ahead of them — playing a guitar like that can completely disrupt your daily routine 🙂 because it’s hard to put it down. And the wives get angry 🙂 But what can you do — the guitar is the greatest love, and no woman can replace it. Unfortunately, I don’t have a photo of the guitar that started our friendship... which is a shame. But I’ll post photos of other guitars I’ve built with APG pickups! Cheers! 🙂
Show Less

s perfectly in both solid-body and semi-hollow-body guitars. In semi-hollow instruments, however, I use 250kΩ pots to bring out that desirable “lower midrange” in the tone. The cleans are not overly compressed, which gives you greater clarity. What I mean here is the presence of the guitar in the mix, because many guitarists forget that when playing in a band, they should be one of the members who are not simply standing on stage as placeholders, but actually have a real impact on the overall sound and character of the band. When the Litza pickup is switched to parallel mode, you get a tone straight out of the rhythm & blues world, and it works extremely well alongside single-coils. And by “single-coils”, I also mean APG pickups in a humbucker-in-a-single-coil format. That way, you don’t lose that desirable “glass” in position 2 of the pickup selector. I should point out that for me, position 2 means the bridge and middle pickups together in a Stratocaster. I know it’s numbered the other way around in the USA, but hey — we live in Poland. 🙂 So... for anyone looking for an open-sounding pickup with the ability to switch between parallel and series modes, this is a great choice. Someone here in the reviews described it as being on a world-class level, and that is exactly how I see it. Of course, I’m not taking anything away from other pickup manufacturers — they have an impressive body of work as well — but what I value most is the fact that I can discuss a customer’s requirements directly with Andrzej. That gives us possibilities that other companies may not be able to offer. After all, before finding the pickup we really like — the one that sounds the way we expect in our particular guitar — we often have to buy several different models, install them, and then sell the unwanted pickups second-hand. We simply lose money in the process, because nobody is going to buy them back from us for the same price we paid. As a luthier with 25 years of experience, I recommend all APG pickups, among other things because we can discuss exactly what we want from a pickup directly with Andrzej. I would also add that in situations like this, it is important to tell Andrzej what kind of wood your guitar is made from and what kind of music it is intended for.
Show Less

copy of a Gibson Marauder and turn it into a Gibson S-1-style guitar, so I wanted to make sure the experiment wouldn’t end in disaster — the shorter Gibson scale, different body material and weight (mahogany), etc. Let me tell you — every time I speak with this man, the experience is fantastic. He is an incredibly kind person with extensive knowledge in this field and a real passion for what he does. The pickups sound fantastic. They are extremely clear, very responsive to articulation, and all positions are very well balanced. P.S. I recently bought another old Japanese guitar in which the bridge pickup unfortunately wasn’t working. So I called Mr. Andrzej and asked if he could take a look and see what could be done to repair it. The man makes his own pickups and is now also starting a company where he will be building guitars under his own brand. He could easily have brushed off some random guy with a broken pickup by simply saying he didn’t have the time — but he didn’t. He had no problem telling me he would take a look and see what could be done. I wholeheartedly recommend this man and his products.
Show Less

ej, thank you for your time, advice and valuable input. I highly recommend APG!!!
Show Less

lean tones. I use it together with the TeleBucker Dual Tone Bridge, and it sounds great in every switch position. I’m absolutely thrilled with it.
Show Less