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Dimarzio Bluesbucker DP163 Review

  • Writer: Barış Şahin
    Barış Şahin
  • Jul 4
  • 10 min read
Dimarzio Bluesbucker DP163

Neck humbuckers can often be tricky. The neck position inherently tends to get muddy, and if the pickup is too powerful, it might introduce other problems; if it’s too weak, you can run into balance issues with the bridge. And if you do pick a matching bridge pickup, it may not be as hot as you'd like—it's a delicate balance. On top of that, finding a neck pickup that actually delivers a usable tone when split is no easy task either (more on that later in the article). Can you imagine a neck pickup that's clear yet warm, powerful enough, and still sounds genuinely meaningful when coil-split? DiMarzio did—and they called it the Bluesbucker. And please, don’t go saying, “What kind of neck pickup has a ceramic magnet and a 10K DC resistance?” like i did in the mid 2000s.


The Test Guitar


The Bluesbucker I have still sits on its throne on my hand-made superstrat, Goldie, that has a Turkish alder body, a Q-sawn one-piece maple neck in a chunky Endur-Neck profile, Gotoh 510T-FE1 tremolo, 25.5” scale, steel frets, Bourns 500K volume and Alpha 500K tone pots, and 009-046 D'Addario NYXL0946 strings in E-standard tuning. The guitar has a Lollar Imperial High Wind bridge and custom wound middle (true single with coil tapping 5.5K/6.5K windings, now on 6.5K side is on) pickups. Its primary (unplugged) tone ranges from balanced to medium-bright.

Evaluation


Let’s read the official desciption first, as always;


And now for something completely different: the Bluesbucker looks like a standard humbucker, but sounds like a P90 and cancels 60-cycle hum as effectively as the average humbucker. This means any guitar with standard size humbuckers can now have the sound of P90s without altering the guitar in any way and without noise. Patented Virtual Vintage and Airbucker technology let the Bluesbucker “see” a narrow string window like a true single-coil, making it extremely sensitive to playing dynamics. When a pair of these pickups are on together, they achieve the open, slightly hollow sound that two single-coils produce. Splitting the pickup produces a sound similar to that of a Strat pickup, with very little drop in output.


The coil with the 6 adjustable slotted poles is the “hot” coil. The coil with the solid poles is along for the ride to cancel hum and look cool. Since one coil is doing most of the work, the direction the Bluesbucker is installed makes an obvious difference in the sound. When the hot coil is closest to the bridge, the sound is brighter; towards the neck is warmer. Even though the look is a little nontraditional, we like the sound of the bridge pickup “backwards” (with the screw coil towards the neck). With a Bluesbucker in the neck position with the screw coil towards the bridge (also “backwards”) the combined sound is Tele-like. With the neck pickup in the more traditional direction, the combination is like two P90s. The Bluesbucker comes with special wiring instructions.”


…And, my measuremens are here;


Dimarzio Bluesbucker DP163

Magnet – Double Ceramic under the screw bobbin

Advertised DCR: 10.07 K Ohm (Series)

Measured DCR: 9.91 K Ohm (Series)

Measured DCR: 6.74 K Ohm (Screw Coil)

Measured DCR: 3.25 K Ohm (Slug Coil)

Inductance @100Hz: 5.58 H (Series)

Inductance @100Hz: 2.95 H (Screw Coil)

Inductance @100Hz: 1.94 H (Slug Coil)

Measured C: -29.3nF (Series)/ -39.3nF (Screw Coil) / -89.1nF (Slug Coil)

Output: 224mV

EQ (B/M/T) – 4.5/5.5/6 (old catalog data) 4.5/5.5/4.5/5.5 (official website)

Gauss: 400G screw, 80G slug (measured at top center of D&G pole pieces)

Patents: Virtual Vintage & Airbucker

Ambient Measurement Temperature: 21C

Users: Brett Garsed, John Norum, Magnus Olsson, Mr. Scott DiGioia, Bo Ramsey

 

When you first open up the pickup and start inspecting it, nothing immediately jumps out as particularly special or unusual. With its nickel silver baseplate—something not too common for DiMarzio—clear heat-shrink tubing over the wires, and short mounting screws, it honestly looks quite a bit like my Virtual Hot PAF. But make no mistake—this is not a typical humbucker. Once you peel back the fabric tape around the coils, it becomes obvious: this really is the “silent P-90” described in the official spec sheet. There’s no magnet under the slug coil. Instead, under the screw coil, there are two small ceramic magnets, positioned to make direct contact with the screws from the center. Measurements confirm this layout: the screw coil exhibits a magnetic field of around 400 gauss, while the slug coil barely hits 80 gauss. The slug coil’s sole purpose is to cancel hum. What puzzles me, though, is why the screw coil was designed with twice the DC resistance of the slug coil. Electrically, the two coils are not matched—at all. As you’ll see in the measurement list below, there’s about a 2:1 ratio in DC resistance, and even a full 1 henry difference in inductance. I’m guessing there might be roughly a 50% difference in winding turns between the two.

Dimarzio Bluesbucker DP163

Another important detail worth mentioning is that the Bluesbucker is wired differently from typical DiMarzio humbuckers. Normally, when wiring a DiMarzio humbucker, the color code goes like this: red is the north start, black is the north finish, green is the south start, and white is the south finish. So, if you want to split the screw coil on a standard DiMarzio, you can’t just use the classic configuration of red as hot, black + white as split, and green + bare as ground. However, with the Bluesbucker, you can actually use that traditional wiring method to split the screw coil—because that’s how it’s internally arranged. When I first wired mine up, I didn’t know this and connected the push/pull pot using the usual alternative method. But when I pulled the knob to split it, the tone was extremely thin and weak. That’s how I learned—the hard way. So take it from me: I made the mistake so you don’t have to.

 

When I first heard about the DiMarzio Bluesbucker years ago, I was very skeptical. Back then, I was convinced that a neck humbucker should never go beyond 8K in DCR—anything more than that would inevitably lead to muddiness, or so I thought. But over the years, as I tried more and more pickups, those biases started to fade. Still, how could a pickup with ~10K DCR and a ceramic magnet possibly be a blues pickup? Wasn’t ceramic supposed to sound sterile and cold? These questions first came up for me when I saw Bill Nash using the Bluesbucker in the neck position of his modded Gibson Les Pauls (the Nash Conversion Series). That choice alone made me question my assumptions. Naturally, the next step was to check out the official product description—and honestly, the Bluesbucker absolutely lives up to it. It is a P-90 in humbucker clothing. How good or bad a P-90 it is… that I can't judge too definitively, since my experience with P-90s is somewhat limited. I’ve always loved them in the neck, but in the bridge, I tend to gravitate more toward the humbucker camp. Still, I’ve always maintained a kind of love–distance relationship with P-90s. Either way, the Bluesbucker is unmistakably a P-90 at heart—and it has many of the classic traits: clear yet fat, warm but never woolly. I absolutely loved it in the neck position. In fact, I liked it so much that it made me reconsider a double cream ADM Neck I already had installed. Now, I think I need a double cream Bluesbucker in its place.


Dimarzio Bluesbucker DP163 Specs
Dimarzio Bluesbucker DP163 Specs

While doing all this, the Bluesbucker offers two major advantages. First, when coil-split, it transforms into a sweet, Strat-style single-coil with very minimal volume drop. But if I had to describe the split tone in a single word—what would it be? Maybe “Texas”? Honestly, the Bluesbucker gets surprisingly close to that classic SRV-style neck tone, and that aspect of it is just a joy to play. You can easily spend long sessions in split mode without ever getting bored.


It seriously really reminded me of Texas Specials, too. I can't say that with absolute certainty, and I no longer own a set of Texas Specials to test it, but based on the electrical specs—especially DCR and inductance—the screw coil seems to be in a similar ballpark.

 

Now, for those of us who like using lower-output neck humbuckers, there’s a common issue: once split, the resulting tone is often too thin or weak to be truly usable. Take a 7.4K PAF clone, for instance—split it, and you often end up with a tone that's just... lacking. But the Bluesbucker excels here: both modes—full humbucker and split—are genuinely useful and musically satisfying. What’s more, the volume and perceived body between the two modes stay surprisingly consistent. The change feels less like a dramatic volume dip and more like a shift in dynamics and response.

 

Dimarzio Bluesbucker DP163

The other major advantage is that it delivers that sweet P-90 tone I mentioned without any of the hum. That’s why the key factor of Bluesbucker is its ‘versatility’.

 

In terms of EQ response, I’d say it has a clear and relatively flat-sounding curve to the ear—tight and defined lows, present mids, and clear highs.

 

For the output, i would put Bluesbucker in the low/moderate category. Because it feels that it is louder than most of low output pickups. Louder than Airbucker Neck for instance.

 

I suppose the most obvious rival to the Bluesbucker would be Seymour Duncan’s P-Rails. It's hard for me to make a true head-to-head comparison here, though—because as I’ve mentioned in various other articles, unless you try two pickups in the same guitar, under the same conditions, back-to-back, it's risky to draw firm conclusions. That said, I did use a full set of P-Rails at one point, and I still remember them fairly well. Based on that memory, I’d say the P-Rails have the edge on the P-90 side, most likely due to their unique construction. However, the humbucker mode, especially in the neck position, was way too muddy for my taste, and the rail mode was, at best, just okay.

 

The Bluesbucker, on the other hand, may fall slightly behind the P-Rails in the P-90 department, but it brings a host of other advantages to the table:

 

·         It splits far better: the split mode yields a much more usable single-coil tone (i mean it gets much better Strat-ish tone)

 

·         It has a classic humbucker look (for those the appearance is too important)

 

·         It fits into nearly any standard humbucker route

 

·         It’s available in all of DiMarzio’s custom color options (like awesome double cream)

 

·         It gives you P-90 tone without the hum

 

So, to sum it up: if your top priority is nailing the most authentic P-90 tone, then... get a Phat Cat. lol (Just kidding—well, kind of. The Phat Cat really is a fantastic P-90 for the neck.) But we’re talking here about two pickups that aim to offer versatility and innovation, not just straight-up P-90 replication. So let me try again: If your priority is pure P-90 tone plus some tonal options, go with the P-Rails. But if you’re after a broader, more flexible and hum-free experience, then I’d definitely pick the Bluesbucker.


Dimarzio Bluesbucker DP163

Now let’s talk about pairing options for the Bluesbucker. In this test, I matched it with a Lollar Imperial High Wind in the bridge—and I was extremely happy with the results. I'm quite confident that it will pair very well with other pickups in the hot PAF range. like Virtual Hot PAF, PAF Pro, FRED or Norton, Al Di Meola Bridge... Even the Super Distortion could work, though you might need to dial it back a little to maintain balance.

 

From the Seymour Duncan line, I think it would pair nicely with the Custom, Brobucker, Custom Custom or Saturday Night Special. Other candidates that pop into my mind include the Mojotone '59 Clone Hot, or from Bare Knuckle, the VHII or Black Dog.

 

Cleans? Do you like the cleans of a generic P-90? Then, you will like it. For the split mode you will like more and more. Especially play it through the tone you like to play with your strat in the neck pickup mode. Brilliant.

 

Who may not like Bluesbucker? Non-Blues players :) Kidding. Well, despite its awesomeness, because of the Dynamics, i think DP163 may not the best option for neck humbucker shred. I mean, for very fast picking, PAF Pro is awesome, so is Air Norton, so is Al DiMeola Neck, so is Duncan ’59 or Pearly Gates Bridge…

 


You might be thinking—does this pickup have no downsides at all? While there are no serious flaws, a couple of subtle points are worth mentioning. First, since the Bluesbucker is voiced with a P-90-style character in mind, it doesn’t fully deliver the classic humbucker feel in the neck. Of course, that’s not entirely unexpected—the original PAFs were themselves designed as hum-free P-90 alternatives. So it’s natural for the two voices to be somewhat related. But they’re not the same. If you’re after the full, traditional humbucker experience in the neck, something might feel slightly missing here. Personally, I love the clarity, so it didn’t bother me at all—but I can imagine that it might for some players.

 

The second point is harder to tell. When playing under high gain, a hotter or an overwound pickup will serve “neater” or, let’s say, fit better compared to Strat-style single coils. So if you’re the type of player who enjoys the bridge position on an HSS Strat but often finds the neck position lacking something under heavy distortion, this pickup might give you similar mixed feelings—maybe even find yourself wishing for a full-fledged humbucker instead. Of course, I’m not saying this will definitely happen. These are more like subtle heads-ups—just things to keep in mind that might come into play, depending on your playing style and tonal preferences.

 

Dimarzio Bluesbucker DP163 Bottom

Conclusion


The DiMarzio Bluesbucker is a challenging neck humbucker. Technically, it features an unconventional internal design. Sonically, it delivers a tone that gets remarkably close to a P-90, all while fitting into a standard humbucker slot.


Its ability to offer a genuinely usable tone when split, and the smooth, balanced transition between full and split modes in terms of volume and dynamics, makes it a far more versatile option than it might seem at first glance. This opens the door not just for blues players, but for classic rock and even alternative styles. If you're after the purest P-90 experience, this can't be the absolute last word—but if you want that vibe with no hum, a classic look, and practical flexibility, the Bluesbucker is a very smart choice.


In my personal experience, it’s a pickup that genuinely surprised me in the neck—pleasantly so. If you're one of those players who often says, “i need a neck humbucker that can good on full hb mode and still in single mode, it better give me something truly useful,” then you’ll definitely want to put the Bluesbucker on your radar.


I just want to know about, your ideas and experience, too. Please share the in the comment section below. So that we can achieve better review, shall we?


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