Have you heard that, “Garbage in means garbage out”? Hum is un-musical sonic garbage that pollutes the amplified sound. Even humbuckers put out some hum. Stompboxes, especially those with gain, amplify hum along with the guitar signal. Chris Kinman’s Zero-Hum pickups negate this hum and let you hear only what you want to hear; the guitar signal, stompbox and amp without any unwanted hum from pickups.
No guitar player wants his sound polluted with hum, but if he chooses to use everyday “noiseless” pickups he faces his tone being degraded, robbed of dynamic expression and presence, polluted with hum, or worse still, all three. That’s because unsophisticated noiseless technologies invariably degrade your sound, even if they are noiseless.
At Kinman we think of pickups as a critically important conduit of artistic expression. Therefore we engineer lots of dynamic expression and pure musical energy into our pickups. We also remove 100% of the garbage hum. Kinman has more high-value patents concerning this goal than all the other Pickup makers combined.
Kinman pickups convert artistic expression into pure, unpolluted dynamic sound, remarkably free of not only mains hum but string rattle and buzz as well as discordant frequencies caused by strong magnets.
Until now, pickups were almost an afterthought of guitar manufacturers and consequently have been the products of tinkering and hap-hazardous trial and error. No serious or innovative electrical engineering science has gone into them since their beginnings some 60 years ago because very few innovative electrical engineers work in the industry. Like the Tiesco ‘Gold Foil’ pickups, most ‘other’ pickups have been happy accidents. Pickups have not kept pace with the modern world and pickup makers continue to make copies of old non-noiseless pickups from the 50’s and 60’s. But music and guitar playing has evolved dramatically since that bold new era thus pickups have come to a stalemate and guitar players are forced to endure polluting hum.
Did you know that there has been a quiet revolution going on over the past few years and that the humble pickup has taken a quantum leap onto the modern world stage unnoticed by many modern players? It began in 1995 when Chris Kinman developed a revolutionary new way of thinking about cancelling hum from single coil pickups. Since those simple beginnings Kinman has made many more scientific discoveries that have led to a sonic revolution which has transformed the ordinary into the extraordinary.
Enter into the realm of Kinman where innovative electrical engineering science, manufacturing know-how, and progressive thinking meet guitar playing. We’ve transformed the humble pickup into the star of the show. Kinman Pickups let your favourite stompbox sound a lot better thanks to the pure and unadulterated musical energy being fed to it. Please also read Any old cable won’t do.
Pickups with extended dynamics, better feel and exciting new sounds with Zero-Hum that will change your world. Expression is the 3rd Dimension of Kinman pickups.