People keep telling me you need humbuckers to play metal but I want to play some heavy stuff on my strat. How does high gain work on single coils and what are some of the pitfalls?
People keep telling me that it is a blues/country guitar but I'm interested in playing an unconventional style on a strat.
This question was partially inspired by this video.
The obvious answer is yes, you can! The question is if you really want it, because it will be easier to achieve an appropriate metal sound with humbucking pick-ups. Today's amps or (modeling) effects provide you with insane amounts of gain, so gain is no problem, even with (lower output) single coil pickups. As explained in topo morto's answer, hum can be a problem, but using a noise gate, not standing too close to the amp or to other sources of interference should be sufficient in most cases. Remember that many rock guitar players use(d) single coil strats at high volumes and relatively high gain settings (Jimi Hendrix, Ritchie Blackmore, Yngwie Malmsteen, etc.).
One useful option is to change the wiring of your single coil strat to allow a series connection of two pickups. Note that this is different from the parallel connection achieved by two positions of the 5-way pickup selector switch. A real hum-bucker uses a series connection of two coils. I've added that option to my strat and it achieves a hum-bucking (i.e., noise canceling) effect, and a sound that is darker and fuller than the original single coil sound. It does sound different from a "real" humbucker though, and honestly, I don't use it that much because even for high gain sounds I found I like the original strat sounds best (I don't play metal though).
Note that this answer only refers to the single coil pickups in your original stat, not the strat as a guitar model itself, because it's probably obvious to you that you can replace the pickups if you like, even without replacing the pickguard.
In sum, you can play metal with a single coil strat, you can even play metal with a ukulele (
), but the question is if it's worth the additional effort to achieve the sound that you like.The only real problem you may have with playing high-gain stuff on single coils is if the pickups are picking up hum, a high-gain signal chain that introduces a lot of clipping (distortion) is going to amplify that hum relative to the level of the actual notes played, potentially to the point where it could sound intrusive. Humbuckers, on the other hand, will 'buck the hum', rejecting some interference to some extent.
If you're not getting problems with hum, then really, there's no problem. You may find that you don't like the sound of single coils through high-gain, but that's where you have to make your own mind up!
bear in mind that two of the 5 pickup selector positions on a modern strat do allow two pickups to sound together and you may find those position somewhat hum-canceling.
Also : you can have true humbuckers in a strat:
my strat has a couple of types of dimarzio humbuckers in, both switchable for series, parallel, AND single coil operation.
It is certainly broadly true that humbuckers tend to provide an fundamentally 'heavier' basic tone, especially when you aren't using much in the way of effects, indeed many modern guitars designs specifically for heavy styles have active pickups for even higher output from the instrument.
Having said that metal covers a diverse range of styles and sounds and it is as much about performance and playing styles as the sound and not all metal is just about a wall, of distortion.
For example consider Iron Maiden, undoubtedly a quintessentially metal band but the guitar sound isn't really all that heavy with a lot of the power of the overall band sound coming from the bass lines and harmonising guitar parts. Indeed often the guitar parts are played by two guitars in unison ever so slightly out of tune with each other.
Equally as mentioned in another answer Jimi Hendrix managed to get a pretty meaty sound out of a single coil Strat.
Also with a Strat type guitar you do have the advantage that it is relatively easy to swap pickups around so you aren't stuck with single coils forever if you find they don't work for you. Indeed a humbucker at the bridge with single coils in the mid and neck positions is common enough in heavy rock and metal.
It is also failry simple to wire up a humbucker to be 'coil tapped' so that you can switch between humbucking and single coil modes at the flick of a switch.
Ultimately what matters is that you can get a sound which you like and works with your musical vision and playing style, how you achieve this is largely irrelevant and many players never really stop experimenting with equipment and setup to either get the sound they want or to try to find something new.
You can play metal even on classical guitar or harp and sound great but of course your question is not about genre. Metal tone is the sound of humbuckers with a lot of gain. Humbuckers are naturally little compressed so for single you need even more gain (or compressor). Distorted sound will be little buzzy so you will need to use tone knob (or eq pedal, or seymour duncan pickups booster that has humbucker mode). The hum can be terrible in some environments so you will need noiseless pickups or at least second position of selector switch (or gate). A lot of work and compromises without any benefit over real humbuckers.
IMHO the best high gain sound I've ever heard were humbucker and single coil played together.
Anyway you may hear single coil on many metal recordings. Leads are sometimes played single coil to give more treble.
I posted link to a video that shows benefits from double tracking in high gain mode. This effect can be emulated by dedicated pedal or chorus set exteeeeeeemly subtly.
