recommend me pickups for my strat!

[nigellum]

what kind of gain im looking for? hmm, i like the kind of smooth gain played in the instrumental song "cliffs of dover". forgot the artist.

the current pickups now sound very raw. to much biting then smooth.

 

[Whitestrat]

hmm, i like the kind of smooth gain played in the instrumental song "cliffs of dover". forgot the artist.

the current pickups now sound very raw. to much biting then smooth.

Ok... That's Eric Johnson. You're biting off more than you can chew to try to chase his tone. Seriously. That guy is THE biggest gearhead I can think of.

Anyways, I think your problem lies more with the pedals, speakers and amplification than pickups.

Single coils by nature are already low output, so they would not be as harsh as a high output humbucker, and can be controlled using various drive pedals. If you want a smooth tone for gains, then use a Boss SD-1 instead of some metal tone pedal or even a DS-1. You need smooth overdrive and not distortion. You need to play with low gain tones rather than high gain stuff, or use a low gain pedal like the SD-1 overdrive as a tone shaper and something else as a gain booster.

Clean-wise, what's wrong with your pickups? Ignore the distorted tones.

 

[nigellum]

right now the cleans are alright. very glassy. im running my guitar through a Boss OD2 with a mxr zakk wylde boosting the gain during leads.