EMG has become the defacto 'Brand X' of active guitar pickups. The fact that they impose their own wretched tone on whatever guitar they are installed in, just ruins it for everyone else.

Anyone who has experienced the sounds available to users of piezo bridge pickups knows better, of course, but we are very much in the minority. I'm sure that there are some wonderful active pickups out there, but I don't have any personal experience with them.

Of the 8 guitars I currently own, only two have active pickups. They are my Washburn SBT-21 Tele-styled solid body, which has a Fishman (?) piezo bridge pickup, and my EA20-12B Festival Series 12-string electric/acoustic, which also has some kind of piezo bridge pickup in it.

Of all the guitars I have owned, and subsequently sold, only my Washburn EA20MTS Festival Series 6-string acoustic/electric had an active pickup, again a piezo bridge type. I think that covers a group of about 30 guitars. I think it would be fair to say that I haven't been sufficiently impressed by many active pickup guitars to lay out my hard-earned cash for the purpose of taking one home with me.

I use passive pickups on my solid-body electric guitars. They will do anything I want them to do. The rest is in the hands of my amps, and sometimes a few pedals. I've never felt a need to move any of the amp circuitry into the guitar.

YMMV, as they say.

I've been impressed by some of the sounds that Dr_simon has coaxed out of his new Line 6 Variax. I am horrified by the thought that someone could buy one guitar that could mimic the tone and response of dozens of fine vintage instruments. I am consoled by the fact that the good Doctor's Variax only sounds as good as it does because he is playing it. He has good hands, and they were brought up on good guitars. I believe that a lot of his tone has roots in the fact that he knows what a good guitar should sound like, and he is teaching this to his new computerized gear.

In the hands of a neophyte, these things all sound just like any other undistiguished wannabe. Which suits me just fine. Tone is still in the hands, where it always has been, and ever shall be.