I'm sure a lot of you have already discovered something like this, but for those of you who have not:
Recently, I've been playing around with the Volume knobs on my Gibson LP Studio. I typically am playing metal or rock with a high gain setting, and as you know, playing with a lot of gain comes with pick noises, unwanted string ringing, etc. But I love the sound of heavy gain for the crunchiness and also the sustain. And up until recently, I left the volume and tone knobs on my guitar all the way to 10. But what I just realized is that if I turn my volume knob down to like 5 or 6, and then just turn my amp up a bit more, I still get the benefits of the high gain but I don't hear hardly any pick noises or string ringing anymore. So this really makes it sound cleaner. Of course, I'm still working on cleaning up my playing with my hands, like palm muting and what not. But this realization really makes me sound better. So if you haven't done so already, try different settings on your volume knob on your guitar.
For me, I get the perfect sound for soloing by using my neck pickup on a volume of 6, I have the tone down to 7, and then I just use the preset "metal" tone on my Fender Mustang (practice amp).
Really, for me to notice a difference in sound, I have to either turn my Tone knob all the way up or all the way down, but I just keep it at 7 for good measure haha.
~Rusty