Wes Borland does not use EMG pickups. He uses the standard PRS Custom 22/24 pickups loaded into his guitars. He never used EMG's on the Ibanez 7 strings either. They were stock passive pickups that Ibanez helped formulate with Wes for his guitars to bring out the harmonics a lot more. He does play Mesa Boogie amps...specifically Triple Recto heads chained in a pair and uses a Dual Recto as a backup. He also uses the Roland JC-120 as the clean amp. He never made his 4 string guitar with his own hands either. That "Nookie" guitar was custom made and is strung with bass string sized guages to accmodate the slap and pop sound of the song.
Tom Morello does the "grounding" lead by unplugging his guitars' jack and grounding it to a metal surface on his guitar. Unless you are playing through a deadbeat electric, your electric will emit a noise when you do this. Provided that you turn up the gain and do a bit of magic with pedals, you can manipulate the frequencies that the grounding action makes. Try it with a whammy or crybaby. Tom Morello uses EMG pickups on his "Arm the Homeless" blue guitar which is made up of a performance guitar body and a kramer neck.
Wedge, to get the ultimate grunt you need the gear. I have always sworn to the fact that you can't sound big using a hondo guitar through a cheesy ass Peavey 1x12 bandit and expect it to sound like a gigantic Mesa through a pair of rectifier cabinets. it is not going to happen. the sound you crave is not going to come from just the guitar. getting a seven string would still need a good amp to sound huge and cut sharp to sound heavy. INVEST IN GOOD GEAR NO MATTER HOW LONG IT TAKES. it always pays off to enjoy great gear than pay less to get immediate gratification. the shake of a good amp using a good guitar will make you happier. trust me.
